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Verizon Iphone - The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

J

JustLeft

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Sep 20, 2007
286
0
I preordered mine and received it on the 7th. I ported my number from AT&T whereupon the fun began.

The Good
- I get excellent coverage with the ip4 and the voice quality is flawless. Definitely better than my AT&T ip4.
- No dropped calls in the last 2 days.

The Bad
- Data speeds have been horrible. From < 90 kbs (down) to a high of 540 kbs. I have made a number of calls to Verizon over the last two days trying to get this resolved. No one has been able to resolve the issue. On my last call they generated a ticket. During the last two days my download speed during the business day was 0. Using Nice Trace (great app!) and pointing to www.verizonwireless.com I see delays at each hop with substantial packet loss, up to and exceeding 100%. All IPs that are experiencing packet loss are verizon servers.
- It took a day to get visual voicemail set up on my account. Two of the individuals I spoke with took my number and promised to call me back. They never did.

The Ugly
- GPS - it is much slower to acquire a lock than my AT&T iphone. Once it gets a lock it loses it easily. For example, on my way home tonight I launched Navigon, set the iphone on the dash as far forward as it could go, selected 'take me home' and had a clear view to the sky. While driving it warned me on 3 different occasions that it was losing its' lock and was accurate to 90 meters. A four mile drive and losing the location lock 3 times. When I came to a stop light the location would jump around, not knowing which direction I was heading. This never happened on my AT&T ip4. I also tested the GPS with Runkeeper. I used this program frequently with my AT&T ip4, without issue. On the Verizon iphone it was 1/3 of a mile off, with a GPS lock.

I am torn as to keeping this phone. The data issues could be resolved, but the GPS issues could mean my phone is defective. I know this GPS is now on an integrated chip and it's performance may not be as good as the dedicated GPS chip.
 
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The best I ever owned was the 3GS.

Now I have both a GSM iP4, and a CDMA iP4.

My verdict is a tie. Both have issues, neither is far superior to the other.

What I'm happy about is Verizon reveals Apple has work to do on the iPhone. That's the good news with Android hot on their heels.

Its time for Apple to focus and create a great Iphone 5.
 
Very good information. I am torn between the two. I am thinking of purchasing a Verizon phone in the morning and just compare the two for my location.

Thanks for sharing. Voice is very important to me, but also stinks if everything else is going to suck.
 
The GPS problem is disappointing.

The GPS signal shouldn't have anything to do with Verizon vs. AT&T. The phone has a GPS antenna and it should just lock onto a GPS signal.

The problems would indicated the Verizon iPhone 4 has a weak or faulty GPS antenna. It's surprising considering they put GPS antennas inside tiny little bike/jogging devices that track GPS statistics.
 
JustLeft said:
I preordered mine and received it on the 7th. I ported my number from AT&T whereupon the fun began.

The Good
- I get excellent coverage with the ip4 and the voice quality is flawless. Definitely better than my AT&T ip4.
- No dropped calls in the last 2 days.

The Bad
- Data speeds have been horrible. From < 9 mbs (down) to a high of 540 mbs. I have made a number of calls to Verizon over the last two days trying to get this resolved. No one has been able to resolve the issue. On my last call they generated a ticket. During the last two days my download speed during the business day was 0. Using Nice Trace (great app!) and pointing to www.verizonwireless.com I see delays at each hop with substantial packet loss, up to and exceeding 100%. All IPs that are experiencing packet loss are verizon servers.
- It took a day to get visual voicemail set up on my account. Two of the individuals I spoke with took my number and promised to call me back. They never did.

The Ugly
- GPS - it is much slower to acquire a lock than my AT&T iphone. Once it gets a lock it loses it easily. For example, on my way home tonight I set the iphone on the dash as far forward as it could go - had a clear view to the sky. While driving it warned me on 3 different occasions that it was losing its' lock and was accurate to 90 meters. A four mile drive and losing the location lock 3 times. When I came to a stop light the location would jump around, not knowing which direction I was heading. This never happened on my AT&T ip4. I also tested the GPS with Runkeeper. I used this program frequently with my AT&T ip4, without issue. On the Verizon iphone it was 1/3 of a mile off, with a GPS lock.

I am torn as to keeping this phone. The data issues could be resolved, but the GPS issues could mean my phone is defective. I know this GPS is now on an integrated chip and it's performance may not be as good as the dedicated GPS chip.
Click to expand...

I admit that Verizon voice is flawless and better than AT&T. However how much better. Ok I might get 1-3 drop calls a month compared to 0 from my Verizon counterparts in my area. Yes with AT&T I drop calls occasionally but not like what the hype says. The hype says if you are with AT&T 'you can't hear me now'. Not true for the most part and as a whole.

The question is... Is this possibly controlled and temporary by Verizon cause they don't want to get caught with their pants down with network congestion? Is it possible that they learned a lesson what happened to AT&T? If this is the case maybe eventually once Verizon knows the numbers of data hungry iPhone users they may 'turn it up'. Verizon IMO must be sort if scared and apprehensive because of what happened to AT&T in certain areas?

Or it can be that the Verizon CDMA network isn't best for the data hungry iPhone. It's a fact that as far as data goes GSM is a better fit.

I'll trade occasional dropped calls and better data for flawless voice and inferior data.
 
When you are talking about data speeds, don't you mean .9 Mbps, or 9 Kbps? Currently there are few if any phone capable of 9 Mbps, and zero capable of 540 Kbps. Regardless, you will find that VZW's network is much slower than at&t's. Also, I don't believe the data source for the Assisted GPS has been updated to reflect the locations of VZW's towers, so that may also be an issue, since it is relying on Wireless networks instead to assist with the GPS.

TEG
 
- removed section for my stupidity -

I would trade occassional dropped calls, but in my case it was much worse than that. On one trip to NY I dropped every call I made over 2 days.

mpossoff said:
snip... snip...
Or it can be that the Verizon CDMA network isn't best for the data hungry iPhone. It's a fact that as far as data goes GSM is a better fit.

I'll trade occasional dropped calls and better data for flawless voice and inferior data.
Click to expand...
 
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JustLeft said:
GSM doesn't do data well. My understanding is AT&T uses WCDMA for data, which is licensed from Qualcomm. It is CDMA technology. Others have posted detailed explanations of the technology at use.

I would trade occassional dropped calls, but in my case it was much worse than that. On one trip to NY I dropped every call I made over 2 days.
Click to expand...

GSM doesn't do data well? It does data better than CDMA.
 
.09 mega bits per second or 90 kps. Thanks for the catch, will correct it in my post.

TEG said:
When you are talking about data speeds, don't you mean .9 Mbps, or 9 Kbps? Currently there are few if any phone capable of 9 Mbps, and zero capable of 540 Kbps. Regardless, you will find that VZW's network is much slower than at&t's. Also, I don't believe the data source for the Assisted GPS has been updated to reflect the locations of VZW's towers, so that may also be an issue, since it is relying on Wireless networks instead to assist with the GPS.

TEG
Click to expand...

Yes, seems I confused UTMS with WCDMA. Noted. Logged.

mpossoff said:
GSM doesn't do data well? It does data better than CDMA.
Click to expand...
 
Last edited by a moderator:
On GPS, you mentioned that the Assisted GPS hasn't been update to reflect the locations of Verizons towers. I could understand that might impact the time to location identification, but how would that cause the GPS to lose signal while having a clear view to the sky?

TEG said:
When you are talking about data speeds, don't you mean .9 Mbps, or 9 Kbps? Currently there are few if any phone capable of 9 Mbps, and zero capable of 540 Kbps. Regardless, you will find that VZW's network is much slower than at&t's. Also, I don't believe the data source for the Assisted GPS has been updated to reflect the locations of VZW's towers, so that may also be an issue, since it is relying on Wireless networks instead to assist with the GPS.

TEG
Click to expand...
 
So far from what I read today is that the Verizon iPhone has a lot of little annoying problems, nothing good, lots of disappointed new owners.

But hey, if you finally get to maintain a call with Verizon, good for you :)

The Good-You get to maintain a phone call, no dropped calls. Hurray!

The Bad-Slow 3G speeds
-No simultaneous voice/data
-GPS problem
-Capping speeds
-FaceTime activation troubles
 
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JustLeft said:
- removed section for my stupidity -

I would trade occassional dropped calls, but in my case it was much worse than that. On one trip to NY I dropped every call I made over 2 days.
Click to expand...

JustLeft said:
On GPS, you mentioned that the Assisted GPS hasn't been update to reflect the locations of Verizons towers. I could understand that might impact the time to location identification, but how would that cause the GPS to lose signal while having a clear view to the sky?
Click to expand...

Because it's possible your 3G can't keep up. You need 3G signal for maps.
 
Hmmm.....

The Good is that it doesn't drop calls at all really
The Bad is that the only data plan is the expensive $30 a month extra. It's not a bad price, but there needs to be a cheaper option
The Ugly is the really bad internet 3G and downloads.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
At my office I would drop an average of 25% of my calls. I get a strong signal at my office with repeaters throughout the building. Signal strength is not the issue. There are a large number of AT&T iphone users in the immediate vicinity.

Over a 3 month period I carried a Verizon Droid X. During that time I dropped 1 call. Hence the reason for moving to Verizon.

I know others who have AT&T iphones and don't suffer the dropped calls that I do. Most of their calls are short duration. I tend to live on conference calls which can last an hour or more.

mpossoff said:
How about your area/region in regards to dropped calls?
Click to expand...

I am using Navigon. The maps are loaded locally on the phone, not pulled down over the air. No data connection needed.

mpossoff said:
Because it's possible your 3G can't keep up. You need 3G signal for maps.
Click to expand...
 
Last edited by a moderator:
There's already several threads about data speeds. We know AT&T is faster. And T-Mobile is faster still. But AT&T's coverage for some of us is the limiting factor. This, for me, makes Verizon the preferred carrier in my area. On VZW I'm getting around 1.5Mbit/sec down and 0.7Mbit/sec up, so I'm content.

I still have my AT&T iPhone 4, which eventually I'll be giving to someone.

As for the GPS, while I've only had the phone for 36 hours, the few times I've played with the Maps app and other GPS-enabled apps (like Bing maps, which I find to be more up-to-date - Bing has an arial view of my house while Google Maps arial views are from before the entire neighborhood existed) seem just as accurate as the AT&T version of the iPhone 4.

But I will put it through its paces tomorrow with Navigon to see how it does since the OP brought up his concern.
 
JustLeft said:
I preordered mine and received it on the 7th. I ported my number from AT&T whereupon the fun began.

The Good
- I get excellent coverage with the ip4 and the voice quality is flawless. Definitely better than my AT&T ip4.
- No dropped calls in the last 2 days.

The Bad
- Data speeds have been horrible. From < 90 kbs (down) to a high of 540 kbs. I have made a number of calls to Verizon over the last two days trying to get this resolved. No one has been able to resolve the issue. On my last call they generated a ticket. During the last two days my download speed during the business day was 0. Using Nice Trace (great app!) and pointing to www.verizonwireless.com I see delays at each hop with substantial packet loss, up to and exceeding 100%. All IPs that are experiencing packet loss are verizon servers.
- It took a day to get visual voicemail set up on my account. Two of the individuals I spoke with took my number and promised to call me back. They never did.

The Ugly
- GPS - it is much slower to acquire a lock than my AT&T iphone. Once it gets a lock it loses it easily. For example, on my way home tonight I launched Navigon, set the iphone on the dash as far forward as it could go, selected 'take me home' and had a clear view to the sky. While driving it warned me on 3 different occasions that it was losing its' lock and was accurate to 90 meters. A four mile drive and losing the location lock 3 times. When I came to a stop light the location would jump around, not knowing which direction I was heading. This never happened on my AT&T ip4. I also tested the GPS with Runkeeper. I used this program frequently with my AT&T ip4, without issue. On the Verizon iphone it was 1/3 of a mile off, with a GPS lock.

I am torn as to keeping this phone. The data issues could be resolved, but the GPS issues could mean my phone is defective. I know this GPS is now on an integrated chip and it's performance may not be as good as the dedicated GPS chip.
Click to expand...

exact same findings I've had. Still have my att iP4 though so I have options at least :/
 
Please post your observations. I figure Verizon will figure out the data issues, the GPS issue is another story. I have never (on my AT&T ip4) gotten the red bar at the top of navigon saying my accuracy was now within 90 meters.

xraydoc said:
But I will put it through its paces tomorrow with Navigon to see how it does since the OP brought up his concern.
Click to expand...
 
JustLeft said:
My reason for switching was to eliminate all the dropped calls I was encountering. Some days 50% of my calls dropped on AT&T. Replaced the phone a few times, issues remained. If not for that, I would stay with AT&T.

If the data speeds and the GPS issues are not eliminated I will be returning to AT&T.
Click to expand...

DATA Speeds will not be fixed. They are not spending their money in old technology anymore. LTE is where it's at and the iphone 4 does not support it. That is why I am waiting for Verizon to release next year the LTE version.

You should just come back now get your old iphone and stay put. AT&T will let you back in your old plan no contract within a certain timeframe of leaving.
 
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