Project Fi

[TraderGary]

Yeah, smallish town and my internet is bare bones but works for what I need and I'm the only one using it. Never goes out like the expensive 100MBps does all the time around here which costs 3 times as much.
Two full days with Fi and it looks promising. The calling issue with the caller not being able to hear that cropped right up the first day seems to be gone and is working well. (so far)
Call quality does not seem on par with Verizon tho. It could be the wifi calling feature, not sure. Seems garbled at times on my end and not sure how they hear me on their end. i made a call with the wifi turned off using Sprint and it sounded pretty good. I noticed alot of call quality complaints on the google fi forums.
. I like it so far and hoping it will work out ok.
Is there any downside to turning off wifi to make a call when at home? tried it both ways and it seems clearer on the LTE.

I have no problem with WiFi call quality from home. Calls are never garbled and always seem quite intelligible. But then I have consistently fast and reliable WiFi. When home I cannot compare with LTE as I have no LTE signal inside my house. I'm at lake level with hills between me and cell towers.

About the only time I use LTE is when making calls while in the car. (I have hands free calling in the car.) I've never had a problem with call quality while in the car. It's interesting that when I start down my driveway, as I start to lose LTE, my home WiFi transparently takes over my calls and I cannot tell when WiFi calling takes over. I can't detect a difference in call quality.

Since you are using "Signal Spy" you can watch your phone as you're driving and get close to home and you can see when WiFi takes over. You could make that experiment with someone and see if you or they can hear a difference in call quality.

 

[cbreze]

Any project fi users using 2.4GHZ on their wifi?

I'm having some issues with Google Fi and am getting discouraged but still looking for work arounds.

Talked to support about the drops when using wifi calling as well as the static,garbled quality prior to the drop. They were nice and helpful and said while a 5GHZ output on my wifi would be better it should not be necessary and my 2.4GHZ should be fine. Also verified I had latest Project Fi app update which I do.
Unfortunately the call dropped before I could finish with the rep. This on T-mobile my strongest signal at 115dBm. Already had wifi turned off to avoid a drop and got a drop anyway due to crap signal. Sprint and US Cell are worse. And I live in town.
I really wanted this to work as it would save me an easy 60% off my Verizon bill. Upgrading to a 5GHZ wifi router is counter productive to saving money and everything else I use wifi for works flawlessly. I've tried resetting the wifi but no change.
Apparently Verizon is the only cell service provider that has a decent enough signal where I live(2 miles from downtown) so I may go on the hunt for a lower priced plan with them. Not seeing one on their site but maybe retentions will throw me a bone. Dammit, I wished this Fi service worked better. Any ideas anyone?

An observation: I don't see how Sprint, T-mobile and US Cellular get any customers at all with crap signal like this. At least I can eliminate them from my list of possibilities.
On the plus side T-mo call quality sounds great until they drop.

 

[hallux]

The only reason I could see them suggesting the 5GHz band is for higher speeds, but typical home internet connections are just starting to be capable of saturating a WiFi connection on 802.11g WiFi (54 Mbps theoretical throughput). That kind of bandwidth isn't needed for WiFi calling unless you have other traffic on your network. Can you set your router up with QoS to prioritize traffic from your phone?

Who do you have for a cable provider? Spectrum is now offering Spectrum Mobile and advertising that it runs on the nation's largest 4G LTE network (Verizon?). They're offering unlimited data for $45/month per line.

 

[cbreze]

The only reason I could see them suggesting the 5GHz band is for higher speeds, but typical home internet connections are just starting to be capable of saturating a WiFi connection on 802.11g WiFi (54 Mbps theoretical throughput). That kind of bandwidth isn't needed for WiFi calling unless you have other traffic on your network. Can you set your router up with QoS to prioritize traffic from your phone?

Who do you have for a cable provider? Spectrum is now offering Spectrum Mobile and advertising that it runs on the nation's largest 4G LTE network (Verizon?). They're offering unlimited data for $45/month per line.

Century Link is my internet provider and I can say they have worked flawlessly for the 8 years I have had them. My Verizon bill for 5GB data plan is $59/month. Was hoping to knock that back to $25 to $30 tops with Fi. I can live with less mobile data easily but also see on Verizons site that 3GB is no cheaper so that must have changed.
My wifi speeds/bandwidth should be fine. I'm the only one using it. Don't see a need for any prioritizing. Calls are dropping even when nothing is pulling on the wifi but the phone call. I can stream movies beautifully so plenty good speeds for that.

When Googling "Fi wifi, drops and issues" I see lots of people are having wifi calling problems and it's looking more and more like a fairly common issue. Of course I'm just test driving the service but I had high hopes for it to work better. It sounded to good to be true. Maybe works great for some I'm sure.

One thing this has done is put me on the hunt for a cheaper plan if not Fi then something else. Got the bug now , LOL.
Thinking Verizon prepaid or AT&T prepaid but AT&T is said to have crap signal in my part of town also.
So I dunno, but nothing ventured nothing gained. Worse case is stick with Verizon @ $59/month.

EDIT: Called my internet provider Century Link because I noticed my bill credits were set to expire and was told they'd install a new "better" modem for free and put in a locked for life price point at $40/month. I was paying $36, so seems a win if the doubling in speed as promised comes along with it. The setup appointment is in 3 weeks so I'll hang in there with Fi till then and see if it helps my wifi calling problems. Either way I get the locked in price for the internet.

 

[TraderGary]

Well, you have to have good cell tower service to have good phone service when you are away from your home WiFi. If Sprint, T-Mobile, and US Cellular are crap where you are, then of course Fi isn't going to work for you. Here in Atlanta the combination of the three services works extremely well since Fi hands off to whichever carrier has the best signal. I've yet to be without phone service in my travels. And of course good WiFi is everywhere.

As far as WiFi goes, if you have good WiFi service then Fi should work just fine. Wherever we go in the Atlanta area there always seems to be good WiFi service. We've never had a problem with voice over WiFi whether at home or when we are out and about. I'm at a loss as to why WiFi isn't working for you if you have good quality service as WiFi isn't dependent on cell tower service.

 

[cbreze]

When my internet is upgraded in 3 weeks I'll see if it helps. Disappointed all 3 FI service providers have poor signal here but guess that's just the way it is. That's why I figured my internet would be my fall back when at home. If it starts working after they upgrade me then , great, if not I'll decide what to do then. Thanks for all the comments and the OP for starting the thread.

 

[Lilybell2]

Thinking Verizon prepaid or AT&T prepaid but AT&T is said to have crap signal in my part of town also.
So I dunno, but nothing ventured nothing gained. Worse case is stick with Verizon @ $59/month.

@cbreze
If you need WiFi calling, do not consider AT&T. AT&T does not provision BYOD Android phones for WiFi calling on either post-paid or pre-paid accounts. WiFi calling on Android phones is reserved for AT&T branded phones on post-paid accounts.

 

[cbreze]

@cbreze
If you need WiFi calling, do not consider AT&T. AT&T does not provision BYOD Android phones for WiFi calling on either post-paid or pre-paid accounts. WiFi calling on Android phones is reserved for AT&T branded phones on post-paid accounts.

Good to know, thank you

 

[Lilybell2]

You're welcome, cbreze.

 

[TraderGary]

When my internet is upgraded in 3 weeks I'll see if it helps. Disappointed all 3 FI service providers have poor signal here but guess that's just the way it is. That's why I figured my internet would be my fall back when at home. If it starts working after they upgrade me then , great, if not I'll decide what to do then. Thanks for all the comments and the OP for starting the thread.

I should add that at my house neither of the 3 services work. If I walk outside my house I get a weak T-Mobile and that's about it. My house is between hills that block cell service. That's why WiFi is so vitally important to us when we are at home.

How is your cell service when you are not at home?

 

[cbreze]

Its acceptable service when out and about. Taking a road trip in another week so that will help in my evaluation as well.
My internet is getting upgraded tomorrow as they had a cancellation and can get to it sooner. I will be able to quickly see if that makes the difference. Hoping it will. When I get a call at home now I go to the room with the wifi modem and have yet to drop a call that way so hoping it's a weakness that will be fixed with the upgrade.

Another observation regarding Fi is it stays on whatever service provider I have set using signal spy. Even if another is stronger which seems counter productive to how it is advertised. The other day I was out at the store and checked the phone and saw it had connected to a nearby wifi. Problem is the signal was so weak it was basically worthless and any incoming call would have certainly failed. So turned off wifi scanning and is working much better. I can always re-enable as needed.
I love the concept of this service and if the wifi upgrade fixes the home phone then I may keep it as the price is certainly right.
When I called customer service about the issues I was having the call dropped as we were in mid converstion, LOL. Haven't called back yet.

 

[hallux]

Another observation regarding Fi is it stays on whatever service provider I have set using signal spy. Even if another is stronger which seems counter productive to how it is advertised.

This is why I stick with using the FINEXT and FIAUTO dialer codes. If I'm out and I see the signal as nonexistent I'll pop in the FINEXT code to force it to scan for another carrier. Since I haven't told it to force itself to a specific carrier, the auto switching should still work but you can always enter the auto code to set it back to auto scan.

 

[TraderGary]

Its acceptable service when out and about. Taking a road trip in another week so that will help in my evaluation as well.
My internet is getting upgraded tomorrow as they had a cancellation and can get to it sooner. I will be able to quickly see if that makes the difference. Hoping it will. When I get a call at home now I go to the room with the wifi modem and have yet to drop a call that way so hoping it's a weakness that will be fixed with the upgrade.

If it works when standing next to the router, the problem most certainly has to be with the quality of the modem/router. I'm using a NetGear R8000 router and NetGear CM1000 Cable Modem and I can connect to my router with a strong signal from anywhere in my house.

Another observation regarding Fi is it stays on whatever service provider I have set using signal spy. Even if another is stronger which seems counter productive to how it is advertised.

I think once you choose a provider with Signal Spy it remains. I tried it out just to test and now don't find a need to use it. I still use Signal Spy, I just don't use the feature to choose a provider, I let Fi do that.

The other day I was out at the store and checked the phone and saw it had connected to a nearby wifi. Problem is the signal was so weak it was basically worthless and any incoming call would have certainly failed. So turned off wifi scanning and is working much better. I can always re-enable as needed.

I've yet to have a problem connecting when Fi chooses a WiFi service. I've just trusted that it work. Although for WiFi calling, if the WiFi is problematic, it should switch automatically to cell service if available.

I love the concept of this service and if the wifi upgrade fixes the home phone then I may keep it as the price is certainly right.

For us the price is MORE than right!

When I called customer service about the issues I was having the call dropped as we were in mid converstion, LOL. Haven't called back yet.

 

[cbreze]

Yeah, I try them all and end up on TMobile as it seems to be strongest. But if I force it to another it doesn't revert back even if I use the auto feature of signal spy. I need to do it manually. TMobile seems to have better call quality as well as signal so I just leave it. Latching onto weak WiFi is not going to cut it so leave wifi scanning off. Decent signal on T-Mobile and it hooks onto a weak WiFi. Shouldn't do that. I'm definitely still in the fi learning curve.

 

[cbreze]

"If it works when standing next to the router, the problem most certainly has to be with the quality of the modem/router"

^ Yes, my thoughts exactly. ^

 

[TraderGary]

When I was having connection problems, I replaced my old router with a NetGear NightHawk R8000. Now I could use my devices from anywhere in the house but I STILL had a problem with dropped calls. So I replaced the Comcast supplied Cable Modem with a NetGear CM1000 Cable Modem. I haven't had a dropped call since!

 

[hallux]

But if I force it to another it doesn't revert back even if I use the auto feature of signal spy.

At some point it will revert back to auto on its own - that might be after 2 hours. If it has a signal, I don't think it's going to re-scan and switch right away when you go back to auto, it might need to see an interruption or a degradation in signal before it does.

My most recent situation that I can recall clearly was that I went for a walk near home. As I was out, I looked at my phone and saw little to no signal and no indication of data service. I did the FINEXT code after seeing it was trying to grab Sprint and it swapped to T-Mobile and gave me a good signal.

 

[cbreze]

Well, I've been using project Fi for about a month or so and have come to some conclusions during this trial period.
Was concerned about the wifi calling not working all that well but coincidently I needed to call my internet provider to check on maintaining my service discounts for another year. The discounts were being discontinued but their new policy was to offer a $40/month price lock for life or at least till I might move out of their area. As this was only $4 more than my previously discounted service and also came with a free upgraded modem, free installation and a bump that doubled the speed I saw it as win/win. Also fixed my wifi calling problem on my Pixel 2 on Project Fi. The upgraded modem has band output switching ability which was maybe the biggest problem previously with the older router with it always being stuck on 2.4 GhZ. 5.0GhZ works much better for wifi calls.

All 3 Fi service providers still have poor signal at my home but the upgraded wifi makes that a non issue which is huge.
The T-mobile signal is fine around town and nearby areas I travel to.
I recently got back from a road trip which included a several day layover in Vancouver B.C. I was the only one in the group who had free data, Sweet! Also the only one with cheap international calling. Sweet again!
So, I've decided to dump my Verizon service later this month after my billing cycle.
Here's my thoughts on the pros and cons of using Fi for me personally and only for my personal situation so YMMV.

Pros: Cheaper, lots cheaper by at least 60% over my Verizon plan. First bill was $22.29. 2nd bill is on track to be about $28, which includes a little international calling from Canada. Should be closer to $25/month on a regular basis in future.

Pro: International calling is 20cents/minute. No extra charge for data. Won't need it much but good to have as I may be doing more traveling.

Pro: I get to dump Verizon. Yes!!

Pro: I think the best feature of the service is to only pay for what data is used. With Verizon I was paying $60/month for a 5GB data bucket but never used more than a Gig or two at most. I hated to pay for what I never used. The pay only for what one uses feature is maybe the single most, best thing I like about Project Fi. All service providers should have that option, but I certainly know why they don't$$$$$$$$$.

Con: The only one I can think of is coverage could be an issue at times. Verizon does rule in the Pacific Northwest as well as most places so there is that advantage for them. However, on the road trip I was never without signal but then we stayed to main highways. the real coverage test would be to take back roads. i'm OK with that possibility as I don't travel the backroads like I used to but I do appreciate the savings on my bill every month. I've calculated I will save at a minimum at least $400 per year over the Verizon service I was using, possibly more but $400 is not to shabby.
I'll be pulling the plug on Verizon by months end or so as long as things continue to go as well as they have been.

 

[Lilybell2]

That's good news indeed, cbreze. Thanks for sharing!

 

[TraderGary]

Cool cbreze!
Since there are two of us, we save even a good bit more!
In the Atlanta area Fi is an absolute no-brainer!
I'm glad it's working out for you.