G2X Review (Network issues - Wait for Android 2.3)

[Droid800]

Bionic = Later

It just sucks. The G2X was my PERFECT android device. Fantastic hardware, great IPS screen, dual-core. And it was all let down by the network. If I knew I was going to be by a city when I get a full time job I would have no qualms dealing with it for now, but I don't know for sure.

I really contemplated just swallowing the problems for now, but I couldn't. I'm really disappointed with this. Now the question becomes: trade in my Thunderbolt for a Charge whenever it is released, or go back to my Droid X and just wait it out until the Bionic is released. Or, I could do the dreaded thing and get a Motorola Atrix on AT&T...

 

[Droid800]

Whoa! Change of situation!

Just checked t-mobile's coverage map (and gave customer service a quick call), and T-mobile is in the process of bringing a new tower online in my area that should shore up coverage. I tried checking this last night, but their coverage locator kept spitting out an error. That changes everything. I know right now there is only two towers running t-mobile for my town of 150,000. (hence the problems.) I'm actually sort of shocked the rep at the store wasn't aware of this expansion.

Needless to say, I'm irritated now. Customer service apologize profusely and said I can go back into the store and do a win-back tomorrow if I want.

Not sure I will though. I think I'll stick with Verizon for now, and start saving my pennies for paying full price on the Bionic when it eventually comes out.

 

[going_home]

The Rubber Meets The Road

Well I got to test the 2nd G2X today at my workplace.
Same result as the 1st one.
Tomorrow would be the 14th day so I returned it today for a refund.
I did not want to return it in the worst way but the reality of it is
this phone has the worst reception of any phone I've tried at my
work location.

Back to the MyTouch 4G again which works great as a wifi hotspot
in the metal building where I work.
The MT4G is supposed to get Gingerbread soon I've been hearing.

Now who needs a couple protective cases for a G2X ?

:'(

 

[Kevin OQuinn]

Whoa! Change of situation!

Just checked t-mobile's coverage map (and gave customer service a quick call), and T-mobile is in the process of bringing a new tower online in my area that should shore up coverage. I tried checking this last night, but their coverage locator kept spitting out an error. That changes everything. I know right now there is only two towers running t-mobile for my town of 150,000. (hence the problems.) I'm actually sort of shocked the rep at the store wasn't aware of this expansion.

Needless to say, I'm irritated now. Customer service apologize profusely and said I can go back into the store and do a win-back tomorrow if I want.

Not sure I will though. I think I'll stick with Verizon for now, and start saving my pennies for paying full price on the Bionic when it eventually comes out.

How far along are they in that process, though? It can take quite a while to get through all the hoops to put up a tower.

 

[Droid800]

How far along are they in that process, though? It can take quite a while to get through all the hoops to put up a tower.

I've no idea. They wouldn't tell me that, they just said that there was a new one in the area. As much as I love the G2X, though, I've decided to stick with Verizon and LTE for now. I can always ebay the Charge if there's a dual-core phone I want.

 

[Droid800]

Verizon is really trying my patience with their continued delay bull****. I'm really contemplating just returning the Thunderbolt and either going back to the G2X and dealing with the network issues for now, or waiting for the Infuse on AT&T. (I'm in one of the upgraded backhaul zones, so I'd get 21 mbps HSPA+)

 

[ROne21]

I would love to see screenshots of these slower speeds. I'm getting faster speeds on the G2X compared to the myTouch 4G.

same here ....

 

[foreveronend]

Honestly I have to agree with many of the comments. however I am pretty certain that the g2x was optimized to be able to handle the up and coming operating systems (like g-slate running 3.0). if you have an old sim card tho, i have personally found that this does drastically effect speeds regardless of whether you find the 4g symbols coming up, compared to the mytouch and galaxy s the g2x pushes much faster speeds. the thing that bothers me thus far about the phone is in regards to the difficulty to root and lack of 2.3 which is necessary for many apps to run well (especially lack of netflix, which despite rooting and changing the build.prop name will not even open on my g2x with 2.2) I'm waiting on a solid CM7 2.3 rom because I don't like dealing with the CM7 nightly bugs. Currently I've switched back to my hd2 waiting for the 2.3 os to come out. If anyone has any tips for this situation please let me know.

 

[wezra]

I am on my second G2x... the first one had major software issues. It kept rebooting and would shut itself off with only a battery pull able to get it restarted. My new one is operating perfectly. Am in Atlanta and the 4G icon is always on; the browser is super fast and I have no issues with Wi-Fi or my Exchange or personal email accounts.

I to had the myTouch 4G and felt T-Mobile has simply let it fall by the wayside. That phone should have had Gingerbread some time ago. The 4G was a good phone.. but not a great phone.

I have gone to the same T-Mobile Company store for many years now and know all the guys that work there. When upgrading to the G2x I asked them about Gingerbread and they (all 3 of them) told me I would absolutely love it when it hit the phone. From what they told me it makes a huge difference in the performance of the phone as it takes true advantage of the dual-core technology. That said, 2.2.2 seems to work pretty darn well as it is.

As for the design of the phone.. it is the largest phone I have ever had, so it is taking a bit to get used to the size. But the quality is top notch and the feel of the phone is excellent as well.

 

[Kevin OQuinn]

Rooting is extremely easy. Superoneclick and you're done.

Flashing clockwork is more involved but isn't difficult.

I am also waiting for a stable build of CM7 so I can't help with netflix.

Gingerbread will make a difference but Ice Cream Sandwich will be the real performance boost for us dual core owners.

Sent from my G2X

 

[anthonylokrn]

After purchasing a HTC EVO at launch and owning it for a year, I don't think I will ever purchase another HTC product again. The QC on the phone was horrible, if I could recall, HTC used 4 different screens throughout the first year. Dealed with hotspots, light leakage, screen separation, dust under screen, loose charging port, and ill-fitted back cover that squeaks.

The ONLY thing I miss from the Evo is the led notification. All that and I HATE HTC Sense...ran CM6/CM7 throughout the nightlies. Reception was good/great, never dropped calls, but 3G was slow and 4G/WiMax was pathetic.

Not trying to do a review on the G2X/EVO, just saying that I'm avoiding all HTC products including the Sensation.

Now the only gripe I have on the G2X is the light leakage and the lack of a led notification. Eventually the OTA updates will fix the software bugs...or just wait for a stable version of CM7.

 

[rizzman]

I'm having issues with the phone too, and I also compared data speeds
with the MyTouch 4G while wifi hotspotting at my workplace.
The laptop was real snappy with the MT4G internet,
but slow, laggy. or no signal at all with the G2X.

I'm on my second G2X and have yet to see the 3G icon, on either phone for that matter.
Its either 2G or 4G and is always UMTS, even though this area is 21mbps 4G.
Monday I'm going to try wifi hotspotting it again with this replacement phone
but I'm not having too much confidence anything will change.

If its the same result the phones going back for a refund and I'll wait for the Sensation.
Maybe HTC will have their phone ready for prime time.

:'(

Funny..I did not notice the 4g to 2g w/o 3g bit till you mentioned it and saw it firsthand. Now you are making me second guess this purchase.

 

[rizzman]

Rooting is extremely easy. Superoneclick and you're done.

Flashing clockwork is more involved but isn't difficult.

I am also waiting for a stable build of CM7 so I can't help with netflix.

Gingerbread will make a difference but Ice Cream Sandwich will be the real performance boost for us dual core owners.

Sent from my G2X

Lets hope so...

 

[Kevin OQuinn]

Funny..I did not notice the 4g to 2g w/o 3g bit till you mentioned it and saw it firsthand. Now you are making me second guess this purchase.

It connects to non-HSPA+ 3G just fine. It just doesn't report properly in the notification area.

Sent from my LG-P999 using Tapatalk

 

[Droid800]

Funny..I did not notice the 4g to 2g w/o 3g bit till you mentioned it and saw it firsthand. Now you are making me second guess this purchase.

Android does not have the capability to report HSDPA as 3G and HSPA+ as 4G. It will only report 4G or 3G, but not both because for t-mobile, they're the same thing. That's because t-mobile's '4G' is really just supercharged 3G. That may change eventually, but for now it goes 4G -> 2G -> G.

 

[bart151]

How ironic, I just got my Sensation yesterday and already considering taking it back and swaping it for either a replacement sensation or the G2x. The speeds on my Sensation feel slower then 56k... and its constant 4g mode with the occassional notch down to 2g.

 

[thebizz]

I'm very happy with this purchase its a very fast phone battery life is equivalent to what I got with my dinc2 which had good battery life. The camera isn't the best but when I used the LG camera software it took great photos. My only gripes with this phone is slow handoff between edge and hspa and slight light leakage which can only bee seen on a black screen in a dark room

 

[rizzman]

Dying to root mine to get rid of the bloatware on the device but am a bit scared to do it. Do not want to mess up my device especially since I am not having any of the common reported problmes that seem to be plaguing some G2X's out there.

 

[20blks]

How ironic, I just got my Sensation yesterday and already considering taking it back and swaping it for either a replacement sensation or the G2x. The speeds on my Sensation feel slower then 56k... and its constant 4g mode with the occassional notch down to 2g.

If you are going from 4g to 2g in roughly the same area, it's most likely a weak 4g area. That would explain the slow speeds. I live in Dallas and when I have a strong 4g signal, my download speeds are blazing fast

 

[cordsig79]

only way my G2X works for 4 hours.

Plugged in at home on wifi.
Plugged in at the car on 4G if on a major highway. traveling on the road it shows G......outside of downtown Austin 2G and spotty 4G.
Plugged in at work on 2G with 1-2 bars. Wifi is blocked for non work related....Im on the 5th floor too, still no 4G.

Battery life fail
Network fail.

I just check FB.........and use the maps once or twice a week with GPS off the rest of the time.......I got the phone the end of May and average less than an hour of talk time and I probably use less than 1G of data every month....

Fail.

I upgraded from an 8100 BB Pearl and had the 49.99 customer loyalty plan since I had surpassed my original 2 year contract and stayed month to month with no contract.

I stayed optimistic but Tmobile and LG failed.

I work in a major software company and we only release enterprise tried and true products.

If there is an issue, its addressed and actively worked with our customers until satisfaction arrives or we are proactively making it right.