How's the signal strength of the Verizon Galaxy S4?

[wpn00b]

Hey Man Give us Contact Numbers and Email addresses.... we will flood them with calls and emails....I switched from Motorola Razr to Galaxy S4 and I have crappy signal in my house with a metal roof, yes I know the signal gets blocked, but my razr...(which i passed down to my son) still gets 4 bars and 4g while mine and my wife's shiny new Galaxy S4s have the speck and 3g... the signal on these things suk suk suk....
but i love all the cool stuff you can do with them, still without phone signal, it kinda defeats the purpose!!

You can email Samsung from here: Samsung
Or call them here:
1-888-987-HELP(4357)

Honestly, I'm not trying to dump upset customers on them, I just know that it takes forever for us to get the issues fixed at the carrier level when it is clearly a manufacturer issue. Not enough of my peers fill out the necessary forms to have the issues escalated to the phone maker. They assume it is a problem with that particular handset and just send the customer another one. Then they have the same issue with 4 phones and finally it becomes a "known issue".

Email or call the source of the issue and get it addressed. I'll do my part.

 

[brownboy1224]

My son has a Samsung driod charge(cheap) that gets lte all around the living room but my wife on her moto driod m has to hunt for a bar. And my galaxy nexus has to be put in the window seal every time I what lte. The sad truth is its worth the trouble! It doesn't matter how makes it. It's something more than that. Love for all bros and siss.

 

[Travo79]

Just upgraded from a GNex on Verizon to the S4, and I'm loving it. In my house the GNex would usually show 1 or 0 bars of 3g and never a hint of 4g. My S4 gives me 4 bars of 4g with consistent call quality and data. My wife's S3 is exactly the same. I couldnt be happier.

I hope all of you folks having issues get them sorted out.

Posted via Android Central App

 

[bamabun]

no question this phone does not perform as well as the razor maxx i had. i love everything about it, but the radio is simply not as good. its not terrible by any means, just not as good. i love the guys saying they are thrilled coming from dinc2 and gnex!!! of course this phone has better reception, those phones were absolute turds when it came to reception.

 

[tx_tuff]

no question this phone does not perform as well as the razor maxx i had. i love everything about it, but the radio is simply not as good. its not terrible by any means, just not as good. i love the guys saying they are thrilled coming from dinc2 and gnex!!! of course this phone has better reception, those phones were absolute turds when it came to reception.

I have a GNex and love everything but the radio and battery. I so wanted the S4 but I went into the Verizon store and check the radios side by side with my GNex and believe it or not but the GNex was like 3 points better then the S4! That pretty much made up my mind for me. Still rocking the GNex, now waiting for the LG G2 so I can compare it to the Droid Maxx. Pretty sure one of them will be my new phone.



Tapatalk mofo

 

[Travo79]

no question this phone does not perform as well as the razor maxx i had. i love everything about it, but the radio is simply not as good. its not terrible by any means, just not as good. i love the guys saying they are thrilled coming from dinc2 and gnex!!! of course this phone has better reception, those phones were absolute turds when it came to reception.

No doubt about it, when it comes to radios Motorola does it better than any other manufacturer. Talking through a couple of tin cans and string would have been better than the gnex.
Maybe the s4 doesn't have the best radios but for me it is at least consistent and reliable. I have yet to find an area where reception disappointed me.

Posted via Android Central App

 

[chris thomas7]

Ummm signal strength sucks on the s4 ,my wifes moto max will have 4 g when I cant even send a text

 

[Kelly Dyke]

Im in the UK & have a S4 i9505 my plan is 4G, in network settings I had auto connect (4G,3G,2G) based on this i was only getting 1 bar if not no bars everywhere, i was concerned because I thought I had signal issues, however I spoke to Samsung & because I had it on 4G,3G,2G it was seaching for 4G 1st and because 4G is new in my area & low signal that is why I was having the issues, as soon as I changed my network settings to 3G/2G only my signal has improved & working, so for people having poor signal go to network settings & change it to auto connect at 2G/3G if your phone is still having issues it may be the phone, but it fixed my issue. maybe that is why alot of people are having low signal if its on 4G/3G/2G i think Samsung should have made customers aware.

 

[abnimmers]

coming from the Motorola bionic the signal appears to be about the same, though I have noticed that the signal will sometimes switch to 3G for a short time.

 

[Ray Josephs]

Well, after owning this S4 for several months I can honestly say...for many calls I am literally back to saying "can you hear me now" or leaning my head one way or another or, when indoors moving near a window.
I feel this "next best thing" hasn't moved me forward but, at times taken me back to 1998.
*but it sure takes some nice pictures...and isn't that all that matters (rolling eyes)

 

[tx_tuff]

Well, after owning this S4 for several months I can honestly say...for many calls I am literally back to saying "can you hear me now" or leaning my head one way or another or, when indoors moving near a window.
I feel this "next best thing" hasn't moved me forward but, at times taken me back to 1998.
*but it sure takes some nice pictures...and isn't that all that matters (rolling eyes)

This is why I ended up waiting and got the LG G2, radios are great on it!

Sent from my VS980 4G using Tapatalk

 

[MomaDave]

I'm a new VZW GS4 owner and the LTE signal BLOWS compared to my HTC Rezound. Other than that, the phone is great!

 

[Ray Josephs]

This is why I ended up waiting and got the LG G2, radios are great on it!

Sent from my VS980 4G using Tapatalk

And I should have stayed with Motorola...but the Samsung marketing bs got me.

 

[PNUT MnM]

We just got new phones on Monday. Wife got the S4 and I the Note 3. She has had no signal issues and it is drastically better than DROID 4 she had before.

~Sent from my GNote3

 

[Ray Josephs]

This is my third S4, the prior two had different issues and confirmed problems from a Verizon tech.
It was acknowledged to me that Samsung rushed the S4 to market, bugs and all.
Also many bad "batches from China had been shipped"...apparently, different manufacture/assembly locations in China had different levels of quality control.
Non of 'my' hand gestures actually work > don't really care about that but, I just need this S4 to be a 'PHONE' and to make a call everywhere like my prior 6-year old Motorola flip did...without the head tilting or "can u hear me now" bs.

 

[cinnamon16201]

Wow I wish I had read this thread earlier, although I thought I had done enough research. I just got my S4 yesterday and made 2 phone calls to different people. Both claimed that I was breaking up. I blamed the first one on the fact that my daughter was traveling through western NY. But when I called my husband at his hotel room the first thing out of his mouth was that I was breaking up. I was sitting in my living room at home and never, ever had a problem with my Samsung Stratosphere, which the S4 replaced. I have been noticing that I have only had 2 bars most of the time, and my Strat, sitting right beside the S4, has a strong 3 and sometimes 4. I had been deciding between the S4 and the LG G2, but the guy at BB steered me towards the S4, although I had been leaning that way myself. I hate the thought of paying a restock fee to get the LG, but if I'm going to have problems with calls and texts, which is the majority of my use then I don't want to hassle for 2 years with this thing.

 

[Ray Josephs]

^ cinnamon, people got all excited about this "device" because it does so many different things, yet many gimmicky features only work when the stars are aligned properly.
I will say, it has a GREAT camera, so when I can't make a 'call', I can at least take a good picture!
At times,when it comes to making an actually PHONE CALL...I went back in time to 1998, and I find myself saying..."can you here me now" and, going near a window in my home (that's bs)
*My old flip Motorola worked everywhere and I mean EVERYWHERE!
Oh, and if my Comcast home internet/wifi goes out...my S4 won't connect to any wifi signal unless I step outside.
Another year and 4 months with this "Made in China" Junk!
Should have got another Motorola, at least 'making a call' is their priority!

 

[cinnamon16201]

Ray.......I'm really disappointed to read all of this. I do still have until March 28th to decide. I'm almost tempted to just turn it back in and have them reactivate my Strat. Yes, it was squirrely with the "semi Ice Cream Sandwich" update and I got a lot of "force close" errors, but at least it made calls and texts without problems. And the errors only really happened when I swiped it when it was locked and once in a great while on a game.

The one thing that I noticed was that the battery got really warm, almost hot, when it was charging. Could this be causing the problem? I did read there were some battery problems early on. I did get the blue version that was only available at BB and guess that these probably weren't the top sellers, plus being from BB to start with. Maybe the heat is doing something to the antenna?

Also, can anyone tell me how much the restock fee would be if I turned it back in? I paid zero for it (was on sale for $49.99 and I had the $50 cell phone gift card}, but I don't want to pay a percentage fee on the entire value of the phone.

 

[Ray Josephs]

Can't say I notice a heat issue when charging as I don't use it while charging. A Verizon tech did tell me the S4 was rushed to market and some early batches had isdies. Again, this is my 3rd or 4th S4. I know a few owners with issues and others with none.
Personally, I would ditch the phone asap. The ONLY reason I kept mine was the Motorola I wanted wasn't out for a few months and I made Verizon give me a two year warranty on this thing...because I just don't see it lasting that long.

 

[Markctco]

The same, better or worst then the Verizon phone you have now?

I live 1/4 mile from a Verizon tower and my signal strength is -96dBm. Pretty crappy but better than my former S3 which hovered around -110dBm and would drop 4g anytime I walked in a building. Verizon actually gave me an early upgrade to the S4 after I waged war about my S3 telling me that the S4 had better antennas (anteni?) and radio files. The signal strength is better but was hoping for more. At least this one holds 4g in Lowe's and Walmart!
And by the way, the bars you see in the status bar indicate phone signal strength and are completely different than data signal strength, such as 4g, 3g, CDMA, etc. That's your network connectivity which uses a different antenna than the one used to make calls. I've never had an issue with the ability to make or receive calls and the call quality is par for the course. I barely even pay attention to those bars as I'm more concerned with data connectivity which is the most important part of a smart phone, IMHO. Without good connectivity the best features of the "phone" suffer.
Your data signal strength can be found under settings>about phone>status where you'll see signal strength in a grayed out box. A good signal should be around -75 or lower.(the smaller the # the better)
If I had known how crappy the signal was on Samsung's Galaxy line I would have returned my original S3 within the 14 day grace period, but I was slow to figure out what was going on.
And on one last note, if you decide to check data signal strengths on active phones in your local Verizon store, know that every phone will have a great signal as they have signal boosters in all stores. I was surprised to hear a Verizon tech rep tell me that after I did just that and saw that both the display S3 and my S3 had a signal of -68dBm (excellent, BTW!). As soon as I got down the road it was back to -110.
Hope that answers your question