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

[Jaycemiskel]

I'm glad I came from a Galaxy Nexus, it only got better lol.

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[cadjak]

If you want to use your phone as a phone, I suggest locking 4G out. I don't believe the reception problem lies with the radios in the Samsung. I believe it is the way the power is allocated to the various antenna signals being amplified in the phone. In my opinion (and that's all it is), the Samsung Galaxy S3, only has so much battery power available to it. The screen and the FIVE antennae are all competing for the limited power the battery can deliver. Samsung chose to go for an ultra thin profile rather than using a more powerful, and thicker, battery. By "powerful" I don't mean increased mAh. I mean one that can handle a larger current draw. The phone's reception will drop out when the signal strength is less than optimum, and the phone needs to use more power to boost the antenna signal to make use of that weaker signal. It reaches a point where the phone just doesn't have enough power to do that successfully. All of this comes from trying to understand why calls in my S3 were breaking up, or being dropped entirely. When I boosted the power to the G3 antenna in my S3, the signal strength rocketed up.

 

[Dreamliner330]

When I boosted the power to the G3 antenna in my S3, the signal strength rocketed up.

How?

 

[cadjak]

How?

Wilson Dual Band Mobile Wireless Cell Phone Signal Booster.

 

[Dreamliner330]

Wilson Dual Band Mobile Wireless Cell Phone Signal Booster.

Oh I see. It seemed like you found an internal solution to the S3 signal defect.

 

[cadjak]

Oh I see. It seemed like you found an internal solution to the S3 signal defect.

It's half a solution. I live in an area where 4G/LTE is only partially built out. When I bought the S3, to replace my Droid X, there were a lot of places that I could no longer make calls, reliably. The S3 signal kept shifting back and forth beween LTE, eHRPD, EvDO_A, 1xRTT. Even without the Wilson Booster, I improved my ability to make and receive voice calls, by shutting down the LTE on my S3. Apparently that is a violation of some Google "rule", even though there are apps on Google Play that claim to do it. A popular app for closing off LTE on Samsung Galaxy phones, last year, was called Phoneinfo. It was pulled from Google Play and there were reports that users were not able to restore LTE on their phones after using it. :-( What made me start thinking that it was a power allocation problem was when I used the Wilson Amp on the S3, when I had LTE disabled. In an area where the Droid X could typically get -65 dBm with the amp,(which is pretty darn good), the S3 got to -21 dBm! That got my attention.

I could be completely off base with my amateur phone tech analysis, but it's the best I've got. I was about to exchange the S3 for one of them famous Motorola phones, but now I will see if I can hang out for a while longer on the S3, without going completely nuts. Partial Nuttiness may have been in my nature before I bought the phones.

 

[pbelfi]

Coming from an older Samsung Fascinate, I find the wifi signal about the same.....as far as the phone signal, it shows it to be a little weaker than the Fascinate, but I have yet to have any dropped calls.....I don't think you can really go by the amount of "bars" that you have, but rather if you experience any dropped calls, or loss of signal.

 

[Valkaneer]

I thought I read that the S4 had the same radio set up as the Note 2. I was talking to a Galaxy rep at Best Buy last week and he told me the S3 had a few issues that the S4 fixed. One was the S4 has more antennas than the S3, two he says there was a software issues that was causing problems in the S3 and now is fixed, and three he said that the S4 has Samsung components now made by Samsung in which the S3 had another companies components. He said other companies components were not functioning well with the Samsung components that were in the S3.

Who knows, but that is what he said.

 

[ksb63]

Crap, wife's thunderbolt has 3 bars 4g I have 1 bar 3g. My old thunderbolt had 1 bar 4g, She always has a better radio than me.

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[Jaycemiskel]

I also moved from the Galaxy Nexus to the S4 and I am happy to report a very strong signal in compairson......although that may not be a good compareson because the Galaxy Nexus had terrable reception and switching problems. WiFi at my home show a strong signal but i am getting terrable speeds...I haven't looked into it yet but i suspect the problem is with the WiFi on the S4's (all my other wifi devices have good bandwidth).



On the Verizon 4g map I am in a solid 4g area however i must be directly in the middle of two towers. With my Galaxy Nexus i was alway switching between 3g and 4g but with the S4 i stay on 4g with good speed.....I get faster speeds with 4g compared to wifi for some reason..... good thing i have unlimited data!!

-Kesnik

Maybe it's the router settings. First one is LTE and second is wifi. As you can see, I'm getting great speeds.


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[a22shady]

Just got the S4 yesterday and I have a good 4G LTE signal but my cell service is crappy it goes between 1-2 bars when my Thunderbolt in same area would always have full

 

[amirh1]

I've upgraded from VZW Motorola RAZR MAXX (the 1st gen). Signal is as good as or slightly better especially in 4g. Honestly only had it for 2 days now so it's not scientific but I can't complain. Around the house I had bad 3g reception and MAXX would sometimes disconnect when entering house, but the S4 doesn't disconnect.
BTW really great phone, large screen though so better make sure you like that

 

[Jdanner46]

My GS4 does not have the same 4G reception, based on bars, as my MAXX' but it seem to be fine in regard to reception. Only had it one day so the jury is still out

 

[kioko91]

I notice that I have better signal when in my settings I choose cdma/lte network instead of global. I know sometimes I accidentally hit yes when prompted to switch in low signal areas like basements in buildings (in NYC). Other than that the signal on my S4 supersedes that of my S3 by far. Used to have dropped calls all the time. With this phone all calls are clear and not a single drop. Couldn't be happier.

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[papafrankm]

Switched from blackberry, it is a lot better but not perfect.
I live in a bad fringe area SE massachusetts. Lots of pine trees which I was told have a tremendous effect or affect on signals.

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[Valkaneer]

Right now side by side my wife has a S3 and I have a S4 . She has ( The S3 -111 dBm and 29asu) I have (The S4 -95 dBm and 9 asu) I have no idea what that means, and if someone could help out on what that all means I would appreciate it, but those are our Signal Strength.

 

[Premium1]

Right now side by side my wife has a S3 and I have a S4 . She has ( The S3 -111 dBm and 29asu) I have (The S4 -95 dBm and 9 asu) I have no idea what that means, and if someone could help out on what that all means I would appreciate it, but those are our Signal Strength.

the lower the number( in this case the s4) the better. So from that the s4 is getting almost 20 dbm lower than the s3 which is pretty good. The closer to 80's the stronger the signal for 4g lte

 

[Valkaneer]

Well I keep and Update of the two models evey now and then so people can see what kind of fluxuations it they have.

 

[inkmantpa]

I'm getting great signal and speed on 4G. I'm in Lakeland, FL

 

[inkmantpa]

I'm across town now and still getting what I would consider decent speed