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For those of you complaining about the signal bars...

tokyoglow

Newbie
Mar 10, 2010
37
1
Hey everyone

so at the risk of sounding somewhat stupid...I will continue to say this:

So my virgin mobile phone that I had a while ago had this same problem, but less severe. I had fluctuations in the signal strength. Cover the side of the phone and the signal will go down, uncover, signal goes up.

Basically what I found, or in this case hypothesize, is that the internal antenna may be somewhere on one of the sides of the phone. When you cover the side the signal bars seem to go down. Hold the phone on the top corner and they may go back up. I've done this in a few places around my usual usage areas and all seem to follow this trend. Im not saying that correlation leads to causation, but im just saying maybe we're overlooking something here.
This usually happens on the right side


However, I am puzzled that this would mean flesh interferes with radio waves...


Also, I'm not complaining or questioning why as I've read several other threads on this issue and side with those who think the bars mean nothing. I've been able to make perfectly good phone calls with 0 bars, no dropped calls, and perfect sound quality.

oddly enough, lately my bars seem to be more accurate. I have no idea why
 
The bars mean nothing. Go into the phone and look for the signal DB's. If I only have one bar, I still have a decibel of over 99, which is pretty good. You should too. Its more than likely a GUI glitch with the bar notifications than it is actually having a lower signal strength, IMHO. Dont worry.

I agree. I went from 3 to 4 bars before 2.1 down to 1 or 2 after. Call/sound/ connection quality is the same. Part of me thinks this may be the same for the battery GUI as well.
 
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The bars mean nothing. Go into the phone and look for the signal DB's. If I only have one bar, I still have a decibel of over 99, which is pretty good. You should too. Its more than likely a GUI glitch with the bar notifications than it is actually having a lower signal strength, IMHO. Dont worry.

The dBm for signal strength is based on a logarithm scale. The 99 you state is actually -99 dBm. So for negative logarithm larger negative values are actually a weaker signal. So -99 dBm is a weaker signal than -90 dBm. Easy way to think of it is -99 is smaller than -90.
 
Upvote 0
The dBm for signal strength is based on a logarithm scale. The 99 you state is actually -99 dBm. So for negative logarithm larger negative values are actually a weaker signal. So -99 dBm is a weaker signal than -90 dBm. Easy way to think of it is -99 is smaller than -90.



Glad you caught that, I didn't mean to put 99. My signal fluctuates between -69 and -79 dbm. Even with 1 bar, my 3G speed is outstanding when tethered to my laptop with pdanet. I'm convinced the lack of bars is a minor GUI glitch and has absolutely nothing to do signal strength.

Thanks for your input.
 
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Glad to hear that it is considered a glitch as I was thinking my nexus one has really bad signal issues.

Been at a friends house at the top of my street, i had 0 signal bars but I could still make a call. I asked my friends to check there signal one of them on the same network and others on a different network, they all had full signal strength with the various handsets they have. Don't think i've ever had an signal issues with my Nokia 5800 previously.

Anyone know if this has been raised as a bug?
 
Upvote 0
Hey everyone

so at the risk of sounding somewhat stupid...I will continue to say this:

So my virgin mobile phone that I had a while ago had this same problem, but less severe. I had fluctuations in the signal strength. Cover the side of the phone and the signal will go down, uncover, signal goes up.

Basically what I found, or in this case hypothesize, is that the internal antenna may be somewhere on one of the sides of the phone. When you cover the side the signal bars seem to go down. Hold the phone on the top corner and they may go back up. I've done this in a few places around my usual usage areas and all seem to follow this trend. Im not saying that correlation leads to causation, but im just saying maybe we're overlooking something here.
This usually happens on the right side


However, I am puzzled that this would mean flesh interferes with radio waves...


Also, I'm not complaining or questioning why as I've read several other threads on this issue and side with those who think the bars mean nothing. I've been able to make perfectly good phone calls with 0 bars, no dropped calls, and perfect sound quality.

oddly enough, lately my bars seem to be more accurate. I have no idea why

My omnia had the antenna at the bottom. It actually had a sticker on it that cautioned you against holding it at the bottom, saying that it might interfere with reception.
 
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i'm on 2.1
and when my signal goes down to 0-2 bars
the signal reception is horrible

and i hate repeating myself over and over due
to breaking up on the phone

or sometimes my phone won't ring

this happens when I am not near my extended network box at home or school

however when i'm out...like when i was in florida
and my signal would go up to 3 bars or higher, the quality was near perfect to perfect
and I rarely hold my phone...it's usually bluetooth or speaker phone
so i am not sure about this argument
however it is something to think about it
 
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