My 4G has abandoned me!

July 2, 2012 7:44 PM

My Samsung Galaxy S2 phone is brand new (I got it only 3 weeks ago) and loses 4g connectivity every time I visit MIT. Connectivity does not come back when I leave the premises, however.

I've tried everything - turning on and off airplace mode, fiddling with the wireless settings, even turning the entire phone on and off. Nothing worked. Finally I was able to get it to reconnect by removing the sim card, then reinserting it.

However, it's a huge pain to have to do this every time I'm in a place that drops connectivity. Is there any way I can get it to reconnect without actually opening up my phone? If so, how? If not, how can I make life as difficult and costly as possible for Samsung (within reasonable limits, of course) so that they start to empathize with my frustration?

posted by wolfdreams01 to technology (6 answers total)

There might be an option in the Settings->Data area to disable 4g/3g and use only 2g. Maybe toggling that on and off when you come back to an area with signal will force it to re-connect?
posted by tiamat at 8:16 PM on July 2, 2012

Happened to my Samsung Droid Charge a LOT. It was awful. Eventually a Verizon rep admitted that it was a "known issue" with the device software's ability to switch between 3G and 4G and that replacing the device might not even help. Eventually, a firmware upgrade cut down the issues by a good 85%. I do remember the rep also suggesting that I try switching from LTE to CDMA in the network settings to see if that helped.
posted by julthumbscrew at 9:18 PM on July 2, 2012

On my S2, if I pull down the status bar at the top of the screen, it gives me icons for some common tasks. One of these icons is "4G", and by turning it on I'm able to connect to 4G. Also, make sure you aren't connected to WiFi when trying to access 4G, since you can only have one or the other.
posted by forforf at 7:54 AM on July 3, 2012

Forforf, on the Galaxy S2, the only icons "Wi-fi", "Bluetooth", "GPS", "Silent Mode", and "Auto-rotation". They're not menus, just on/off toggles. I'm wondering if maybe you or the sales guy may have set up 4G as a "common tasks" icon when you first bought the phone...?
posted by wolfdreams01 at 2:20 PM on July 3, 2012

You might be right that those common task icons are non-standard, and either created by Sprint or the sales guy (or perhaps by some software I installed). I'll have access to a brand new S2 in a few days and I'll see if it has the same icons as mine and if it has the same 4G behavior as yours.
posted by forforf at 3:58 PM on July 3, 2012 [1 favorite]

I did get the new phone and it has the same 4g icon as the old one. I haven't had a chance to try out the 4g yet.
posted by forforf at 12:50 PM on July 20, 2012