Connectivity Icon for 950XL - 4G vs LTE

[StephenWagner7]

So I've had the 950 XL for a couple months now (using Rogers in Canada). For the most part it's mostly been on LTE (L) if I remember.

As of this morning I'm noticing it now says 4G... I've never seen this before, it's always rotated between H, H+, L, LTE.

Now it rotates between H, H+, and 4G.

In one area with bad reception I usually get 75% reception on H+ and 1 bar on LTE. Since the change I'm getting 75% on H+, and 1 bar on 4G.

Just wondering if there was some update or something pushed out that may have rebadged LTE to 4G?

Only thing that's changed is I picked up a WIND sim for the second sim slot. I have the SIM turned off though for the WIND sim. For a couple days I still got L symbol with the second SIM insert, only appeared today.

Is this happening to anyone else?

 

[StephenWagner7]

Just a follow up....

Found "Net Check Pro" on the app store. Paid/Downloaded...

While the phone states 4G in the notification center. Opening the app, it states it's connected at 4G LTE....

Interesting...

 

[Joe920]

Just a follow up....

Found "Net Check Pro" on the app store. Paid/Downloaded...

While the phone states 4G in the notification center. Opening the app, it states it's connected at 4G LTE....

Interesting...

Indeed, at least to me! I just came from an ATT store where we tried to get LTE working on my 950XL. Used the IMEI from my old 1020, but it still won't show LTE. It showed it for maybe 5 seconds at some point, and then disappeared. They told me to put user name nxtgenhone in the APN profile, but tbh it's a provisioning thing, not fixable via the user name field. Sadface..

 

[Krystianpants]

I'm on rogers in Toronto. Always shows rogers L. 950xl, firmware 15506, os: .63 insider build

 

[StephenWagner7]

I'm on rogers in Toronto. Always shows rogers L. 950xl, firmware 15506, os: .63 insider build

It has for me too, until the other day...

The only thing that could have caused anything on my side is the fact I put a WIND sim in the second SIM slot... It still showed LTE for 2 days and then stopped...

Called Rogers, they said they don't blacklist devices from LTE connectivity... It's just weird... Even with the WIND SIM disabled, it only shows Rogers at 4G...

When I take the Rogers SIM out and put it in my 1020 with 10 on it, it shows LTE, when I put it back in the 950 XL it only shows 4G...

I still don't know what to think about this...

It's interesting that the Net Check app says that 4G is LTE... And I find it interesting that the bar count matches the bar count when I had LTE, but now in 4G....

I just don't get why the icons would change... Not sure if it is the icon itself changing, the fact I have two SIMs (I usually always keep the WIND SIM disabled), or what????

I just installed Windows Insider, going to update to latest insider build and see what happens...

 

[StephenWagner7]

Just an update.... I guess 4G does mean LTE????? I loaded up the Microsoft Field Test app, check these screenshots out....




Notice that the notification center says 4G... When you swipe down it says "Rogers 4G"... But LTE field test menu shows this...

 

[Krystianpants]

It has for me too, until the other day...

The only thing that could have caused anything on my side is the fact I put a WIND sim in the second SIM slot... It still showed LTE for 2 days and then stopped...

Called Rogers, they said they don't blacklist devices from LTE connectivity... It's just weird... Even with the WIND SIM disabled, it only shows Rogers at 4G...

When I take the Rogers SIM out and put it in my 1020 with 10 on it, it shows LTE, when I put it back in the 950 XL it only shows 4G...

I still don't know what to think about this...

It's interesting that the Net Check app says that 4G is LTE... And I find it interesting that the bar count matches the bar count when I had LTE, but now in 4G....

I just don't get why the icons would change... Not sure if it is the icon itself changing, the fact I have two SIMs (I usually always keep the WIND SIM disabled), or what????

I just installed Windows Insider, going to update to latest insider build and see what happens...

Rogers has 2 types of 4G. The first being the 3.5G network that was always considered 4G. And then it has Rogers LTE advanced which is true LTE. So you may not just be getting the new LTE advanced network. Now did you remove the Wind sim instead of disabling it and try that? It would be good to test that and then provide feedback to MS if that indeed causes the issue. Again W10 has its quirks and it could just be the icons. You can always do a speed test in both scenarios too.

 

[Joe920]

Just an update.... I guess 4G does mean LTE????? I loaded up the Microsoft Field Test app, check these screenshots out.... Notice that the notification center says 4G... When you swipe down it says "Rogers 4G"... But LTE field test menu shows this...

Exact same result on ATT GoPhone. I wasted half an our in the ATT store, but dialing ##3282# from the phone app and selecting LTE to see the status, mine also says that LTE is "in service" while the status icon says 4G. If it's just a bug in the status icon I'm at once happy that it works and annoyed for the time wasted! Next up: speed test.

Edit: getting 20 Mbps down 8 Mbps up, so I guess 4G means LTE now. Sheesh!

 

[StephenWagner7]

Rogers has 2 types of 4G. The first being the 3.5G network that was always considered 4G. And then it has Rogers LTE advanced which is true LTE. So you may not just be getting the new LTE advanced network. Now did you remove the Wind sim instead of disabling it and try that? It would be good to test that and then provide feedback to MS if that indeed causes the issue. Again W10 has its quirks and it could just be the icons. You can always do a speed test in both scenarios too.

Before I did any of the screenshots... A couple days ago, I completely removed the WIND SIM. Turned off/on the phone, and then did an additional soft-reset... Made sure all the settings were good, and nothing was wrong. I was all over the city. I even stopped 50 meters away from a cell tower.. Had full reception, but it stayed on "4G" (net check app reported it was LTE). I also did a soft-reset, and then did a network search, chose automatic (for the hell of it, even though it was already automatic)... It still stayed on 4G....

Left it like that for the rest of the day. No change whatsoever. When placing calls, it changes from 4G, to H, or H+, and then when the call is done it goes back to 4G (same behavior as LTE).

Literally, the only thing I haven't tried is a hard-reset... I just don't want to do that and have to re-link all my contacts (I have a ton, and contacts never self re-link after hard resets)...

It's odd, because I've taken the SIM out and put it in a 1020... 1020 shows L
A 920 on my corporate account also shows L, it's just the 950 (that shows the same bars when it goes to 4G), that shows 4G...


Is there any way inside of the field test to tell if it's on the LTE Advanced network?

 

[StephenWagner7]

Exact same result on ATT GoPhone. I wasted half an our in the ATT store, but dialing ##3282# from the phone app and selecting LTE to see the status, mine also says that LTE is "in service" while the status icon says 4G. If it's just a bug in the status icon I'm at once happy that it works and annoyed for the time wasted! Next up: speed test.

Edit: getting 20 Mbps down 8 Mbps up, so I guess 4G means LTE now. Sheesh!

In your case I wouldn't be convinced... That speed also fits in with H, and H+ (HSPA HSUPA+)... Do me a favour and load up the "Net Check" app from the app store... And tell me what it says on the top left...

 

[Cosmyc]

I don't understand the problem, 4G is LTE, as 3.5G+ is HSUPA+, as well 2.5G is EDGE and so on... nothing new, is normal and the same.

 

[StephenWagner7]

I don't understand the problem, 4G is LTE, as 3.5G+ is HSUPA+, as well 2.5G is EDGE and so on... nothing new, is normal and the same.

My 950XL was showing L or LTE for the longest time until recently... I'm trying to find out if it's lost the ability to do LTE Advanced, or if something has been disabled... Trying to find out if this is normal behaviour, or a bug or something, or a result of adding a second SIM card...

There's a known issue in the U.S. with AT&T users with the 950 XL not getting LTE... I'm trying to find out exactly what "4G" means, and why my device all of a sudden changed...

 

[Cosmyc]

My 950XL was showing L or LTE for the longest time until recently... I'm trying to find out if it's lost the ability to do LTE Advanced, or if something has been disabled... Trying to find out if this is normal behaviour, or a bug or something, or a result of adding a second SIM card...

There's a known issue in the U.S. with AT&T users with the 950 XL not getting LTE... I'm trying to find out exactly what "4G" means, and why my device all of a sudden changed...

In my country (Spain) LTE Advanced is also called 4G+, I don't have that signal in my area to know what name displays my 950 but because it varies between different phones like ones showing H+ and others 3.5G+ albeit being the same signal.

My 950 showed G, E, 3G, H, H+ and 4G, never seen LTE but it wouldn't have sense if it's already saying 4G.

 

[StephenWagner7]

It would be nice for a technical document from Microsoft to explain the Notification Speed icons for Windows 10... I know with Windows Phone 8, it varied depending on if you had a US handset, versus a non-US handset... But clarification would be nice....

I'm starting to wonder if there are two sets of icons like with earlier releases... And for some reason my phone switched from the US icon subset to the World icon subset...

Example on this thread: http://forums.windowscentral.com/windows-phone-8/260747-4g-icon-vs-lte-icon-whats-difference.html

 

[Joe920]

In your case I wouldn't be convinced... That speed also fits in with H, and H+ (HSPA HSUPA+)... Do me a favour and load up the "Net Check" app from the app store... And tell me what it says on the top left...

Thanks, nice app. It says "AT&T 4G LTE 75 mbit", while the icon in the phone status bar (not the app) shows just "4G". I know for a fact that it CAN show "LTE" as it did that very briefly while the AT&T guys were monkeying with the settings. What a confusing state of affairs.

 

[StephenWagner7]

Thanks, nice app. It says "AT&T 4G LTE 75 mbit", while the icon in the phone status bar (not the app) shows just "4G". I know for a fact that it CAN show "LTE" as it did that very briefly while the AT&T guys were monkeying with the settings. What a confusing state of affairs.

I'd still like to know for sure... I'm wondering if something was recently pushed out to some customers or something on the Windows 10 OS to change these icons...

 

[StephenWagner7]

Well, some more info...




While I'm kind of a n00b when it comes to cell technologies. Someone correct me if I'm wrong in the following statement:

EARFCN 2900 is ~2500-2600Mhz
EARFCN 5035 is ~700-735Mhz
Therefore, my phone while passing data was active on LTE Advanced (using multiple spectrums of LTE)?

lol

EDIT/ADDITION: I'm an *****... Dual SIM 950 XL only supports LTE Category 4 (not LTE Advanced), only the Single SIM supports LTE Category 6 which is LTE Advanced... lol

The list above was just listing off "friendly towers" intra/inter means different towers on same frequency or different frequency (not sure which is which with inter/intra)...

 

[StephenWagner7]

Anyways, I would say it's safe to say that the icons on my Lumia 950XL changed for connection speed. Just don't know why... 4G does = LTE...

I'm curious how many other people this is happening to?

 

[Joe920]

Anyways, I would say it's safe to say that the icons on my Lumia 950XL changed for connection speed. Just don't know why... 4G does = LTE...

I'm curious how many other people this is happening to?

I guess we'll find out as more people visit this thread trying to find out where their LTE icon went! Thanks for researching this, you have removed one major gripe with my 950XL!

 

[signal-2-noise]

If anything at least I learned about a new app today. Checking out this "Net Check Pro".