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Verizon iPhone Download cancels on a text received?

M

MauiGideon

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 5, 2008
173
0
So I was downloading an app and when I received a text I got a pop up error saying something along the lines of couldn't connect to server. I went to go check my download and it stopped.

I knew verizon CDMA couldn't handle data and voice at same time, but I thought we could at lease download a file and text at the same time.

Was this a coincidence or will this really happen all the time?
 
text messages are transported over the network by being embedded between voice signaling packets sent between the phone and nearest tower, therefore it's a voice operation and not data (texts do not travel over the evdo connection), for all intents and purposes.

MMS, on the other hand, are a combination of voice and data... the notification and message is sent via the the voice network, same as SMS, but the attached media is transported over the data connection.

SMS stands for "short mail system" or "short messaging system" and was designed to take advantage of these 160 character blank packets that occur normally for voice connectivity.

and that is why it interfered with your download.

as you probably already know, the only way to circumvent this for now is to use wifi whenever possible.


i know my terminology is probably all messed up, but that's the basic mechanics of how SMS works and why it'll interfere with your data connection.
 
Last edited:
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)

Dang...so voice and data is a bit more than not being able to look up Internet on the phone.
 
This is a pretty big limitation that I haven't previously heard about.

The more I think about how many types of applications this could impact, this is huge.
 
I'm in the uk so not an issue for me but I'm surprised at this. Can you imagine streaming internet radio on 3g and someones sends you a text and the streaming stops. Oh dear... Are you sure it wasn't just a bug? I can't believe it would be this limited
 
oakie said:
text messages are transported over the network by being embedded between voice signaling packets sent between the phone and nearest tower, therefore it's a voice operation and not data (texts do not travel over the evdo connection), for all intents and purposes.

MMS, on the other hand, are a combination of voice and data... the notification and message is sent via the the voice network, same as SMS, but the attached media is transported over the data connection.

SMS stands for "short mail system" or "short messaging system" and was designed to take advantage of these 160 character blank packets that occur normally for voice connectivity.

and that is why it interfered with your download.

as you probably already know, the only way to circumvent this for now is to use wifi whenever possible.


i know my terminology is probably all messed up, but that's the basic mechanics of how SMS works and why it'll interfere with your data connection.
Click to expand...
Partly wrong. SMS does NOT interfere with data on Verizon phones and they can be sent and received while on a call.
I have an HTC Incredible on Verizon currently (at least until UPS comes) and text messages do not interfere with anything.
MMS is different, but SMS don't interrupt calls or data.
 
uhhh

I'm confused? You mean Verizon has flaws in their network and some people are going to complain/not be happy with it. I thought they could do no wrong and that AT&T was the worst thing to ever happen to cell phones. hahahaah

Again I have never had a problem with AT&T and my friend has a Droid Incredible and it's funny to see how the CDMA network limits you at times.
 
But I thought Verizon was sooooooooo much better??????

</sarcasm...>

The grass is not alwasy greener on the other side.... :D
 
LOL, I'll be sticking with ATT, with all the prior Verizon customers that switched to ATT for the iPhone, they will be leaving, and going back to verizon, freeing up airspace on ATT for current/existing customers...this will lead to even more improved speed/service for ATT.

;)
 
This should only occur when downloading an MMS message. SMS messages will not interfere with your data connection.
 
Honestly, I bet it's a software bug.

My Droid used to have the data connection freeze when it'd receive a text. Annoying as can be when streaming Pandora. A software update (not sure which one) fixed that issue and now I stream and send/receive texts without any interruptions.

If this is happening on the iPhone then users need to pressure Verizon/Apple into fixing it via a software update.
 
oakie said:
text messages are transported over the network by being embedded between voice signaling packets sent between the phone and nearest tower, therefore it's a voice operation and not data (texts do not travel over the evdo connection), for all intents and purposes.

MMS, on the other hand, are a combination of voice and data... the notification and message is sent via the the voice network, same as SMS, but the attached media is transported over the data connection.

SMS stands for "short mail system" or "short messaging system" and was designed to take advantage of these 160 character blank packets that occur normally for voice connectivity.

and that is why it interfered with your download.

as you probably already know, the only way to circumvent this for now is to use wifi whenever possible.


i know my terminology is probably all messed up, but that's the basic mechanics of how SMS works and why it'll interfere with your data connection.
Click to expand...

I read an article once that was about the 160 character limitation. It isn't because that's the size the blank packets are limited to, it's because the original creator of SMS did research to determine the average length of a text, and came to the conclusion that 160 characters was all you'd need.
 
This is most likely a software issue on Apple's part. I've had many Verizon phones in the past, most recently a Droid X and Blackberry Bold, and when I would get texts on them, my data connection stayed in touch.
 
gdjsnyder said:
This is most likely a software issue on Apple's part. I've had many Verizon phones in the past, most recently a Droid X and Blackberry Bold, and when I would get texts on them, my data connection stayed in touch.
Click to expand...

Exactly, this is not a Verizon issue but a software bug.
 
But I thought Verizon was sooooooooo much better??????
Click to expand...

Sigh. Don't the posters who write things like this realize how immature they sound? Nothing like publicly marking yourself as a kid, or at best, as an obnoxious person.

thetexan said:
Honestly, I bet it's a software bug.
Click to expand...

It could be one. If so, it's a little surprising if Verizon missed it in testing.

MauiGideon said:
So I was downloading an app and when I received a text I got a pop up error saying something along the lines of couldn't connect to server. I went to go check my download and it stopped.
Click to expand...

If it stopped (and it shouldn't have), then it should've started up again right away.

Did you get the error message right away? Or a few minutes later? That's important.

Under certain conditions, a phone could take several minutes to reconnect a paused data session. An app that has its own timeout, instead of depending on the comm system, could post an error.
 
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