Slow WiFi Speeds

[Phil Nickinson]

If you don't mine me asking, were you far from the router of somewhat close? Only seems to happen when it goes through a couple walls where as my Nexus 6P does not have that problem. Also I am only really 25-30 feet away from my router "as the crow flies".

Thank you again for your time and effort. I really appreciate it!

Exactly this far:

 

[atg284]

Exactly this far:

Yeah mine was fine up close like that but download speeds went drastically down hill when I was just 30 ft away and through a couple walls. My Nexus 6P did not have any issues at the same distance.

I get my replacement tomorrow and will do more testing.

 

[Phil Nickinson]

I did some more testing at home last night. ... In the bathroom. Saw a slight difference between the PC and the N9. Not sure if I'd say it's enough to be a thing.

LOTS of variables at work for this sort of thing.

 

[atg284]

I did some more testing at home last night. ... In the bathroom. Saw a slight difference between the PC and the N9. Not sure if I'd say it's enough to be a thing.

LOTS of variables at work for this sort of thing.

Well I got my replacement and it is not good news...

I did the same testing as I did before spelled out earlier in this post. Same results. If you are close to the router it is fine but then drastically drops off not too far away from it (25-30 ft through a wall or 2). By drastically I mean 1/4 the speed compared to my other test devices at the same distance. If the service is 30mbps download at a distance of say 30 ft through a wall or two I will get 5mbps where as my other devices are pulling 28-30mbps. It is a drastic drop off. My other test devices are a Nexus 6p and a Galaxy Note 10.1 2014 Edition. I tested this at yet another network (4 total) within a smaller house and it is the same story.

This is my second Pixel C and it is experiencing the exact same phenomenon. There are others experiencing the same exact thing. Doesn't matter if it is wireless N or AC (2.4ghz or 5ghz). The dbm levels while testing paint the same picture as well. The drop off is bad. Here are cross references:

Official Nexus Forum

https://productforums.google.com/forum/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer#!topic/nexus/CM9tv3pjTfQ

XDA: (glowing review from yours truly turning into wifi hell)

My Initial Impressions & Pictures! - Pg. 3 | Google Pixel C

XDA: Another thread dedicated to this issue:

Slow WiFi Speeds | Google Pixel C

I know this sounds like I am chicken little with the whole sky is falling but I'm sure there are not many of us with Pixel C's out there. I tend to get very excited with product launches and this one was no different. The Pixel C ticks all the boxes off for me in a premium 10 inch Android tablet. That is exactly why I am so upset about this. It is near perfect for me but this might be too big of a thing for me to overlook.

Honestly I really would just like someone on the dev team to acknowledge the issue and say they are working on it. I know that will not likely happen. Not a dig against the team the dev team I figure that is just how it is.

I'm going to continue to look into this and read about any potential fixes or troubleshooting ideas but at this point I'm kind of burnt out. I'm probably going to give it another week before I throw in the towel and return this second one. I've tried to tell my self to just get a wifi extender, an industrial strength router that runs on diesel, or just deal with it but why should I have to? The room I need this to work in is not that far away. But with the Pixel C it might as well be a block down the street. Ok, that is a bit dramatic, but I am still frustrated and really do not want to return another unit. I really want to love this thing.

 

[Wildo6882]

That is most definitely not good news. Really sours me on this thing. Like you, this looked like the perfect Android tablet for me. And now I think I'm going to pass for now.

 

[Trigati]

Other than the obsession with testing, how is it actually effecting your real world usage? I mean, are you just freaking out over low appearing numbers, or is it having an impact over how you're using the tablet?

If it's the former, you'll have to get over the obsession with big numbers. If it's the latter, then yes, its an actual problem which needs to be addressed.

 

[anon(8938849)]

Just got mine today and I've got the same problem. I'm 20-30 feet from my router, through a wall, and my WiFi speed is about half of what it is on every other device. I get a very stable 120-126Mbps on everything else, but the pixel wildly fluctuates and lands somewhere between 40 and 70 Mbps.

This is extremely frustrating considering the price I paid, and how premium this hardware is in other ways. I'm not even gonna bother trying a replacement, and I'm not gonna give it a week. Seems like this is a legit problem that's not going away overnight. I'll call tomorrow and return it. It's all good I could really use the $700 for other things. But such a shame that the best Android tablet ever made is crippled like this.

 

[Balti101]

Other than the obsession with testing, how is it actually effecting your real world usage? I mean, are you just freaking out over low appearing numbers, or is it having an impact over how you're using the tablet?

If it's the former, you'll have to get over the obsession with big numbers. If it's the latter, then yes, its an actual problem which needs to be addressed.

What are you talking about? We are talking about Internet speeds, not benchmark scores. Of course it affects real world usage....

 

[mavrrick]

Can you try something for me. Turn off Bluetooth and run your speed tests again.

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[atg284]

Just got mine today and I've got the same problem. I'm 20-30 feet from my router, through a wall, and my WiFi speed is about half of what it is on every other device. I get a very stable 120-126Mbps on everything else, but the pixel wildly fluctuates and lands somewhere between 40 and 70 Mbps.

This is extremely frustrating considering the price I paid, and how premium this hardware is in other ways. I'm not even gonna bother trying a replacement, and I'm not gonna give it a week. Seems like this is a legit problem that's not going away overnight. I'll call tomorrow and return it. It's all good I could really use the $700 for other things. But such a shame that the best Android tablet ever made is crippled like this.

That is exactly what I am experiencing. This with two different Pixel C's. My service is only rated for 30mbps download but it is the same as you described. Its a drastic drop off where I start to get 1/2 or even 1/4th the speed where as my other devices are getting the full wifi ability.

Can you try something for me. Turn off Bluetooth and run your speed tests again.

I did this on my first unit as I thought it might have something to do with the keyboard initially. It did not help sadly. The first thing I did was test wifi on my second unit and didn't even have Bluetooth on yet.

Other than the obsession with testing, how is it actually effecting your real world usage? I mean, are you just freaking out over low appearing numbers, or is it having an impact over how you're using the tablet?

If it's the former, you'll have to get over the obsession with big numbers. If it's the latter, then yes, its an actual problem which needs to be addressed.

I have recognized, within, that this has become a bit of an obsession and it is not unprecedented for myself. I think more so with this device since there are so few of us. I feel the need to shout it out just so it gets attention and fixed. Don't get me wrong. I want to keep this device. I want it to work well. This is a major hangup for me though.

Your real world inquire is a valid one. I first started to look into this when I went to look at a picture album on imgur.com. The photos were loading at a slower than normal pace. I did my normal speed check with the speed check app to see if my network was acting up. Normal stuff. The speed was slow. humm ok, lets run it again, same slow speeds. Let me see what the Nexus 6P gets. Uh oh this isn't good. Let me check my other tablet (Note 10.1 2014)....Crap...reset router...crap...router needs a firmware update? Crap, already up to date. And that is how this all got started.

So I will say that I can tell in real world use that I am missing internet speeds where I would use this most in my house. It is not like dial-up speeds but I can tell the difference for what it could be when I am close to the router and what it is at a distance. Now that I know that it bugs me and I feel I shouldn't have to deal with it on such a premium device.

If you extrapolate this to the outside world who knows how many frustrating times I could have. Restaurants, bars, hotels, airports, coffee shops....Not all these places will have stellar wifi. It is troubling.

 

[Trigati]

I have recognized, within, that this has become a bit of an obsession and it is not unprecedented for myself. I think more so with this device since there are so few of us. I feel the need to shout it out just so it gets attention and fixed. Don't get me wrong. I want to keep this device. I want it to work well. This is a major hangup for me though.

Your real world inquire is a valid one. I first started to look into this when I went to look at a picture album on imgur.com. The photos were loading at a slower than normal pace. I did my normal speed check with the speed check app to see if my network was acting up. Normal stuff. The speed was slow. humm ok, lets run it again, same slow speeds. Let me see what the Nexus 6P gets. Uh oh this isn't good. Let me check my other tablet (Note 10.1 2014)....Crap...reset router...crap...router needs a firmware update? Crap, already up to date. And that is how this all got started.

So I will say that I can tell in real world use that I am missing internet speeds where I would use this most in my house. It is not like dial-up speeds but I can tell the difference for what it could be when I am close to the router and what it is at a distance. Now that I know that it bugs me and I feel I shouldn't have to deal with it on such a premium device.

If you extrapolate this to the outside world who knows how many frustrating times I could have. Restaurants, bars, hotels, airports, coffee shops....Not all these places will have stellar wifi. It is troubling.

That's the info I was interested in. With someone like Sean David, who's *slow* speed on the Pixel C is faster than my fastest (because I only have 30 Mbps down), I wouldn't think there'd be any noticable difference. But, if you can actually notice slower load times, perhaps Netflix giving the spinning circle and/or not going to HD, that's 'real world' usage and issues, not just obsessing over the fact it 'only' gets 40 Mbps down (for instance).

I wonder if it's a hardware problem or something a software update can fix. I'll have to see how mine works when it arrives.

 

[Trigati]

What are you talking about? We are talking about Internet speeds, not benchmark scores. Of course it affects real world usage....

What are *you* talking about? As I said above, for someone like Sean David who's still getting 40 Mbps down, that's not going to effect his ability to stream music, netflix, youtube; send emails; check posts; browse the web in any noticeable fashion. It's a valid question. Sorry you don't understand it.

 

[anon(8938849)]

What are *you* talking about? As I said above, for someone like Sean David who's still getting 40 Mbps down, that's not going to effect his ability to stream music, netflix, youtube; send emails; check posts; browse the web in any noticeable fashion. It's a valid question. Sorry you don't understand it.

At those speeds there is a noticeable difference in all kinds of things, including simply loading web pages. I wouldn't pay for 120Mbps if it made no difference and was exactly the same as 40Mbps. But what about when I take my tablet to any other place with, say 7Mbps speeds on 2.4Ghz, and my tablet is barely loading anything? What if I choose to downgrade my internet speed in the future to save money? All valid reasons to be concerned.

 

[atg284]

Yeah I would be happy with 40mbps but that is because I am getting 5mbps at the worst at the range I need . And yeah the concern is on lessor networks and networks that are not comfortably in range at a house. Even though my house range is bad current state.

Someone in the official nexus forums contacted Google support. They were told "Yes, we are aware of this emerging issue and we're closely working with the engineering team to fix this issue as earliest as we can." -sidm2k15 (https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/nexus/CM9tv3pjTfQ)

Read into that however you want...

 

[LinuxWeather]

I really have no idea how this wasn't caught in testing, and while I'm not metallurgist there's ample testing done here in this and other threads that makes me think its less an absorption of signal by the body than a software issue. You'd think you'd see the same ratio of drop-off regardless of position to the router, but folks report optimum speeds closer to the router and significantly degraded at a distance.

I'd expect to see some degradation regardless of proximity if its a construction issue. Not sure if that's good news or not, but I don't doubt there's a lot of bugs right now out there with this device, touchscreen issues/WiFi issues/firmware boot loops, that hopefully get ironed out soon.

There may be some info out there that points to this, just spouting out as I'm frustrated as well with similar issues.

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[atg284]

I really have no idea how this wasn't caught in testing, and while I'm not metallurgist there's ample testing done here in this and other threads that makes me think its less an absorption of signal by the body than a software issue. You'd think you'd see the same ratio of drop-off regardless of position to the router, but folks report optimum speeds closer to the router and significantly degraded at a distance.

I'd expect to see some degradation regardless of proximity if its a construction issue. Not sure if that's good news or not, but I don't doubt there's a lot of bugs right now out there with this device, touchscreen issues/WiFi issues/firmware boot loops, that hopefully get ironed out soon.

There may be some info out there that points to this, just spouting out as I'm frustrated as well with similar issues.

Posted via the Android Central App

I am hoping it is software and I keep going back and forth about whether or not it is hardware or software. Part of me thinks it is software because my upload speed is consistent at various ranges with all of my device (9mbps for N6P, Galaxy note 10.1 2014 edition AND Pixel C). The other part of me thinks it is hardware with the metal back or the wifi antenna assembly.

But altogether I am with you in being shocked this issue was not caught in development.

 

[Billeeee]

Same problem here. It's much slower than my Nexus 10 when you get more than 20 feet from the router. Looks like an antenna (hardware) problem to me.

I have two WiFI sources in my house which provide enough coverage to compensate for the problem. However, the Pixel C does not automatically switch to the nearest router like my Nexus 10 does. I have to switch it manually.

 

[anon(8938849)]

Well I ran more tests today. It was factory reset and boxed up to return but I took it out one last time and updated the apps and ran some tests. To my surprise it was hanging right with my nexus 6p, even scoring faster many times. I was in the worst spot in the apartment for WiFi signal too. I don't know what's going on now or if I should return it or keep it.

 

[atg284]

UPDATE:

So there are a lot of developments happening in the official nexus forum. It looks like the dev team is aware of the issue 100% and they are looking into it!

Source: https://productforums.google.com/fo...ce=footer#!msg/nexus/CM9tv3pjTfQ/FJSGfeWvAAAJ

Keep the information streaming on that forum and send your info for the cause!!!

 

[LinuxWeather]

I'm on my second Pixel C, I RMA the first due to the touchscreen issues. This far, no touchscreen issues on the new one, and no WiFi issues but I don't think this tells me anything.

What's interesting is the first Pixel C I got when unboxed and updated, didn't include things like sheets, docs, keep ... Setup as new device. This time around they were installed. The first one also had the "Google Play Services needs updating" message but the second one did not.

Just more anecdotal evidence that perhaps Google is aware of some general early issues and hopefully WiFi as stated is one.

Posted via the Android Central App