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prism

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Dec 6, 2006
1,060
389
Before updating, I could force the phone to stick to 2G only, which is more reliable than the 3G coverage over here. Now the 3G on/off switch has been replaced by an LTE on/off switch and when switch off LTE, the phone keeps jumping between 2G and 3G, is this for real???
 

dsh3

macrumors 6502a
Apr 30, 2012
556
276
Denmark
Looks like it. Same thing on my unlocked iPhone 5 here in Denmark.

I, too, had to lock it to 2G because of the bad 3G coverage here in the area, and now I have barely any coverage at all. And even worse, there's no 4G/LTE network available at all on this carrier, so now I have nearly zero coverage on my phone. :mad:
 

Korican100

macrumors 65816
Oct 9, 2012
1,202
613
dont kno if you got the memo, but 2g is being phased out permanently. expect more loss of 2g to come in the following year
 

Marjamrob1

macrumors regular
Jul 19, 2012
114
0
2G is dying in America, Verizon and ATT will soon be dropping it. But yes it does, that actually happened to me on my iPhone 5 with 6.0.2
 

WillFisher

macrumors 6502
Feb 19, 2011
387
16
Here in the UK people still use 2G, but mainly for inside buildings.
Especially for the network 3, around where I live I can only get 2G inside a building, I find it impossible to get 3G in my house!
 

MattMJB0188

macrumors 68020
Dec 28, 2009
2,032
583
You all need to speak for yourselves!!! 2G is very much alive here with AT&T, despite having very strong HSPA+ and LTE coverage. I have an Android phone that allows you to force 2G only and the signal is very strong and it works as it should.

AT&T might have gotten rid of some its 2G towers but NOT all of them!!!

I feel the frustration of OP because I felt the same way last year with the 4S before I moved. Had one bar of 3G coverage and by turing it off I was able to get 4 bars of 2G and much better service.
 

0dev

macrumors 68040
Dec 22, 2009
3,947
24
127.0.0.1
Here in the UK people still use 2G, but mainly for inside buildings.
Especially for the network 3, around where I live I can only get 2G inside a building, I find it impossible to get 3G in my house!

Three disabled the 3G toggle in the first place anyway, they've done that with every phone they sell ever since they first started up. I still remember having one of those "teardrop" Nokia 7600 phones which had the disable 3G option greyed out on Three.

But yeah Three's coverage can be quite iffy. If I go across the road my signal drops from around four bars to virtually nothing. The thing is, though, Three has no 2G network, only 3G. When it says 2G it's actually roaming to O2's network, and Three has to pay O2 for that, so they don't want you using just 2G.
 

maflynn

macrumors Haswell
May 3, 2009
73,470
43,392
Here on verizon I could not choose 2G. I could disable LTE, but I had no way to disable 3G.
 

WillFisher

macrumors 6502
Feb 19, 2011
387
16
But yeah Three's coverage can be quite iffy. If I go across the road my signal drops from around four bars to virtually nothing. The thing is, though, Three has no 2G network, only 3G. When it says 2G it's actually roaming to O2's network, and Three has to pay O2 for that, so they don't want you using just 2G.

Did not realise that AT ALL. Thanks for that.
My contract ends in around 4 months, the unlimited data won't keep me this time!
 

0dev

macrumors 68040
Dec 22, 2009
3,947
24
127.0.0.1
Did not realise that AT ALL. Thanks for that.
My contract ends in around 4 months, the unlimited data won't keep me this time!

No problem.

What network will you be switching to? I'm on Three just because they're the only network I could find with reasonably priced unlimited data which allowed tethering and didn't come with fair use limits. If I can tether without limits for a decent price on another network I might move. I'm just on a rolling contract.
 

WillFisher

macrumors 6502
Feb 19, 2011
387
16
No problem.

What network will you be switching to? I'm on Three just because they're the only network I could find with reasonably priced unlimited data which allowed tethering and didn't come with fair use limits. If I can tether without limits for a decent price on another network I might move. I'm just on a rolling contract.

Well I'm unsure at the moment, I don't use as much data as I thought, therefore I'm going to be looking for around 2GB of Data. And even then, I don't tether, so I'm in a slightly different situation.
I've been with O2, Orange, 3 and Vodaphone, and I found Orange and O2 where the best, in both signal strength and customer service, so I recon I'll go with either O2 or EE possibly, especially with the 4G price drops in the next few weeks might give a few 3G prices drop, who knows!
 

0dev

macrumors 68040
Dec 22, 2009
3,947
24
127.0.0.1
Well I'm unsure at the moment, I don't use as much data as I thought, therefore I'm going to be looking for around 2GB of Data. And even then, I don't tether, so I'm in a slightly different situation.
I've been with O2, Orange, 3 and Vodaphone, and I found Orange and O2 where the best, in both signal strength and customer service, so I recon I'll go with either O2 or EE possibly, especially with the 4G price drops in the next few weeks might give a few 3G prices drop, who knows!

Yeah I might sign up to EE, especially since they have such wide 2G and 3G coverage, but I'll be waiting until prices drop and 4G rolls out to my area first, and I will need unlimited data so I'll wait until they can provide that because with unlimited LTE I really won't need broadband anymore at all :D

I was on O2 which had good coverage but, around my way at least, the network itself was unreliable.

I'll have to shop around and see what kind of data I can get, but last I checked no other network could match Three for data.
 

KPOM

macrumors P6
Oct 23, 2010
18,026
7,868
Looks like it. Same thing on my unlocked iPhone 5 here in Denmark.

I, too, had to lock it to 2G because of the bad 3G coverage here in the area, and now I have barely any coverage at all. And even worse, there's no 4G/LTE network available at all on this carrier, so now I have nearly zero coverage on my phone. :mad:

dont kno if you got the memo, but 2g is being phased out permanently. expect more loss of 2g to come in the following year

Don't know if you got the memo, but the USA isn't the only country in the world, nor AT&T the only carrier. :rolleyes:

The 2G/3G toggle is actually something built into the carrier settings. The iPhone 4S dropped support for that toggle on AT&T in 2011, and the iPhone 5 never had it here. My guess is that the carriers requested that Apple drop the toggle, perhaps because the carrier wants to deprecate the 2G network to make room for more 3G or LTE coverage later. Note that Apple has a bit more sway than usual in the carrier settings (they won't activate LTE, for instance, until they have tested the network), but the carriers still have a lot of say into what goes into the settings.
 
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