Radar wireless problems.

[drg]

Bought the radar for my wife a month ago. Awesome phone, thinking of getting one myself. But she's starting to have issues the past couple weeks with the wireless connection. Every so often it seems to stop working even though it shows it's still connected. Nothing in particular seems to trigger it. It can just happen. Happens about once or twice a day. Sometimes I've noticed it happens when I plug it into the power supply but other times it doesn't so it's not necessarily only triggered by plugging it into the power.

To get it working sometimes I turn wifi off and on again and it works fine. Sometimes I need to do it a couple times. Sometimes I've turned off 3G data connection and then wireless starts working again which is weird. I can then turn 3G back on and everything is fine.

Only thing that rings a bell of when it may have started happening was the first time I tried wifi tethering. I recall trying it out and the problem may have started sometime after.

So it's a very weird issue and hard to nut down when it happens. I'm going to do a hard reset the next day or 2 to see if it fixes but wondering if anyone else is having any similar issues. If the hard reset doesn't work I'm going to have to send it back to the supplier which is always a bummer

 

[christopher#WP]

Hi Drg,

I've got a Radar for 3 weeks now, and I've got exactly the same problem. At home, I'm using two wifi access points with the same SSID, so I was thinking that the Radar was not able to well switch from one access point to the other, but as you have the same problem, it seems to be a bug.

I've got that also time to time, I've to turn off/on the wifi and most of the time it's work after.

 

[bradleyj]

Hi Drg and Christopher,

I own a Samsung Focus and I believe I have the same problem (in fact i posted a thread on it in the Focus Forum which hasn't helped). I find sometimes even though I am connected to WIFI, and other devices are working fine on the WIFI, my Focus will start to use the 3G/3G+ data and then everything 'stalls'.

The strange thing being that if I turn off either WIFI or 3G, then the other will work...it is like they are conflicting.

I had wondered if I caused this by interop-unlocking and activating the Internet Sharing on my phone, and now that seeems like it might be the case! I just got the Focus a few days ago and the first thing I did was developer-unlock it and do the hack that enables the Wifi tethering! I didn't really use the phone before I enabled and tried the Tethering...but I think it might have messed up my phone.

The disturbing thing is that your phones have that built in...and it seems that there may be a problem with the Wifi-tethering. On the other hand, could it be that this Wifi/3G issue is a problem with Windows Phone or Mango itself? Have you used other mango devices and not noticed this? Like I said, I just got my Focus and it is my first Windows Phone so i don't know...

 

[bradleyj]

Maybe we should start a thread "Internet Sharing Causes Wifi Problems?" or something and see if others are affected.

EDIT: I opened a thread to see if this is broader: http://forums.windowscentral.com/windows-phone-7-os-discussion/182913.htm#post1585563

 

[drg]

Yeah that's exactly what it seems like. WiFi is on but it uses 3g because when it happens apps like Facebook will show the loading dots for a long time as if its using 3g not WiFi. It does eventually load but not with the usual quickness it should loads over my WiFi broadband connection when it is working. I'll add my post to your broader thread and I'll log an issue with MS support.

Sent from my OMNIA7 using Board Express

 

[christopher#WP]

I just would like to add that my radar is not simlocked on any carrier and I've got the tethering option out of the box without any modification.

So for me, this problem is not related to the tethering feature.

 

[drg]

@christopher same here but have you tried using WiFi tethering? We're wondering if the issue starts to happen after the first time you actually use WiFi tethering. If you have never used WiFi tethering and have the issue then you may be right and its unrelated.

Sent from my OMNIA7 using Board Express

 

[christopher#WP]

Your are right, I already used the tethering feature several times.

 

[bradleyj]

How do you log an issue with MS support?

 

[drg]

Best way I've found is tweet @winphonesupport. They respond fairly quickly but still waiting for some decent feedback/suggestions.

Sent from my OMNIA7 using Board Express

 

[drg]

Response was to try hard reset. Will try this soon and post back.

Sent from my OMNIA7 using Board Express

 

[drg]

Have done a hard reset. No problems for 3 days now which is good because previously problem was happening every day.But I haven't turned wifi tethering on yet. Will monitor for the next week or so and if still no problems I will then turn on wifi tethering and see if that triggers the problem and will report back.

 

[christopher#WP]

Hi Drg, Wifi still ok for you ?

I did the 2 wp updates last weeks, but I still have the problem, time to time, I connected to my wifi network (Signal at 100%), but I cannot go on internet. I have to turn off and turn on the wifi on my radar and after that it's working.

 

[drg]

Hi christopher. No it's not working again. The problem came back after a few days so the hard reset did not work. I've got in touch with the reseller and I have just sent the phone back for warranty repair. I don't think this problem should happen as it is quite annoying. I put a video of it occurring on my skydrive account you can view here: https://skydrive.live.com/#cid=93AA9A941DD84E76&id=93AA9A941DD84E76!182.

I noticed the problem happened more when the battery level was low and I plugged it into the power so I was able to replicate the problem on video. But it does sometimes happen when battery level is fine and the phone is not connected so it's a very hard problem to diagnose. Hopefully the phone comes back to me working in which case I think you should probably send yours back to manufacturer as well.

 

[bradleyj]

Hi drg,

For what it is worth, since hard-reseting my phone (which removed the Internet sharing that I had enabled and also relocked my phone) I have not experienced the issue we had. I watched your video and I know what it is like! I hope your phone can be fixed (though you can't get rid of internet sharing...though you could perhaps never activate it). For me, it cost me internet sharing to make my Focus work...

Brad

 

[RGinKC]

I had to hard-reset mine and turn of my WPA2 broadcast in order to connect. Mine connects fine to any open or WPA network as long as the SSID is broadcast.

 

[drg]

UPDATE: I've sent the phone for warranty repairs and the issue (of course) isn't happening for them. They said it could be my router. I've got an Intellinet router. So I did some searching and someone had a similar problem with a different HTC phone HTC Droid Incredible keeps disconnecting from Wifi

Funnily enough I have just been borrowing a mates HTC Trophy and it seems to be having a similar issue.

I also noticed the problem has been mainly happening when I'm in my bedroom.

So I went on the admin page of my router and noticed it was on Channel 11. It had a function to find the best channel. It shows that Channel 11 and Channel 3 were being used by routers near me (it also highlighted the SID using the channel). I noticed that the strength of that SID is a little stronger in my bedroom so maybe, just maybe that's whats causing the issue. THe router suggested channel 5 so I've changed the channel of the router to 5 and will now see if the problem resolves.

 

[christopher#WP]

I also found something, most of the time when I've got the WiFi problem, I go to the WiFi settings, Ip configuration and my network mask is 255.255.0.0, or it must be 255.255.255.0

I turn off the WiFi, turn it on and the mask is back to the right value. I checked my DHCP server configuration and everything is fine.

I'm really convince that there is something strange in the HTC radar WiFi configuration. I will try to do a screenshot when it happen again.

Sent from my Radar C110e using Board Express

 

[RuiH]

Solved?

Hi,

I was facing the same problem, and as you said, I've changed the communication channel of my wifi router to 5.

My Radar immediately found the network and everything seems to be working...

 

[christopher#WP]

I did the same than you, I changed one of my ap to channel 6 and the other one to channel 13, and it's true that I've got less problem with the WiFi. I'm not yet convince that I will not have the problem anymore, wait & see ;-) thanks for the tips.

Sent from my Radar C110e using Board Express