International Note 5 920 I gets better LTE than other devices? - Galaxy Note5 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

I didn't see this brought up - if it has I apologize.
I have an International Unlocked N920I Note 5. Its on Metro PCS and works perfectly. Speeds over 100 MBPS sometimes.
My issue is this. Does an International Phone access more or better LTE Bands? I have tried to use a Nexus 6 and 6P on my service. Both work and get LTE, but speeds drastically slower. I have spent hours with tech support and always end up going back to the Note 5 which immediately works like a speed racer. Only thing I noticed is by default the other phone use Metro APNs and my Note uses epc.tmobile . But I have changed the setting to no avail.
Any ideas?

Well, I owned an iPhone 6 and it has better signals than my N920i on 4G.

cxhugh said:
Well, I owned an iPhone 6 and it has better signals than my N920i on 4G.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So better phone - better signal capture I suppose?

Related

Data speed on H - not as fast as it should be???

So I just bought a galaxy skyrocket for my wife. I'm in an LTE area. It is TEN TIMES FASTER on the skyrocket than the Note. Literally 10x. Used SpeedTest. Averaged 12800 download and 12200 upload. That's faster than my wifi. My note gets 1380 download and 380 upload. Horrendous!
I couldn't believe it. Now I realise why LTE is so good. Of course there aren't many people using LTE yet in NYC but still. That's unreal.
I have continued to test the Note v the Skyrocket and I think its not just LTE. I switched the sim but the lte sim didn't work on the note. However the note sim worked in the skyrocket and it still showed 2-3 x the note speed in a non LTE location. I cant get more than 1800 download when the skytocket shows 7000 in the same location same network. I tried the apn setting from the skyrocket but it doesn't work on the note. On wifi the skyroxket also showed double or more speed. Its very odd.
Anyone got any ideas?
Sent from my GT-N7000 using XDA App
ekerbuddyeker said:
SpeedTest. Averaged 12800 download and 12200 upload. That's father than my wifi. My note gets 1380 download and 380 upload. Horrendous!
I couldn't believe it. Now I realise why LTE is so good. Of course there aren't many people using LTE yet in NYC but still.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am not going to say LTE is slower than HSPA+, because it should not be.
BUT, what I can tell you is HSPA+ can be really fast, and it usually never is a matter of the cellphone, but the network.
My Note, in a random speedtest I did yesterday:
That's pretty much 9Mbps down and 3Mbps.
That reduces a lot the diference to what you can get with LTE.
I would choose for improving a lot HSPA+ networks before starting with LTE...
By the way, during busiest hours of the day I can always get 5-6Mbps down and 2-3Mbps up.
At night, it is easy to see 11+Mbps
My network is Vodafone Spain, which here it is HSPA+ 14.4Mbps. And the tests I make are in Valencia, Spain.
I used to have the T-Mobile Galaxy S2 same hardware as the ATT skyrocket just no LTE.
I use to pull down 16-18Mbps on their 4G network, super fast almost matching my home cable internet.
Unfortunately the Note doesn't support T-Mobile's 4G so I had to switch to AT&T, now on average I get about 1.5-3Mbps, and most I've seen is peak to 7Mbps.
On T-Mobile I paid $20 a month for 5GB of data, now I'm paying AT&T $25 a month for 2GB! Too bad T-Mobile wasn't able to run my note on full data speeds or else I'd never switch.
wierdly side by side with the skyrocket in a Non LTE area the skyrocket still gets double the speed on H. On wifi it does the same.
Sent from my GT-N7000 using XDA App
ekerbuddyeker said:
wierdly side by side with the skyrocket in a Non LTE area the skyrocket still gets double the speed on H. On wifi it does the same.
Sent from my GT-N7000 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Speed on a smartphone literally means squat. Those super fast speeds on the ****rocket are almost never utilized because of its crappy Snapdragon chipset.
The speed advantage that LTE phones have is almost never seen when browsing or anything because the Snapdragon is a piece of trash chipset. It's laggy, unreliable, but its the only chipset that works on LTE phones.
Thats why Im NEVER buying an LTE ****phone till they find a SoC that can outperform the 1.4ghz Exynos and put it in an LTE phone.That won't happen for a long long time. 12 months min.
Sent from my GT-N7000 using xda premium
@ eker - it must be your APN - i get about 3-3.5k down and 1.2k up
but I also get a MUCH better reception than my inspire 4g (in same spots that inspire barely got any reception, I get 2-3+ bars, and the whole thing just seems faster. I used standard APN settings - same as I used on my Inspire.
I'm in Boston area - and we got this retard heaven - Brookline, where they banned cell tower - so I used to not get any reception in many spots - now I do, and it's somewhat faster (internet speed that is) - in youtube for example
That's a lot of anger. Its just a phone... anyway in side by side tests with the note, loading web pages running maps or Google earth... actually every app, the phone speed is about the same. Have you actually tied the skyrocket????
I am happy with the note but trying to figure out why, in non LTE and side by side in wifi, the skyrocket is still significantly faster than the note. It feels a generation faster which is weird.
xAnimal5 said:
Speed on a smartphone literally means squat. Those super fast speeds on the ****rocket are almost never utilized because of its crappy Snapdragon chipset.
The speed advantage that LTE phones have is almost never seen when browsing or anything because the Snapdragon is a piece of trash chipset. It's laggy, unreliable, but its the only chipset that works on LTE phones.
Thats why Im NEVER buying an LTE ****phone till they find a SoC that can outperform the 1.4ghz Exynos and put it in an LTE phone.That won't happen for a long long time. 12 months min.
Sent from my GT-N7000 using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sent from my GT-N7000 using XDA App
Slow speeds?
On at&t. I know they have a huge r&d operation in Israel but not Dubai
Sent from my GT-N7000 using XDA App

Any reason to get an AT&T Note 3 over T-Mobile?

I'm thinking about picking up a used Note 3 to use on my AT&T account. Is there any reason to get an AT&T branded note over T-Mobile branded?
I can SIM unlock the T-Mobile, but would have to deal with locked bootloaders with AT&T. All the supported bands are there using the T-Mobile on AT&T, right?
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Tapatalk
I used the T-Mobile Note 3 for a while. I unlocked it using Chanfire's app. When using my AT&T sim card in it, I found the LTE to be horrible, despite supporting band 17 (700mhz) In places where I had average LTE on the iPhone, the TMO N3 would be on H+ or have the worst LTE signal. This was frustrating. I took it back. It was fun to flash roms and kernels though.
I got an awesome deal on a new AT&T note 3 where I couldn't pass it up haha. At first I noticed my AT&T LTE signal was not as good as it should be. I then created a thread about it. I cleared the cache in my phone and did a full factory reset. Now my LTE seems fine. Constantly sitting on -93db on my desk where my iPhone gets the same.
I'm pretty happy now with my AT&T Note 3. Rooting was so easy and gives me everything a custom rom would.
Yep, the LTE (band 17) on my N900T is horrible. My neighbor has N900A and we compared them side by side (with punching *#0011# and monitoring signal on both devices) and my N900T was always showing signal that was ~15db lower than the N900A. Gonna sell it. Will wait for Xperia Z2.
I agree completely with Matt and bormasina.
I just sold my N900T and bought a N900A and have noticed a dramatic improving, specifically in LTE bandwidth.
Hands down, the AT&T version performs better on an AT&T network. Go figure.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N900A using XDA Premium 4 mobile app
Yeah. Is it a coincidence that the ATT version perms better on the network it designed for? I'm sure ATT optimizes their signals in their phones for the proper frequencies.
I'm actually sitting in a place where my N900T would sit on a -105dbm signal and right now my N900A has been locked on a solid -89dbm. Night and day difference.
Go with the At&T version. The T-Mobile version is fine though if your on their network. But AWS still does suck in general when it comes to signal strength.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N900A using Tapatalk
please continue this here...http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2466099

T-Mobile LTE signal

I just got the phone on Monday. With the original ROM and after taking several OTA updates, my LTE signal strength at home and at work was horrible. I'd get around -120 dBm and it would frequently change to HSPA and even EVDO.
One thing that I noticed is that on LTE, it was using band 4, which is 2100 MHz. On my Note 2, it always used band 14, which is 700 MHz. The lower frequency penetrates buildings better and gave me a better signal at work and home (not great, but useable).
I just updated to the latest T-Mobile ROM from the developer site. The LTE signal strength is a bit better at -116 dBm and so far, it isn't changing to HSPA or worse. However, it is still using band 4.
Does anyone know why my old phone used band 14 and this new phone uses band 4? I would think that the phone would use whichever band gave it the best signal, which would certainly be band 14. Is there any way to force this?
Thanks.
I didn't look up the Note 2's specs but I'd guess it didn't have band 4. What are you using to see your band? OpenSignal?
Powell730 said:
I didn't look up the Note 2's specs but I'd guess it didn't have band 4. What are you using to see your band? OpenSignal?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I just looked up the specs on Wikipedia. It says that the T-Mobile version uses band 17, but I know that the phone said band 14 before I swapped SIMs.
Wikipedia says the Nexus 6 uses bands 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 7 / 12 / 13 / 17 / 25 / 26 / 29 / 41.
This is from the T-Mobile Support site: "TMO uses bands 2 and 4 on LTE/4G & 3G". Also from Support: "LTE band 4(1700/2100), 17(700)". I'm not sure what to believe, or what is in use around here. Like I said above, I know that the Note 2 said it was using band 14.
On the Nexus 6, I'm using an app called LTE Discovery.
T mobile only uses band 2,4,12 for LTE. The note 2 doesn't support band 12. I never heard of band 14.
Sent from my Nexus 6 using Tapatalk
mojoehand said:
I just looked up the specs on Wikipedia. It says that the T-Mobile version uses band 17, but I know that the phone said band 14 before I swapped SIMs.
Wikipedia says the Nexus 6 uses bands 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 7 / 12 / 13 / 17 / 25 / 26 / 29 / 41.
This is from the T-Mobile Support site: "TMO uses bands 2 and 4 on LTE/4G & 3G". Also from Support: "LTE band 4(1700/2100), 17(700)". I'm not sure what to believe, or what is in use around here. Like I said above, I know that the Note 2 said it was using band 14.
On the Nexus 6, I'm using an app called LTE Discovery.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm by no means an expert when it comes to bands/frequencies, however, if the app told you the Note 2 was on band 14, I think it was lying to you. I'm pretty sure there isn't even a band 14 in the U.S., and almost positive T-Mobile does not run LTE on that band.
When (if) band 12 reaches your neighborhood receiption indoors should improve drastically. On band 4 I usually get -109 to -101 dBm. On band 12 I get around -89 to -94 dBm.
I have tried different ROMs and different radio modems. Nothing I do gets me a decent signal. Very occasionally I have had a moderately strong LTE signal, but even then, the download speed is only usable and the upload speed sucks.
The phone doesn't stay on LTE for long. It switched to HSPA and even EVDO most of the time. On HSPA, my old Note 2 got at least 2 Mb downloads. This N6 can't even get a kilobyte down on HSPA.
I don't know if it really affects things, but I read some comments that a bad SIM could possibly cause this. Is this true? If so, I'll drop by the T-Mobile store again and ask them to try another SIM.
I love the phone for the big screen and other features, but I really can't live with this lousy data connection. If I can't get this resolved, I'll have to return the N6 and buy another phone.
I might consider a Note 5 if I have to. It only has a 5.7 inch screen, but my Note 2 had a 5.5 incher. I don't really use the pen and the price premium is high, but I don't know what other phones have a 5.7-6 inch display, except for some Chinese phones. I don't know if they are any good, or if I could use them on T-Mobile.
Call me frustrated.
have you verified apn settings? mine needed a few changes. band 12 should be rolling out soon. i saw it for a day here in portland and service was amazing. can't wait!
nigelorion said:
have you verified apn settings? mine needed a few changes. band 12 should be rolling out soon. i saw it for a day here in portland and service was amazing. can't wait!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Anyway to see where band 12 is going live?
Sent from my SM-G920T using Tapatalk
Powell730 said:
Anyway to see where band 12 is going live?
Sent from my SM-G920T using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
not sure. saw a few people on reddit mentioning they had seen it in my area. i have been using an app called lte discovery to check what band i am on. 12 only popped up once and haven't seen it since.
mojoehand said:
I have tried different ROMs and different radio modems. Nothing I do gets me a decent signal. Very occasionally I have had a moderately strong LTE signal, but even then, the download speed is only usable and the upload speed sucks.
The phone doesn't stay on LTE for long. It switched to HSPA and even EVDO most of the time. On HSPA, my old Note 2 got at least 2 Mb downloads. This N6 can't even get a kilobyte down on HSPA.
I don't know if it really affects things, but I read some comments that a bad SIM could possibly cause this. Is this true? If so, I'll drop by the T-Mobile store again and ask them to try another SIM.
I love the phone for the big screen and other features, but I really can't live with this lousy data connection. If I can't get this resolved, I'll have to return the N6 and buy another phone.
I might consider a Note 5 if I have to. It only has a 5.7 inch screen, but my Note 2 had a 5.5 incher. I don't really use the pen and the price premium is high, but I don't know what other phones have a 5.7-6 inch display, except for some Chinese phones. I don't know if they are any good, or if I could use them on T-Mobile.
Call me frustrated.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you sure that you're on T-Mobile? EVDO is CDMA network and T-Mobile is GSM...
Sent from my Nexus 6 using Tapatalk
BigDig said:
Are you sure that you're on T-Mobile? EVDO is CDMA network and T-Mobile is GSM...
Sent from my Nexus 6 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, I am on T-Mobile. I meant Edge, not EVDO. Too many acronyms.
I just got home and even though the phone is currently showing three bars on LTE, the signal level is only -118 dBm, which isn't good. Speed test won't even do 1/2 Mb/s on download. This is pathetic.
As much as I otherwise like this phone, I can't live with this lousy signal issue. Unless someone knows of a fix, I will have to return the phone to Amazon. As I said, I have tried different ROMS and modems. I have also tried changing various settings that others have suggested (clearing cache, APN settings, etc.). I don't know what else to do.
mojoehand said:
Yes, I am on T-Mobile. I meant Edge, not EVDO. Too many acronyms.
I just got home and even though the phone is currently showing three bars on LTE, the signal level is only -118 dBm, which isn't good. Speed test won't even do 1/2 Mb/s on download. This is pathetic.
As much as I otherwise like this phone, I can't live with this lousy signal issue. Unless someone knows of a fix, I will have to return the phone to Amazon. As I said, I have tried different ROMS and modems. I have also tried changing various settings that others have suggested (clearing cache, APN settings, etc.). I don't know what else to do.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you tried calling tmobile and trouble shooting with them?
Andromendous said:
Have you tried calling tmobile and trouble shooting with them?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, I've been to the store.
mojoehand said:
Yes, I've been to the store.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Call and speak to tech support. Most people in the store don't know what there doing.
Sent from my Nexus 6 using XDA Free mobile app
mojoehand said:
Yes, I've been to the store.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Or chat with t force on twitter. I have had great success with them. They're awesome.
Sent from my SM-G920T using Tapatalk
Because of the choppy voice calls, as well as the lousy data connection, I am returning this phone and getting a Note 5. Although it is my personal phone, I also need a reliable phone for when I am on call at work.
I have spent all week on this and can't waste any more time. I need something that works. My Note 2 was reliable. I hope the Note 5 will be also.
Thanks to all for suggestions.
I too am having LTE data connection issues on LYZ28K. Anyone on LMY48M having data issues? I tried setting phone info to "LTE only", but that didn't help. I don't need wifi calling, so I'm wondering if I should switch to LMY48M?

Nexus 6 Internet slow

I have sat in the same spot and done numerous speed tests on my nexus 6 (pure nexus rom), my wife's nexus 6, and they are both around 4mb down 2mb up.. I put my Sim card in my nexus 4, nexus 5, g2, or s4 and they get 28mb down 32mb up.. in the same spot.. nexus 6 both were -100 and -93 dBm the other devices were -115 and -100, but had better speeds..
What's wrong with the nexus 6 radio?
Anyone else encountering this?
In some areas out on town they get roughly the same.. within a mb or 2.. but most areas I'm at the nexus 6 performs horribly compared to the s4 or nexus 4
I'm on tmobile.. unlimited, no throttle, using same Sim card between devices
using same ROM and its slow, yeah
same here.. just seems on IG or reddit, it just "hangs" loading a pic or comments thread ..
Similar stuff happens with my Nexus 6, however after the new radio (.34R) things have gotten better.
The radio is included in the Android N DP and in the new MOB30D build.
on pure nexus rom as well, not a single issue with data speeds, 54mbps download, 27mbps upload.. problem is probably your provider, your location, or your apn being used.
Are you talking about on wifi or cellular? If it's wifi, it may be IPv6 related
OK, I flashed the newest radio and now my nexus 6 speeds are where they should be. Was on *5.14R previously.. Now flashed 5.34R..
Edit.. well that lasted for 1 day.. speeds back to 6mbps.. put same sim in my s4.. 38mbps..
Maybe ill flash older radio and back to new again see what happens..
OK, seems that my s4, nexus4, nexus5 all are connecting to LTE band 4 and getting 80+MBps down 30+MBps up in this area right now if I put my sim in nexus 6 it will go to band 4 for a few minutes and get same speeds, but it will always switch to band 12 and only gets 5-7MBps down, 0.5-2MBps up..
I tried LTE engineering menu to set priority of bands but only 12, 25,26,and 41 are listed.. Band 12 is enabled, 25,26,and 41 are disabled.
How can I sent priority to band 4?
I found a temporary fix, flashed 03R modem (I think the original modem) which only wanted to connect to edge by default, went into *#*#4636#*#* and switched to LTE only.. This connects to band 4.. I don't think a voice call will work on LTE only though.. And if I go to an area where band 12 is better I have to flash radios again I believe.

Network Connectivity

I have a Samsung Galaxy Note 8 unlocked that used to have LTE coverage in my area after an update to Android 8.0 all sudden all I can get is 3 G. Although at the same time my old Nexus 6 gets LTE coverage easy all the time. What happened question mark why doesn't my Note 8 get LTE coverage like it once did? How do I get it back to LTE?
Liftkit said:
I have a Samsung Galaxy Note 8 unlocked that used to have LTE coverage in my area after an update to Android 8.0 all sudden all I can get is 3 G. Although at the same time my old Nexus 6 gets LTE coverage easy all the time. What happened question mark why doesn't my Note 8 get LTE coverage like it once did? How do I get it back to LTE?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Use this app and check what network are you using, you can change them to search the best signal
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=www.extremedroid.com.a4gltetoolkit&hl=es

Categories

Resources