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I just want AirDrop to work!

V

viperGTS

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Nov 15, 2010
1,560
941
Seriously, I have tested it with 3 other iPhones already and NONE of them can find me! Before you ask, yes, everything has been set up properly! Wi-Fi/Bluetooth/AirDrop itself ALL enabled to EVERYONE with the screens turned on! My phone CANNOT be discovered by any others! In fact, in two iPhone 5's I tested, they were able to detect eachother but could NOT detect my phone!

Anyone else facing these issues? I just want AirDrop to work... I'm already on my 3rd 5s and I'd be very disappointed if I had to get my 4th replacement. :mad:

EDIT: Just sign out and back into your iCloud account. Should fix any issues with AirDrop. :)
 
Last edited:
Stupid question but what is your iPhone's name?

Mine says "Armen's iPhone" for example. Do you have some weird characters in the name?
 
I tried AirDrop for the first time, trying to use it to send some stuff to my Mac from my iPhone. I am upset with the fact that you can only use AirDrop iPhone to iPhone? Why isn't there a way to transfer stuff between different devices.
 
When my wife detects my phone on her's, it lists my wife's name. We have completely separate everything, so I have no idea what's going on.
 
Armen said:
Stupid question but what is your iPhone's name?

Mine says "Armen's iPhone" for example. Do you have some weird characters in the name?
Click to expand...

My name is just like yours. "******'s iPhone 5s" and it won't show up.
 
Airdrop only seems to work if the persons I am sending to has their phone screen on. Is that the only way it will work? I would have assumed it would work if their screen was off and it would pop up like a typical notification.
 
bigred7078 said:
Airdrop only seems to work if the persons I am sending to has their phone screen on. Is that the only way it will work? I would have assumed it would work if their screen was off and it would pop up like a typical notification.
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I just tried this also, if my IPhone screen is not on, my IPad doesn't see it.
 
I just email files. Takes less than 15 seconds, can send to anyone on any device. iMessage or MMS if it's a photo or video and it's to a mobile device.

AirDrop would be more useful to me if iOS had a better way of organizing stored files, like a more traditional file structure one could access, or a Documents folder, for example. Even then, still less convenient for me.
 
Altis said:
I just email files. Takes less than 15 seconds, can send to anyone on any device. iMessage or MMS if it's a photo or video and it's to a mobile device.

AirDrop would be more useful to me if iOS had a better way of organizing stored files, like a more traditional file structure one could access, or a Documents folder, for example. Even then, still less convenient for me.
Click to expand...

But sending a mail uses data, if you're not connected to a wifi-network. This might be important to many people
 
Shuri said:
But sending a mail uses data, if you're not connected to a wifi-network. This might be important to many people
Click to expand...

I should probably look into this first, but I thought you had to be on the same wifi as the other devices in order to airdrop. If so, there's your internet.
 
Altis said:
I should probably look into this first, but I thought you had to be on the same wifi as the other devices in order to airdrop. If so, there's your internet.
Click to expand...

I think it uses Bluetooth to create a peer-to-peer Wi-Fi network between the devices. So you wouldn't need the internet Wi-Fi conection for this.
 
Worked like a charm when I tested it between my iPad mini and an iPhone 5, I do think its ridiculous that it does not seem to work between iOS 7 and Mavericks though.
 
BvizioN said:
I think it uses Bluetooth to create a peer-to-peer Wi-Fi network between the devices. So you wouldn't need the internet Wi-Fi conection for this.
Click to expand...

Interesting. I'll look more into how it works. In any case, for me at least, it's pretty rare that it will fulfill a task better than MMS, email, iMessage... no setup required for those, and doesn't matter what device or computer receives it.
 
BvizioN said:
I think it uses Bluetooth to create a peer-to-peer Wi-Fi network between the devices. So you wouldn't need the internet Wi-Fi conection for this.
Click to expand...

Correct. Strange enough, AirDrop on OS X works differently and does not require BT. Not sure why they choose to implement it differently these two OS:es.

clystron said:
Worked like a charm when I tested it between my iPad mini and an iPhone 5, I do think its ridiculous that it does not seem to work between iOS 7 and Mavericks though.
Click to expand...

As mentioned above, the difference lies in that on iOS it requires BT, but on OS X not. Not sure the logic behind this, but I hope it is resolved in one way or another in future releases.
 
Altis said:
Interesting. I'll look more into how it works. In any case, for me at least, it's pretty rare that it will fulfill a task better than MMS, email, iMessage... no setup required for those, and doesn't matter what device or computer receives it.
Click to expand...

Like he said; It uses the Bluetooth Low Energy profile to engage the connection via WifiDirect. (Lack of WifiDirect capabilities on older devices like the iphone 4S explains the reason why they didn't have got AirDrop).

No setup required on AirDrop either, all you need is iOS 7 running on a newer device and an iCloud Account (which I'd see as given mostly).

And I'm pretty sure, that developers can extend the functionality of AirDrop even further, using its API, if there is one.
 
Air Drop is finicky at best and only works in certain situations
First the person receiving must have their IPhone on and not in sleep mode. AirDrop will not wake anyone's IPhone to receive Also keep in mind that other Bluetooth enabled devices in the room might interfere Also keep in mind that while Airdrop is supposed to work for 30 feet, your case, interference, etc will limit how far it works It's not the greatest technology .....If anything far from it
 
Jimbo47 said:
I tried AirDrop for the first time, trying to use it to send some stuff to my Mac from my iPhone. I am upset with the fact that you can only use AirDrop iPhone to iPhone? Why isn't there a way to transfer stuff between different devices.
Click to expand...

Just tested this and was able to Airdrop photo from phone to iPad.
 
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