Reports of Slow and Inconsistent Wi-Fi Connections on Some iPhone 5 Devices

[goinskiing]

I thought it was just me, but appears to be a real issue. I have 50Mbps internet at home and was getting about 1.5Mbps. My LTE gets about 9Mbps so it's much faster until this is resolved, except there's a size lit on App Store downloads so garageband took forever.

 

[GeneralSpecial]

This is the first major system release at Apple since Steve died. It shows.

Yeah. Those several million other happy customers notwithstanding, of course.

The article describes what's clearly a wi-fi problem, not a phone problem. Unless the phone literally has a defective antenna (or defective system software), it's outside the phone. If it were the antenna, the signal would cut in and out frequently--or drop altogether. If it were defective system software, there'd be other significant problems.

It's not the software. Or the antenna. Or the phone.

And what I'd like to know is--when did this owner "call Applecare", exactly? There's no such place--there's only the AppleCare support plan, and Apple support.

 

[TonyC28]

Mine is fast. I think these reports are fake.

Total BS I have iPhone 5 my wifi works absolutely fine, some people like to rain on everyone's parade. This is the best smartphone out there, some people just want to see it fail.

Written on my iPhone 5.

I haven't even received my iPhone 5 yet so I can't compare results. But I wanted to ask you two, is it possible that maybe some people, as the article states, are having issues and you two fall into the group that isn't having problems?

 

[Sean1]

Had this problem with one of the phones (black 16GB) that I ordered. Tried setting it up Friday night and realized that the wifi connection would keep dropping out. Connection would die off 6 ft from my router and LTE would take over. I literally had to place the phone on top of my router to get a full wifi connection on the phone. Tested this against my other iPhone 5 (white 32gb) that had worked perfectly out of the box. Seems like the wifi antenna was not properly connected maybe?
Took into my local apple store saturday afternoon and let them know what was up. They ran a few quick tests, determined that the phone was bad and replaced it with a brand new black 16 GB. Now, no more wifi connection problems with the new phone.

 

[GeneralSpecial]

I haven't even received my iPhone 5 yet so I can't compare results. But I wanted to ask you two, is it possible that maybe some people, as the article states, are having issues and you two fall into the group that isn't having problems?

I've received mine, but I've heard reports of militant geese breaking into houses and stealing iPhone 5's. This hasn't happened to me, but obviously it must be real--because somebody posted it in a comments section (which is what this story is based on).

 

[CrAkD]

Mine seems fixed. I'm getting 22 down 25 up on a 5ghz wifi signal. Someone kicked the plug out of the modem today but that shouldn't have mattered since I connect through a time capsule

 

[GeneralSpecial]

Took into my local apple store saturday afternoon and let them know what was up. They ran a few quick tests, determined that the phone was bad and replaced it with a brand new black 16 GB. Now, no more wifi connection problems with the new phone.

Uh huh. Which is interesting, since no Apple store in the US has regular stock of iPhone 5's as of Friday night. Which specific store did you visit? I'd like to get another iPhone 5.

 

[jonnysods]

Early adopter pains....

Hopefully this will get fixed pretty quick.

 

[Sean1]

Uh huh. Which is interesting, since no Apple store in the US has regular stock of iPhone 5's as of Friday night. Which specific store did you visit? I'd like to get another iPhone 5.

Burlingame, CA. They brought out a brand new unit unboxed it and set it up. Dunno what their stock is like for this phone. More than likely I just got lucky that day.

 

[ghostface147]

This has been a problem since the iOS 5 days. Sometimes it connects fine (when ping time is around 18 ms) and most of the times it is slow (ping is 30 ms). Annoying.

 

[SonoViva]

Oddly enough, I inadvertently noticed this running some speed tests! My iPhone 5 is getting slower speeds from my WPA2 AirPort than my 4 did, but was incredibly fast on my dad's WEP-protected WiFi. Meh. I have an iPhone 5 so I'm happy, and don't really care. Even on the WPA2 at my house, it's still fast enough.

 

[duffman9000]

I think it's a problem with IOS6. I am having the same problem with my third generation of the IPAD. It takes a long time to download software and movies. I have the FIOS updated speed>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Wifi performance on my 4S is terrible on my usually reliable home connection. I can't explain why it's so bad right now.

 

[joekun]

Are any of these problems with AirPort Extreme?

I've been having the issue since Friday with my time capsule. I also have an AT&T microcell, so when I switch wifi off after it gets ridiculously slow, I'm still using the same data connection, but through the microcell instead of directly through my time capsule.

 

[Monk Edsel]

My first gen iPad won't connect to my router at work. My dad's HP laptop won't connect to the AirPort Express I bought him for Christmas, but it does connect to his new AirPort Extreme just fine. As with people, particular machines just don't play well with some others.

Most people are having zero issues. It sucks for those that are, though. Hopefully, Apple can remedy that; the rest of us are in heaven. iPhone 5 is awesome.

 

[SparkyGa]

For those with Problems

I am not sure if this will help but if you are connecting to a wifi on 5GHZ what wide band are yo using? I am using 149 and 153 auto - but if I set one then I am having problems. Also have an Airport Extreme in the home as well and there has been issues using that all the same.

Can't hurt to try.

 

[SparkyGa]

Try This

My first gen iPad won't connect to my router at work. My dad's HP laptop won't connect to the AirPort Express I bought him for Christmas, but it does connect to his new AirPort Extreme just fine. As with people, particular machines just don't play well with some others.

Most people are having zero issues. It sucks for those that are, though. Hopefully, Apple can remedy that; the rest of us are in heaven. iPhone 5 is awesome.

I bet the AirPort is on Dual band and the airport Extreme is just set to use a 5ghz band, or maybe I have it backwards.

 

[richard371]

Both my ipad 3 and iPhone 5 have full reception on wifi. Speedtest shows I have 25mbpps wired. My air gets about 20. My ipad used to get 18 to 20 now with ios 6 it gets about 5 or 6. iPhone 5 is not far behind at 4 to 5 Mbps. Tonight I had an issue where I could not access any data on the iPhone even though it showed I had full strength. Tried cellular and it was fine. I'm not sure how this could be a hardware issue since it was fine on my ipad before 6. I'm going to not connect to wifi on my iPhone until we get something more solid.

I've tried every permeation and combination of router settings and nothing helps.

 

[SparkyGa]

Made changes to airport

I made some changes to the AirPort / Set the channel for your 5ghz from auto to channel 149 and 153. It seemed to help out for my second network and not receiving the speeds that I pay for on that network as well - we have two networks in the home for a fail-over; wife and I both work from home.

 

[Gorge]

My wifi barely works. It rarely sees any wifi connections. My iPhone 4 sees around 10 possible connections. When/if I do get it to connect to a wifi, it'll stay connected for a few seconds and get kicked off.

I also have bluetooth issues where it won't connect to my Alpine INE-S920HD for more than 2 seconds. Pretty frustrating, but oh well. Waiting for Alpine or Apple to confirm who needs to release a patch.

I did speak with AppleCare on Saturday and the tech confirmed that Apple is aware of Bluetooth and Wifi issues.

 

[IFinancials]

This fixed my slow iphone 5

Fix: Do Settings/General/Reset/Reset Network, then put word "test" in Client ID under ur router name, then press Renew Lease

This "mostly" fixed my black 32GB Verizon iPhone 5 compared to my iPhone 4S on Cisco Router running WPA2

On iPhone 5 now only 1/3 slower and uploads only 10%-20% slower compared to iPhone 4S running IOS 5.1.1

Before fix the downloads would just crap out.

Don't ask why this works - it is a bug work around.

 

[Mengels7]

And what I'd like to know is--when did this owner "call Applecare", exactly? There's no such place--there's only the AppleCare support plan, and Apple support.

No, there's Applecare on the phone. When I called in on launch day for issues I was informed I was speaking to AppleCare. They even transferred me to a separate Apple Customer Support at some point who got feisty with me and claimed she couldn't do the stuff AppleCare said she could.

 

[gri]

This is the first major system release at Apple since Steve died. It shows.

Forgot antennagate?

Or do you refer to iOS?

 

[lenard]

Everything is cool here, actually wifi on the iphone 5 seems faster than it was on my iphone 4. Alls good.

 

[Trek2100]

Everything is good here. Just checked my original iPad and the iPhone 5 on my WiFi and I get the full 15/5 on both devices. LTE on the iPhone is amazing. Perhaps I'm one of the lucky couple of million or so owners. As in the past, the vast majority do not seem to have issues. The only issue I ever had was with the first iPad and a Verizon router where the connection would constantly drop. I bought an AirPort extreme and have had no problems since.

I hope anyone with a problem gets it resolved soon.

 

[jctevere]

Mine tests fine. The speedtest app actually doesn't test long enough for my needle to stop rising on wifi. I have the 50mbps download / 25mbps upload FIOS package. No problems on 2.4GHz or 5GHz - WPA2 encryption password and all... Go figure?

For what its worth I have a 64GB black iPhone?