Pixel - Signal dropping (Update: Google Knows)

[Amele]

That's why I said that the only real test would be to take 2 phones to a low signal area and see when they drop a call or signal.

I did this test with my Pixel and my Motorola Droid Maxx and can say that they lose the signal at about the same point and the Pixel holds a VoLTE call even better than the Maxx. So what Davidoo said about weak radio/antenna is definitely not true from my experience. If you don't think that Motorola phones are also bad for reception of course

I did this with my old LG G3 and the Pixel XL and the G3 connected to my LTE at home and out in the world one heck of a lot better than the Pixel, which I already knew from prior experience but thought I would check again. The Pixel marginally works better on my wifi which isn't great, but not enough to make up for not having LTE. When the LG couldn't connect to wifi, if it mattered enough to burn data, I would switch. Can't do that with the Pixel. I procrastinated returning it because I had been through the two Note 7's and was so tired of dealing with phones so my bad. But while I get that not everybody has this issue, when I check it out via search, there are a lot of people who do.

 

[James4]

I did this with my old LG G3 and the Pixel XL and the G3 connected to my LTE at home and out in the world one heck of a lot better than the Pixel, which I already knew from prior experience but thought I would check again. The Pixel marginally works better on my wifi which isn't great, but not enough to make up for not having LTE. When the LG couldn't connect to wifi, if it mattered enough to burn data, I would switch. Can't do that with the Pixel. I procrastinated returning it because I had been through the two Note 7's and was so tired of dealing with phones so my bad. But while I get that not everybody has this issue, when I check it out via search, there are a lot of people who do.

Not sure what you mean by "connected to my LTE one heck of a lot better". Did it totally lose the signal or fell back to CDMA? Did you try to start a call, go to a weak reception area and watch at which point the call drops on each phone?

I have a regular Pixel, not an XL, that's might be where the difference is. It would be strange if a bigger phone had worse reception though.

 

[matty032]

Re: Verizon Pixel XL - Dropping calls?

I am not sure why my problems have pretty much gone away and others have seen no improvement. My Pixel is using wifi at home where the signal is bad to make the calls now. Used to, it would keep trying to use cellular and give me a "cellular network not found." And used to when I was on the road, the calls would drop almost every time if advanced calling was on. Today I held an hour long chat going down the road with no drops. As for WiFi, I get 10 times better signaI strength with the Pixel over the Moto XPE. I am wondering if this is a Verizon issue. Are most of you guys and gals on Verizon that are still dropping calls?

 

[James4]

Re: Verizon Pixel XL - Dropping calls?

I am not sure why my problems have pretty much gone away and others have seen no improvement. My Pixel is using wifi at home where the signal is bad to make the calls now. Used to, it would keep trying to use cellular and give me a "cellular network not found." And used to when I was on the road, the calls would drop almost every time if advanced calling was on. Today I held an hour long chat going down the road with no drops. I am wondering if this is a Verizon issue. Are most of you guys and gals on Verizon that are still dropping calls?

Verizon fixed some towers in your area? I know that nobody believed me when I said that's a towers issue many pages ago, but isn't it the most obvious explanation?

 

[matty032]

Re: Verizon Pixel XL - Dropping calls?

I am starting to think that may be why some are suffering and some are fine. My signal strength hasn't improved, but the signal stability has improved. Like my phone has been entered into their system, where it wasn't before. Or, the LTE Advanced switchover has been completed in my area, and so it's stable now. Like I said, my phone started to be stable before I ever got this last update. Something more along those lines, than just a weak radio in the phone.

 

[recDNA]

Re: Verizon Pixel XL - Dropping calls?

Nope. Weak antennas and radios. Radios can be improved. Antenna cannot. JMO. Why. Not every phone has these problems. They're all using same towers.

 

[Amele]

Not sure what you mean by "connected to my LTE one heck of a lot better". Did it totally lose the signal or fell back to CDMA? Did you try to start a call, go to a weak reception area and watch at which point the call drops on each phone?

I have a regular Pixel, not an XL, that's might be where the difference is. It would be strange if a bigger phone had worse reception though.

I mean it gets a signal so weak the web pages come up and say No Connection, or Timed Out. It doesn't drop back, it just doesn't connect. It will sometimes connect enough to get on but it's really slow to load. I don't have many dropped calls, a few, but I don't do much calling, either. My daughter and son-on-law have two ancient Samsung phones, a S3 and a S5 and have no problems, and this is the Bay Area, I don't think it's a tower problem. Since the last update, it does connect a little better off and on but I just don't have the patience. I use wifi at home even though it isn't great.This whole thing confuses me anyway because I do get texts and can send them. This has all been true from day one.

 

[James4]

I mean it gets a signal so weak the web pages come up and say No Connection, or Timed Out. It doesn't drop back, it just doesn't connect. It will sometimes connect enough to get on but it's really slow to load. I don't have many dropped calls, a few, but I don't do much calling, either. My daughter and son-on-law have two ancient Samsung phones, a S3 and a S5 and have no problems, and this is the Bay Area, I don't think it's a tower problem. Since the last update, it does connect a little better off and on but I just don't have the patience. I use wifi at home even though it isn't great.This whole thing confuses me anyway because I do get texts and can send them. This has all been true from day one.

Web pages load very fast for me even with zero bars. It's because the speed has more to do with signal quality, not signal strength. See another example here, 20 Mbps with zero bars!

Verizon uses three bands for LTE: 2, 4 and 13. S3 supports only 13 and S5 supports 13 and 4. Pixel supports all, so maybe band 2 is the problem. Verizon is not always good with load balancing between different bands, see here for example.

Nope. Weak antennas and radios. Radios can be improved. Antenna cannot. JMO. Why. Not every phone has these problems. They're all using same towers.

If it's weak antennas and radios, why my Pixel holds the signal well?

 

[tdunn014]

I'm using a Pixel on T-Mobile and it has amazing reception. I have service in areas my iPhone 6S and 7 both would show no service or refused to load any data. The Pixel never drops to no service in these fringe areas and the data continues to work. In the case on T-Mobile this phone has a great antenna/radio combination.

 

[Jace18]

I mean it gets a signal so weak the web pages come up and say No Connection, or Timed Out. It doesn't drop back, it just doesn't connect. It will sometimes connect enough to get on but it's really slow to load. I don't have many dropped calls, a few, but I don't do much calling, either. My daughter and son-on-law have two ancient Samsung phones, a S3 and a S5 and have no problems, and this is the Bay Area, I don't think it's a tower problem. Since the last update, it does connect a little better off and on but I just don't have the patience. I use wifi at home even though it isn't great.This whole thing confuses me anyway because I do get texts and can send them. This has all been true from day one.

I'm from the bay area as well. The worst thing I have going on were dropped calls which seems strange given the fact that it's silicon valley. Go figure. The update has seemed to help reduce my dropped calls but recently, I was talking to someone via Bluetooth and they couldn't hear me. I could hear them loud and clear. I had to call her back and that fixed the issue. I wish that the phone would just work well as a phone

 

[Jace18]

Forgot to mention that I'm on verizon.

 

[Preach2k]

Re: Verizon Pixel XL - Dropping calls?

Here is a article that might help.

http://www.androidauthority.com/problems-pixel-pixel-xl-fix-734560/

 

[Wildo6882]

I noticed that the wifi is slightly weaker than my iPhone 6s Plus. I did a completely non-scientific test last night just to see if my Pixel had issues. I went to the end of my bathroom (which is about as far away from my router as possible, and my Internet service is spotty anyway - 10 Mbps tops). I used the "Fast" app just to see what my download times were. Facing the direction of the router, both phones were equal. Facing away from the router, my iPhone was frequently around 6-8 Mbps. My Pixel was frequently 1-4 Mbps. I know this wasn't the best test, but I'd say the wifi is a little worse on the Pixel when compared to my iPhone.

Don't know if this has anything to do with LTE service and dropped calls. But thought I would share.

 

[recDNA]

Web pages load very fast for me even with zero bars. It's because the speed has more to do with signal quality, not signal strength. See another example here, 20 Mbps with zero bars!

Verizon uses three bands for LTE: 2, 4 and 13. S3 supports only 13 and S5 supports 13 and 4. Pixel supports all, so maybe band 2 is the problem. Verizon is not always good with load balancing between different bands, see here for example.


If it's weak antennas and radios, why my Pixel holds the signal well?

Very strong signal in a good band.

 

[recDNA]

I'm using a Pixel on T-Mobile and it has amazing reception. I have service in areas my iPhone 6S and 7 both would show no service or refused to load any data. The Pixel never drops to no service in these fringe areas and the data continues to work. In the case on T-Mobile this phone has a great antenna/radio combination.

More of a VZW problem as I understand it. Maybe cdma thing. Maybe just really bad qc and you got a good phone. I doubt software will fix it since many still have the problem as you've read.

 

[James4]

Very strong signal in a good band.

I don't understand what you mean.

 

[Wildo6882]

I don't understand what you mean.

One of two things:

Good signal in Pearl Jam.

Or...

One of the stringer bands had a good signal, so calls weren't being dropped.

 

[jlarkins08]

I'm using a Pixel on T-Mobile and it has amazing reception. I have service in areas my iPhone 6S and 7 both would show no service or refused to load any data. The Pixel never drops to no service in these fringe areas and the data continues to work. In the case on T-Mobile this phone has a great antenna/radio combination.

I agree.. seems like it's a VZW issue
I'm on T-Mobile with a Google Store pixel and I get great reception, no network problems over here..

 

[rslifkin]

I agree.. seems like it's a VZW issue
I'm on T-Mobile with a Google Store pixel and I get great reception, no network problems over here..

And even then, it's not affecting all of us on VZW. I'm thinking there's some set of conditions that causes the issue to show up and some VZW towers are affected while others aren't or something like that (so those of us who aren't having issues likely haven't been to an area where those conditions exist). At that point, the issue could be a software patch to work around the issue or it could be a network-level fix.

 

[Preach2k]

I agree.. seems like it's a VZW issue
I'm on T-Mobile with a Google Store pixel and I get great reception, no network problems over here..

Not an Verizon issue. My brother is on Verizon with his Pixel XL. No issues with signal or dropped calls. His only issue is The Halo effect.