Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
I just got off the phone for the 2nd time today with VZW tech support. They have been great since I first opened a ticket with them on July 11th. I have been having horrible signal strength/quality issues since receiving it on the 9th. I was also having trouble with the 4g-3g handoff. I did get a new SIM as suggested and that issue seems to have gotten slightly better. At our house we now get 1 bar of signal and have to use WiFi for any apps or surfing. Our Droid X's always had full 3g signal.We were also away this past weekend and we had 1x (along with quickly dying batteries) while our family members had full 3g on their Droid2 and BB on VZW. My wife is also having similar issues with her SGS3.
When I opened up the ticket I was the first to call in with this issue. Now, 2 weeks later, they are "seeing massive issues with this" and the majority of the calls they are receiving are about that. The support agent said they are working closely and quickly with Samsung on an MR update help with the problem. They are also getting a lot of calls about the WiFi bug where it keeps asking you to use WiFi even though you have those settings turned off. They offered to send me a replacement today but they don't have any to send as they are out of stock. They had also offered to waive the re-stock fee for both of phones if we decided to get different phones while we were in the 14 day period but that ended on Monday. Amazingly they will now still give us a few more days to use that option if we decide since the notes were made on our account during the period. It actually seemed to me that the support agent was pushing for me to go that route - specifically the RAZR MAXX. In fact, when I went into my local store for the SIM swap the agent said "you should have just got a RAZR MAXX". Believe me, the MAXX is awesome but after seeing the 2 screens next to each other it makes me want to stay with the S3. Not sure what to do.
Make sure that if you are having similar issues with your VZW SGS3 that you call into VZW tech support and haven them open a support ticket.
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
Me personally, I'm going to give Samsung and Verizon a chance to work out the bugs and put out a software update that likely will fix these issues. If not, I'll be stuck with this phone until something better comes out and I'll be paying full price for it.
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
Sorry to hear your having problems. My phone works great, no issues, great connection, no annoying pop-ups.
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
I've noticed some pretty bad signal strenght at my house as well. Prior to this my wife and I were using an iPhone4 and Droid Incredible. Both did pretty well. The Galaxy S3 though is definitely worse. We both have S3's now and both phones have a signal strenght issue, so hopefully they'll have a software fix for it.
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
Oh wells, there goes my thoughts to drop my sh$tty Bionic for the SG3. 3G/4G VZW signal handoffs suck on the Bionic, so I was wondering if this same issue is on the SG3.
Guess that makes my decision easy and VZW out of $600 of my money. LMAO idiots... Rolling out all these 4G signals means sh!t if it don't work :mad:
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
Yeah, like the others, I'm going to wait for Verizon to get updates or work out the bugs. If it still continues like this, then I'll have to reconsider.
Nothing will be perfect straight from factory.
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
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They are also getting a lot of calls about the WiFi bug where it keeps asking you to use WiFi even though you have those settings turned off. They offered to send me a replacement today but they don't have any to send as they are out of stock. In fact, when I went into my local store for the SIM swap the agent said "you should have just got a RAZR MAXX". Believe me, the MAXX is awesome but after seeing the 2 screens next to each other it makes me want to stay with the S3.
If you have not tried the following for the WiFi message you might want to give it a try. It seems to have worked for me.
[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]
Have to wonder if there are some incentives or a higher commission for selling the RAZR MAXX. Hmmmm..
Personally, I did not even have the RAZR MAXX on my shopping list after owning a Moto Droid X for the last two years. Not a terrible device hardware wise but the OS updates and how Moto & Verizon handled the problems the updates created were a PITA that I wanted to try to avoid this time around.
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
I don't get the wifi pop-ups, but the signal strength has me concerned. In most areas it is ok. I live 3.17 miles from a tower. Monday night I was on a call and the other person wasn't able to hear me. The call didn't drop but I couldn't hear them and they couldn't hear me. Disconnected the call and went outside to call them back, since I was inside in my living room. Once outside, I was only getting 3g data and I live in a strong 4g area. Made the call again and while talking outside, it happened again. I had to move around to find a spot where we could hear each other. Oddly enough, Wednesday morning I made a call from my basement, spent probably a minute or two on the call and there was no issues. I was told at the Verizon store, the next time it happens, to dial *111 after the call and after it has happened a couple times, to come back into the store so their techs can track it.
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
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I was told at the Verizon store, the next time it happens, to dial *111 after the call and after it has happened a couple times, to come back into the store so their techs can track it.
I'll have to remember that. Thanks.
I figure, the more people that contact Verizon about this, the quicker a fix will be found.
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
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Me personally, I'm going to give Samsung and Verizon a chance to work out the bugs and put out a software update that likely will fix these issues. If not, I'll be stuck with this phone until something better comes out and I'll be paying full price for it.
I wouldn't hold your breath. I thought the same thing when I was waiting on the software fix for my Galaxy Nexus, and the updates didn't fix a damn thing in terms of signal/reception/handoff.
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
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If you have not tried the following for the WiFi message you might want to give it a try. It seems to have worked for me.
[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]
Have to wonder if there are some incentives or a higher commission for selling the RAZR MAXX. Hmmmm..
Personally, I did not even have the RAZR MAXX on my shopping list after owning a Moto Droid X for the last two years. Not a terrible device hardware wise but the OS updates and how Moto & Verizon handled the problems the updates created were a PITA that I wanted to try to avoid this time around.
The WiFi alert edit helped out - thanks for sharing that link!
I think the MAXX has been their hottest selling phone and it is obviously their least subsidized phone so I would imagine they are making a little more commission on them.
I am going to stick with the S3... I love the size and the screen too much. Hopefully they will update it quickly but I am not holding my breath. Swapping the SIM cards definitely helped out with the 3g/4g issue and my signal seems slightly more consistent. I will get my wife's SIM swapped tomorrow. Our S3's came shipped in the same box and it almost feels like the SIM's were messed up! One of my co-workers got his the same day and he is not seeing the same issues with signal.
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
I received my phone via FedEx on the 12th. I had a number of drop outs over the first few days. I went to the Verizon store and had one in the store.
They gave me a new phone and other than battery limits I could not be happier. Reception is fine with the new unit.
Unfortunately I could not compare software build numbers.
Keep the faith. The phone is a keeper once they get a couple of things tweaked and somebody brings out a big hulking Thunderbolt battery for the S3. :)
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
yep me too, super psyched on this phone although i have noticed a drop in signal ability in my home area in colorado. I use to solve this by *228 but now that its a 4g phone it guess it automatically does this....to poor performance :(
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
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yep me too, super psyched on this phone although i have noticed a drop in signal ability in my home area in colorado. I use to solve this by *228 but now that its a 4g phone it guess it automatically does this....to poor performance :(
I heard from tech support that with 4g phones you can just "restart" the phone and it automatically does a so called *228.
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
I was on my 14th day with the S3 and had to make a decision.
Every morning after unplugging from a night of charging I would lose data service (no 4G, 3G, or 1X). Rebooting was the only way to get service back. Once I did that the phone was fine all day. For whatever reason a long sleep caused it to lose service.
I spoke with VZ twice and Samsung once and neither were able to help. The best they could suggest was a new sim card....had already tried that.
Aside from that the phone has been great.
I went into the store and explained the situation and one salesperson wanted to replace it immediately while another was trying everything not to??? (not sure why). She was saying it was my apps, sim card settings, or it needed a master reset (she was determined not to replace the phone). I told her I didn't want a new phone, I just wanted a phone that worked by the time I left the store. Long story short, we did a master reset (which cleared all apps) and replaced the sim card. Here's where it gets a little funny, the phone quit working altogether.....no service of any kind (no matter what she tried). After a while a manager came by and the other salesperson explained everything that happened to the manager. The manager looked at the computer and said this guy is a long time customer with multiple lines, why didn't we just replace the phone?
He's been here an hour already.....take care of him.
The other salesperson activated a new phone and sent me on my way. Woke up this morning with 3 bars of 4G service :)
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
How long have you been with Verizon to be considered a "long time customer"
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
About 11 years, 4 lines (I have my Mother & Father on my account).
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How long have you been with Verizon to be considered a "long time customer"
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
I'm having the same issues here in Nashville. Calls get dropped. Also audio is phasing in and out. I've been to the Verizon store twice and called tech support. I'm a biz customer, so I have 30 days to return the phone--which I don't want to. Everything works great, except for phone calls. It is a phone, right?
Tech support tells me that they are getting a lot of calls about this issue, so they expect for Samsung to do a software update that will eliminate the issue--hopefully soon. I never had this problem with my Droid X. It was amazing. Usually had 5 bars at my house--and never had a dropped call in 2 years. The tech rep at the Verizon store asked me to do *228. I plan on doing that tonight when I get home.
We need to keep the pressure up to get the software update implemented.
Re: Galaxy S3 signal issue and Verizon support
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I'm having the same issues here in Nashville. Calls get dropped. Also audio is phasing in and out. I've been to the Verizon store twice and called tech support. I'm a biz customer, so I have 30 days to return the phone--which I don't want to. Everything works great, except for phone calls. It is a phone, right?
Tech support tells me that they are getting a lot of calls about this issue, so they expect for Samsung to do a software update that will eliminate the issue--hopefully soon. I never had this problem with my Droid X. It was amazing. Usually had 5 bars at my house--and never had a dropped call in 2 years. The tech rep at the Verizon store asked me to do *228. I plan on doing that tonight when I get home.
We need to keep the pressure up to get the software update implemented.
That won't work with a 4G phone.
