June MR2 vs Newest MR2

[bjboucher]

OK, for those who installed the leaked MR2 from June 10th and have upgraded to the latest MR2, what are your thoughts? Mine are that other than having better app compatibility, it is much worse, at least for my phone. Here is what I am noticing:

1. GPS in now intermittant. The problem being reported in other threads has hit my phone. I lose all my satellites every 30-60 seconds or so. I still get very quick lock but if you watch your GPS using GPS status you'll notice the satellites dropping a lot (at least for me and others). I think most people that are saying GPS is much better are just noticing a faster lock but arent aware of the constant dropping of satellites. Its not noticable unless you use GPS status. Never had this problem with original, MR1 or the leaked MR2 from June.

2. My network connection was much better with the original MR2. I have less bars now, last night my phone dropped to 3G where it never did for the month I had the original MR2 on. I had to reboot to get 4G to come back....it was stuck on 3G for over 12 hours.

Really not sure what they thought they found that made them change the radios and GPS files. Wish they would've just tweaked the app compatibility and left everything else from June the same. Anyone know if I can just re-run the RUU from June and have it overwrite the current operating system? I'd rather run the set-up from June if I could.

 

[dragonsamus]

I've noticed my battery life worse.

 

[heartagram616]

Kinda glad I only downloaded the new ruu but didn't update yet. I'm waiting to see how this new one runs overall before taking the plunge as the leaked mr2 runs great on my phone. I might hold out until gingerbread

 

[bjboucher]

Kinda glad I only downloaded the new ruu but didn't update yet. I'm waiting to see how this new one runs overall before taking the plunge as the leaked mr2 runs great on my phone. I might hold out until gingerbread

Sounds like a good idea. Wishing I had done the same. My phone was pretty much perfect on the June set up.

 

[anon(394005)]

Did you try a master reset after flashing the new MR2 RUU? I also did the battery and sim pull to reset the data connection. So far, this new update has been good. Better battery life, snappier overall operation. I'm currently testing in a LTE area (from my normal 3G only) and it transitioned pretty quick.

Sent from my Thunderbolt!

 

[yodatom10]

I personaly ran both and I found the newest mr2 to be much better then the June one.

 

[anon(394005)]

Ok, I'm back at home now in a 3G area after spending 3 hours in LTE around Montgomery. The phone transitioned pretty quickly once entered the LTE area. While driving and with the first LTE cell tower in direct line of site, I did a speed test (Ookla's Speedtest app) and got 33612kbps down and 6436kbps up (Awesome!) While driving around the area and hitting different towers, sometimes parked, other times moving, I would continually get around 12 - 19kbps down and 6-12kbps up. Before I left the area, I hit the same original tower and got much better results with 28715kbps down and 9562kbps up. Apparently that tower doesn't have as much traffic on it as it's just outside the metro area, almost rural!

Now, at no time did I ever lose the LTE signal while driving around in various areas, some hilly, most with dense trees, mostly all in urban areas at least 10 miles outside downtown Montgomery. Also, the phone transitioned in and out of LTE on its own without any manual intervention and rather quickly. Once outside LTE, I maintained a solid 3G connection all the way back home.

As far as battery life, I'm going on 6 total hours now (from a fully charged standard battery), 3 of which were in LTE with heavy use. There is currently about 35% left.

All in all, I'd say the new MR2 is working quite well!

As I mentioned before, I did a master reset after flashing the new MR2 RUU and also did the battery and sim pull to reset the data connection. May be that will help others. It certainly has for me!

Come on Verizon, bring LTE to BHam!!!!!

 

[bjboucher]

Synycalwon, have you tested your GPS with GPS status? Just curious if that working fine for you as well. I have done a battery and SIM pull but havent done a master reset. I'll try that when I get home from work. Wouldn't seem like it would be necessary since the install itself does a master reset but its worth a shot. Wonder if I can try re-installing the RUU, maybe it just didnt install smoothly???

 

[jrmarinojr]

bjboucher - a master reset would not change anything...I was having the same exact problem with the GPS as you stated. Wasn't until my 3rd battery pull (leave it out for 5 min) that the GPS started working. Satellites still drop in gps status but google maps has me within 5 meters and thats all that counts.

 

[anon(394005)]

Synycalwon, have you tested your GPS with GPS status? Just curious if that working fine for you as well. I have done a battery and SIM pull but havent done a master reset. I'll try that when I get home from work. Wouldn't seem like it would be necessary since the install itself does a master reset but its worth a shot. Wonder if I can try re-installing the RUU, maybe it just didnt install smoothly???

Haven't tried GPS status previously, usually just use Google location services or when enabling navigation via Google Maps, turn on stand alone GPS and it locks within ten seconds. So I downloaded/installed GPS status and turned on stand alone GPS. It locked on to various GPS satellites within about 10 seconds, even under heavily overcast skies (thunderstorms in area). Of course, I went outside for better reception. I do notice however in GPS Status that it seems like it is connecting/disconnecting to various GPS satellites. Don't know if that is just the way the app works as it's refreshing or if it means something else. I can't attest to GPS operation much though overall as I really don't use it much and typically only have Google location services enabled for general location needs (ex. Weather clock and general Google Map’s location data).

 

[bjboucher]

Sounds like you guys are having the same GPS issues as me. It shouldnt be dropping satellites as much it is doing. Definitely not normal and not something it was doing before. I've watched it using Google Nav as i'm driving around and it is choppy when the satellites keep going in and out like that. It still keeps fairly close to my location but this is definitely not normal operation.

 

[yodatom10]

Sounds like you guys are having the same GPS issues as me. It shouldnt be dropping satellites as much it is doing. Definitely not normal and not something it was doing before. I've watched it using Google Nav as i'm driving around and it is choppy when the satellites keep going in and out like that. It still keeps fairly close to my location but this is definitely not normal operation.

have u tried using the GPS status app to see if that helps your GPS. Some people are also finding success after doing a factory reset. I know it sucks but it just might fix it. And if all else fails u could take into Verizon and get a new phone and see if the GPS is better in the.new phone

 

[anon(394005)]

I wonder if that is a battery saving function, although you would think it could use more battery connecting/disconnecting (if that is what it's doing). Could be a possible trade off between functionality and increasing battery life....

 

[yodatom10]

I wonder if that is a battery saving function, although you would think it could use more battery connecting/disconnecting (if that is what it's doing). Could be a possible trade off between functionality and increasing battery life....

i don't think its battery saving function as it would take more power to reconect.

 

[bjboucher]

have u tried using the GPS status app to see if that helps your GPS. Some people are also finding success after doing a factory reset. I know it sucks but it just might fix it. And if all else fails u could take into Verizon and get a new phone and see if the GPS is better in the.new phone

Of course, thats how I know its dropping satellites constantly is by using GPS status. I've cleared the data and re-downloaded several times too. Nothing seems to help.

 

[KJ78]

GPS dropping satellites is prolly a failed battery saving fix. My battery life seems worse and the radio much more willing to switch down to 3G. I haven't been out of am LTE area yet. Throughput might be a lil slower but I only had it a few days before update.

 

[yodatom10]

GPS dropping satellites is prolly a failed battery saving fix. My battery life seems worse and the radio much more willing to switch down to 3G. I haven't been out of am LTE area yet. Throughput might be a lil slower but I only had it a few days before update.

I'm the exact opposite my battery life has gone up GPS is better then ever. It looks to be a tose up if you have a good or bad experience. Glad I got lucky and can finaly use my phone for what I bought it for.

 

[robrecht]

I wonder if that is a battery saving function, although you would think it could use more battery connecting/disconnecting (if that is what it's doing). Could be a possible trade off between functionality and increasing battery life....

GPS dropping satellites is prolly a failed battery saving fix. My battery life seems worse and the radio much more willing to switch down to 3G. I haven't been out of am LTE area yet. Throughput might be a lil slower but I only had it a few days before update.

Another (completely unproven) theory is that they are struggling with 4G-GPS interference. Maybe the off/on blips of GPS connectivity are meant to allow the 4G/eHRPD signal connection a better chance of staying connected. Factory radio: GPS problems. MR1 intended in large part to address GPS problems exacerbated connectivity/reboot* issues. MR2 intended in large part to address the connectivity/reboot problems may have reintroduced greater GPS problems for some. This is writ too large as there are plenty of people that have not had problems with any of the radios and some people's experience is the opposite of others. There are plenty of other variables between phone radio hardware and especially network tower set up and performance so it is completely impossible to make blanket statements, but these variables may help explain different experiences by different consumers. Prior ot the release of the phone there were rumors of incredibly poor 2-4 hour battery performance. So maybe to make battery life more acceptable, they attenuated the radio and GPS performance of the phone to the point where it is very difficult to keep either or both performing well in some circumstances.

*Yet another (completely unproven) hypothesis that data connectivity and reboot problems may be related. I have seen my phone essentially 'fix' a data connectivity problem by spontaneously rebooting, but only after draining the battery excessively while trying to reconnect to a tower.

 

[bjboucher]

Another (completely unproven) theory is that they are struggling with 4G-GPS interference. Maybe the off/on blips of GPS connectivity are meant to allow the 4G/eHRPD signal connection a better chance of staying connected. Factory radio: GPS problems. MR1 intended in large part to address GPS problems exacerbated connectivity/reboot issues. MR2 intended in large part to address the connectivity/reboot problems may have reintroduced greater GPS problems for some. This is writ too large as there are plenty of people that have not had problems with any of the radios and some people's experience is the opposite of others. There are plenty of other variables between phone radio hardware and especially network tower set up and performance so it is completely impossible to make blanket statements, but these variables may help explain different experiences by different consumers. Prior ot the release of the phone there were rumors of incredibly poor 2-4 hour battery performance. So maybe to make battery life more acceptable, they attenuated the radio and GPS performance of the phone to the point where it is very difficult to keep either or both performing well in some circumstances.

Makes a lot of sense but I like I said earlier, both worked beautifully for me with the June 10th version of the MR2 release. Not sure what they thought was wrong with it. ugh.

 

[robrecht]

Makes a lot of sense but I like I said earlier, both worked beautifully for me with the June 10th version of the MR2 release. Not sure what they thought was wrong with it. ugh.

There's always n=1 experiences that don't fit the theory. Hence the need to factor in multiple substantial variables. If you look at some peoples' experiences of the differences between leaked MR2 and leaked MR2.5 some people were definitely seeing changes in greater/lesser 3G or 4G connectivity and shorter/longer battery life. And some people had diametrically opposing experiences. It was a bit of a crap shoot to try different radios and see which one worked best in a given situation. Lots of variables to factor in and adjust various settings to try and find the fix that worked best for the largest number of people & towers. Because we were already pushing the envelope on multiple sides trying to tweak marginal performance dictated by a much too weenie-ish 1400 mAh battery. Hope you can handle the technical terms I'm throwing out there!