WiFi sensitivity question for Jeff Liebermann & anyone well

[Aardvarks]

In your experience with *both* Android & iOS mobile devices, have you also
found the iOS devices severely lacking in WiFi sensitivity (resulting in
dropped connections when Android devices are still working fine)?

This is a question borne out of experience setting up WiFi for dozens of
local neighbors, some of whom use Apple ipads & iPhones, and others who use
Android mobile equipment.

Almost always, in my own personal experience in my own large home with
multiple iPads and Android phones, and in the large homes of my neighbors,
the Apple iPads and iPhones almost always have *far worse* WiFi reception
than do the Android phones.

Has this been your experience also?
If so, why do you think this is the case?
-------------------------------------------
NOTE: Jeff is honest to a fault, so, his opinion matters greatly.

 

Verizon Samsung 5 Android beats V MiFi PC Dell Inspiron 2013......

 

[Aardvarks]

On Sat, 30 Jul 2016 17:49:59 -0700, Jeff Liebermann wrote:

About the same range. At least the same range within some
reasonable tolerance range, such as +/- 10% or so.

Interesting. Very interesting, as I have Apple and Android devices, and my
WISP has dealt with them, and almost *every* home that complains about piss
poor WiFi reception is an Apple home where I help out.

Note that I
consider "range" to be somewhat equivalent to your "sensitivity" where
"sensitivity" is limited to receive only and does not involve the
antenna or environmental situations.

Fair enough.

Also note that anecdotal
evidence of a problem is not definitive as measurements such as
"range" and "sensitivity" tend to follow a bell curve.

I have had the two iPads tested at the Apple Genius bar, and they passed
"that" test, even though they both fail miserably at having the same WiFi
reception as all four of my Android devices have.

I'll resist the temptation to offer my opinion of Apple engineering
and RF design. Well, maybe not totally. This is my play on the
iPhone 4 antenna grip problem in 2010:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/cellular/cell-test.htm
Steve Jobs was right that all phones have the antenna grip problem. He
just didn't mention that the iPhone 4 had it 10 times worse than the
others.

I *knew* you had tested Apple antennas in the past!
"The worst phone I tested dropped the rx signal 16 times (-12dB). The
iPhone 4 rx signal dropped 100 times (-20dB) to 288 times (-24.6dB) .
That's a 6 to 18 times worse signal drop for the iPhone 4. Little wonder it
drops calls. My guess(tm) is that something more than detuning the antenna
is happening. I suspect that the receiver front end might be slightly
regenerative, where touching the antenna kills the regeneration and the
associated sensitivity."

How far worse? How did you measure "reception"? What were you
measuring? Using wi-fi receive signal strength from an app or
counting "bars" isn't worth much. These vary substantially between
devices and is affected by temperature.

In all cases in "my" house, I had my Android devices on a flat surface
within a foot of the iOS devices when the Android devices would easily
connect home broadband router at the far fringes of the home, while the iOS
devices failed to make any connection.

I had to solve the problem by setting up a spare WRT54G router as a wired
extension (crawling under the house and cursing Apple the entire time), so,
the fact that the WiFi reception of the iOS devices sucks compared to that
of the Android devices caused me considerable effort.

In addition, as you know, I assist my small WISP in setting up customers
and troubleshooting when they have WiFi problems. Almost invariably, the
Apple-based customers are highly non technical, so, they call up with
problems that aren't really the WISP's prerogative, such as the fact they
can't connect to either his or their routers (he insists everyone have a
router so he gives them one if they don't have their own).

Almost always, if not always, I put their iDevices next to my Android
device to test WiFi connectivity and signal strength at the distance that
the customer complains.

Even though the tools available to sniff WiFi issues on iOS devices are
downright primitive, you "can" easily see that the Android devices
"connect" to the router at distance while the iOS devices are oblivious of
the router at the same distances.

Working in the other direction, I start with the iOS device in one hand,
and the Android device in the other hand, using the primitive iOS tools and
the more sophisticated (aka modern) Android sniffing tools, so that I can
see the BSSID and perceived signal strength (in case there are multiple
SSIDs of the same name, as I have in my own setup), and almost always, if
not always, the iOS devices *drop* the connection well before the Android
devices do (I generally walk outside until the Android device drops the
connection).

After having done this so many times, whenever we get a call, we ask if
they're using Apple equipment, and, if they are, we know what's going on.

Yes of course. Since I don't like Apple, every Apple is by definition
far worse than Android. Or course, for a nominal bribe, I can reverse
the situation.

While my grandkids play games almost exclusively on the iDevices, the main
problem "I" have with Apple is that it's primitive in terms of being able
to do useful things, e.g., WiFi reception sniffers on iOS are primitive in
comparison to what's available on Android.

Jeff lives on a fault. Being honest improves my karma, and prevents
earthquakes from ruining my day.

Given the century-long cycles, you already had yours in 1989. Let someone
else have their faults!

In the past, I've offered you various ways of running a controlled
range (performance) test. The next time you get your hands on a test
device, try it. It's quite easy.

Looks like iPerf is available on iOS & Android & Windows & Linux!
https://iperf.fr/iperf-download.php

1. You will need a reasonably fast computah running iperf ver 2,
iperf3, or jperf. This turn the compoutah into an iperf server by
running just:
iperf -s
The computah should be connected via an ethernet cable to the users
router. Gigabit ethernet is nice for measuring maximum speeds, but
that's not what we're doing here.

I don't have any fast computers - but just basic laptops.

2. Next, you'll need a iperf client on the phone or tablet. There
are iperf clients for most OS's. Note that iperf2 and iperf3 are
quite different and not really compatible. If the version is not
specified, it's probably iperf2.

Android:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.he.networktools&hl=en
http://networktools.he.net/
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.magicandroidapps.iperf&hl=en

IOS:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/he.net-network-tools/id858241710?mt=8
http://networktools.he.net/
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/iperf-network-bandwidth-measurement/id951598770?mt=8
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/iperf3-network-bandwidth-performance/id986846572?mt=8

PC, OS/X, Linux, etc:
https://iperf.fr/iperf-download.php

This is good that we an lay two mobile devices on a desk and run the same
iPerf utility to check performance.

Note that most Linux mutations ship with iperf2 and that iperf3 must
be installed. You can have both iperf and iperf3 installed at the
same time:
https://iperf.fr/iperf-download.php#more-recent

I'd just pick one. Probably iPerf2 for compatibility.

JAVA (runs on anything that groks Java and does pretty graphs):
https://www.rarst.net/software/jperf/
https://sourceforge.net/projects/iperf/files/
JPerf is iperf2 not 3. Version 3 is for higher speed wireless. Don't
mix versions.

I'd stick with iPerf 2.

Tutorials on iperf and jperf:
http://openmaniak.com/iperf.php
https://www.jamescoyle.net/how-to/574-testing-network-speed-with-iperf
https://www.jamescoyle.net/cheat-sheets/581-iperf-cheat-sheet

I recommend the HE (Hurricane Electric) versions which will test
either IPv4 and IPv6.

YouTube video of a typical test:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qdKgHBO_Gc

Interesting that Mike Pennacchi set up a linux box running iperf -s.
Then he runs Android iperf -c to get 10.0.10.80 as the linux box.
Then he runs Android iperf for 60 seconds & gets 50Mbps throughput.

With iPerf, not only Android but even the primitive iOS phones can be
turned into powerful network-troubleshooting tools!

This is great information!

Some notes I made from a talk on iperf and jperf:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/FLUG-talk-2015-03-28/iperf3%20talk.htm

You used iperf3, but I'd probably use iPerf 2 only because I want simple
compatibility with iOS and Android, Windows, and Linux.

3. Connect your test phone or tablet via wi-fi and just run a test to
see if it works. If you're running Jperf, you should see something
like this:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/FLUG-talk-2015-02-28/802.11gn%20direct.jpg
Note that the max speed is about 60 Mbits/sec.

Are the three graphs (purple, green, and blue) different access points?
Or are they different ports on the computer (1840, 1872, & 1860)?

If you insert a wireless repeater in between the wireless router and
the client, you get this mess:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/FLUG-talk-2015-02-28/802.11gn%20through%20Netgear%20repeater.jpg
Note the drastic drop in maximum speed. I'll save my rant against
mesh networks for another day.

Thanks to you, I set up a *wired* extender out of my spare WRT54G router,
as you had explained, long (long) ago, that the extender is faster, in
effect, than the repeater - even though the repeater is easier to set up
(but not easily set up on a WRT54G v5 due to lack of memory).

4. Now comes the big trick. Temporarily change the speed of your
wireless router from "automatic" to a fixed speed and/or protocol.

I've never done this. I'll have to check how to set the speed on the
Netgear WNDR2400 router and the Linksys WRT54G router. I'm sure the speed
is currently set at defaults.

For
802.11g, that would be 54 Mbits/sec. For faster protocols, it can be
faster. If you have an 802.11ac wireless router, leave both 2.4 and
5GHz on. However, if you're testing with a lesser protocol, enable
only one frequency band at a time, so that you know which one you're
testing. I would initially do the test using 802.11g and 54Mbit/sec
because higher speeds and protocols allow for fallback, which will
produce odd results.

Hmmmm....

By fixing the speed and protocol, you're eliminating the ability of
the wireless router to slow down the wireless connection speed and
thus improve the range.

Ah. That makes sense!

As you walk away from the wireless router,
instead of a general slowdown, you'll see an abrupt drop in speed,
possibly followed by a disconnect.

Eureka! That's the test I need to run!

The typical 2.4GHz 802.11g system
will go about 10 meters before the speed drops abruptly. Measure and
record this distance along with the test conditions (devices,
frequency, protocol, fixed speed, etc).

That's a PERFECT test!
My hypothesis is that the iOS devices will drop in half the distance that
the Android devices will drop - but that remains to be seen in the test.

You'll find indoor testing to vary substantially, mostly depending on
reflections and wireless router antenna positions. Outdoors works
better, but only if you don't have any interference. Try to pick an
empty channel (good luck with that).

We're in the boonies. Empty channels aren't hard to find.
Especially in the 5MHz range.

5. If you're lazy and don't want to deal with servers and iperf, you
do something similar with just ping. You still have to set a fixed
speed and protocol, but you don't get the pretty graphs and data. Just
continuously ping the wireless router. At some point, the latency
will drastically increase, followed by 100% packet loss, and possibly
a disconnect. This is not as precise as iperf because you're not
saturating the pipe with traffic, but probably good enough.

In general, for utilities, the limitation is that iTools don't allow
powerful tools, but it seems, on iOS, apparently there is a simple ping app
from MochaSoft:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/network-ping-lite/id289967115?mt=8

Android, as would be expected for a mature mobile operating system, has a
bunch of usable ping utilities, e.g., StreamSoft makes:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=ua.com.streamsoft.pingtools&hl=en

6. That's all there is. The "range" of a device, which is a
measurement of the overall radio design, antenna, internal noise,
packaging, orientation sensitivity, etc quality, should give you a
clue as to relative quality of the various test devices. If
everything you test craps out at approximately the same range (using
the same speeds and protocols), then as far as I'm concerned, they're
all the same.

I would agree with you.

If the two devices under test crap out at the same time, then they're
equivalent. If the Android device craps out at twice the distance of the
iOS devices, then the hypothesis is supported.

Of course, I'd have to test multiple random devices to be sure of the data.

However, if you see substantial variations, then you
can legitimately claim that Apple and Android devices are different.

I've already many times over seen substantial variations.
So, what remains is only a more rigid test, as you have proposed.

7. Incidentally, you can also try it pointing iperf to a public
server instead of your own iperf server. Note that you'll be
measuring the speed of your internet connection, not the speed of the
wireless. I wouldn't do that for the range test.
Iperf public servers:
https://iperf.fr/iperf-servers.php
Also, if you want to be sick, try running iperf over a cellular data
connection.

Cellular is not in the cards; just WiFi.

Just do it. I didn't spend an hour writing all this so that you lean
back in your chair and deliver your "impressions" or "feelings". Such
things as range can and should be tested. If you need help, you know
where you can try to pry me out of my hole.

I will set up the iperf 2 on the various devices and test this out!

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Sat, 30 Jul 2016 16:18:02 -0000 (UTC), Aardvarks
<aardvarks@a.b.c.com> wrote:

In your experience with *both* Android & iOS mobile devices, have you also
found the iOS devices severely lacking in WiFi sensitivity (resulting in
dropped connections when Android devices are still working fine)?

Nope. About the same range. At least the same range within some
reasonable tolerance range, such as +/- 10% or so. Note that I
consider "range" to be somewhat equivalent to your "sensitivity" where
"sensitivity" is limited to receive only and does not involve the
antenna or environmental situations. Also note that anecdotal
evidence of a problem is not definitive as measurements such as
"range" and "sensitivity" tend to follow a bell curve.

This is a question borne out of experience setting up WiFi for dozens of
local neighbors, some of whom use Apple ipads & iPhones, and others who use
Android mobile equipment.

I'll resist the temptation to offer my opinion of Apple engineering
and RF design. Well, maybe not totally. This is my play on the
iPhone 4 antenna grip problem in 2010:
<http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/cellular/cell-test.htm>
Steve Jobs was right that all phones have the antenna grip problem. He
just didn't mention that the iPhone 4 had it 10 times worse than the
others.

Almost always, in my own personal experience in my own large home with
multiple iPads and Android phones, and in the large homes of my neighbors,
the Apple iPads and iPhones almost always have *far worse* WiFi reception
than do the Android phones.

How far worse? How did you measure "reception"? What were you
measuring? Using wi-fi receive signal strength from an app or
counting "bars" isn't worth much. These vary substantially between
devices and is affected by temperature.

Has this been your experience also?
If so, why do you think this is the case?

Yes of course. Since I don't like Apple, every Apple is by definition
far worse than Android. Or course, for a nominal bribe, I can reverse
the situation.

>NOTE: Jeff is honest to a fault, so, his opinion matters greatly.

Jeff lives on a fault. Being honest improves my karma, and prevents
earthquakes from ruining my day.

In the past, I've offered you various ways of running a controlled
range (performance) test. The next time you get your hands on a test
device, try it. It's quite easy.

1. You will need a reasonably fast computah running iperf ver 2,
iperf3, or jperf. This turn the compoutah into an iperf server by
running just:
iperf -s
The computah should be connected via an ethernet cable to the users
router. Gigabit ethernet is nice for measuring maximum speeds, but
that's not what we're doing here.

2. Next, you'll need a iperf client on the phone or tablet. There
are iperf clients for most OS's. Note that iperf2 and iperf3 are
quite different and not really compatible. If the version is not
specified, it's probably iperf2.

Android:
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.he.networktools&hl=en>
<http://networktools.he.net/>
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.magicandroidapps.iperf&hl=en>

IOS:
<https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/he.net-network-tools/id858241710?mt=8>
<http://networktools.he.net/>
<https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/iperf-network-bandwidth-measurement/id951598770?mt=8>
<https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/iperf3-network-bandwidth-performance/id986846572?mt=8>

PC, OS/X, Linux, etc:
<https://iperf.fr/iperf-download.php>

Note that most Linux mutations ship with iperf2 and that iperf3 must
be installed. You can have both iperf and iperf3 installed at the
same time:
<https://iperf.fr/iperf-download.php#more-recent>

JAVA (runs on anything that groks Java and does pretty graphs):
<https://www.rarst.net/software/jperf/>
<https://sourceforge.net/projects/iperf/files/>
JPerf is iperf2 not 3. Version 3 is for higher speed wireless. Don't
mix versions.

Tutorials on iperf and jperf:
<http://openmaniak.com/iperf.php>
<https://www.jamescoyle.net/how-to/574-testing-network-speed-with-iperf>
<https://www.jamescoyle.net/cheat-sheets/581-iperf-cheat-sheet>

I recommend the HE (Hurricane Electric) versions which will test
either IPv4 and IPv6.

YouTube video of a typical test:
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qdKgHBO_Gc>

Some notes I made from a talk on iperf and jperf:
<http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/FLUG-talk-2015-03-28/iperf3%20talk.htm>

3. Connect your test phone or tablet via wi-fi and just run a test to
see if it works. If you're running Jperf, you should see something
like this:
<http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/FLUG-talk-2015-02-28/802.11gn%20direct.jpg>
Note that the max speed is about 60 Mbits/sec.

If you insert a wireless repeater in between the wireless router and
the client, you get this mess:
<http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/FLUG-talk-2015-02-28/802.11gn%20through%20Netgear%20repeater.jpg>
Note the drastic drop in maximum speed. I'll save my rant against
mesh networks for another day.

4. Now comes the big trick. Temporarily change the speed of your
wireless router from "automatic" to a fixed speed and/or protocol. For
802.11g, that would be 54 Mbits/sec. For faster protocols, it can be
faster. If you have an 802.11ac wireless router, leave both 2.4 and
5GHz on. However, if you're testing with a lesser protocol, enable
only one frequency band at a time, so that you know which one you're
testing. I would initially do the test using 802.11g and 54Mbit/sec
because higher speeds and protocols allow for fallback, which will
produce odd results.

By fixing the speed and protocol, you're eliminating the ability of
the wireless router to slow down the wireless connection speed and
thus improve the range. As you walk away from the wireless router,
instead of a general slowdown, you'll see an abrupt drop in speed,
possibly followed by a disconnect. The typical 2.4GHz 802.11g system
will go about 10 meters before the speed drops abruptly. Measure and
record this distance along with the test conditions (devices,
frequency, protocol, fixed speed, etc).

You'll find indoor testing to vary substantially, mostly depending on
reflections and wireless router antenna positions. Outdoors works
better, but only if you don't have any interference. Try to pick an
empty channel (good luck with that).

5. If you're lazy and don't want to deal with servers and iperf, you
do something similar with just ping. You still have to set a fixed
speed and protocol, but you don't get the pretty graphs and data. Just
continuously ping the wireless router. At some point, the latency
will drastically increase, followed by 100% packet loss, and possibly
a disconnect. This is not as precise as iperf because you're not
saturating the pipe with traffic, but probably good enough.

6. That's all there is. The "range" of a device, which is a
measurement of the overall radio design, antenna, internal noise,
packaging, orientation sensitivity, etc quality, should give you a
clue as to relative quality of the various test devices. If
everything you test craps out at approximately the same range (using
the same speeds and protocols), then as far as I'm concerned, they're
all the same. However, if you see substantial variations, then you
can legitimately claim that Apple and Android devices are different.

7. Incidentally, you can also try it pointing iperf to a public
server instead of your own iperf server. Note that you'll be
measuring the speed of your internet connection, not the speed of the
wireless. I wouldn't do that for the range test.
Iperf public servers:
<https://iperf.fr/iperf-servers.php>
Also, if you want to be sick, try running iperf over a cellular data
connection.

Just do it. I didn't spend an hour writing all this so that you lean
back in your chair and deliver your "impressions" or "feelings". Such
things as range can and should be tested. If you need help, you know
where you can try to pry me out of my hole.

Good luck...


--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Sun, 31 Jul 2016 02:59:24 -0000 (UTC), Aardvarks
<aardvarks@a.b.c.com> wrote:

I have had the two iPads tested at the Apple Genius bar, and they passed
"that" test, even though they both fail miserably at having the same WiFi
reception as all four of my Android devices have.

I don't have a proper 802.11 tester, but can make some fairly good BER
(bit error rate) and signal level tests on my messy workbench. Yeah,
it's all antiques but it's probably better than what you'll find at
the Genius Bar:
<http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/pics/home/slides/test-equip-mess.html>
Mostly, I find that RFI/EMI from the computah section of a smart gizmo
causes most of the loss of wi-fi reception problems. For example, my
Droid X and X2 would show reduced sensitivity when the display
backlighting was on full compared to when it was dim. My guess(tm) is
that most of the wi-fi radios are quite good, but in proximity of the
computah noise generator, don't do as well. How Apple or Android
compare, I don't know.

In all cases in "my" house, I had my Android devices on a flat surface
within a foot of the iOS devices when the Android devices would easily
connect home broadband router at the far fringes of the home, while the iOS
devices failed to make any connection.

Well, that's a fairly good side by side comparison. However, it might
not be the radios. One of my customers is all Apple. They must have
one of everything, although wisely, they never buy the latest devices.
I had problems with range at their house. My Chrombook, Nexus 7
tablet, and Moto G phone were also having range problem. I eventually
found a neighbor with Roku 2 and 3 boxes streaming away furiously
24x7, with both located near facing windows. I convinced the neighbor
to let me connect the Roku boxes with ethernet cable (3ft and 6ft
away), which eliminated the problem. Range was then dramatically
improved.

I had to solve the problem by setting up a spare WRT54G router as a wired
extension (crawling under the house and cursing Apple the entire time), so,
the fact that the WiFi reception of the iOS devices sucks compared to that
of the Android devices caused me considerable effort.

You'll get no sympathy from me. I do that all the time. However, my
days of crawling under houses are largely over thanks to health
issues. I was pulling wires and installing wall jacks last week for
about a day, and still haven't recovered. Maybe I'll learn to like
power line connected wireless repeaters instead.

In addition, as you know, I assist my small WISP in setting up customers
and troubleshooting when they have WiFi problems. Almost invariably, the
Apple-based customers are highly non technical, so, they call up with
problems that aren't really the WISP's prerogative, such as the fact they
can't connect to either his or their routers (he insists everyone have a
router so he gives them one if they don't have their own).

Ok, the first step to solving a problem is to blame someone. In this
case Apple. I tend to allow other options, such as junk routers and
interference. I carry a WiSpy 2.4Ghz spectrum analyzer, that isn't
limited to seeing wi-fi devices. Amazing what I find out there.
<http://www.metageek.com>
<http://www.metageek.com/products/wi-spy/index-3.html>

However, I did have problems with the older Apple Airport wireless
routers. Even the Apple products would not stay connected. Almost
anything could connect, but didn't stay connected. Streaming was the
big problem, where it would disconnect abruptly and without much
provocation. I usually solved it by temporarily replacing the router
with a Linksys equivalent. Current favorite is a Linksys EA2700.
Range is not so good because it's a lower power device than most. I
don't care because if a customer want's to go through walls, I just
sell them another EA2700 router.

Almost always, if not always, I put their iDevices next to my Android
device to test WiFi connectivity and signal strength at the distance that
the customer complains.

Even though the tools available to sniff WiFi issues on iOS devices are
downright primitive, you "can" easily see that the Android devices
"connect" to the router at distance while the iOS devices are oblivious of
the router at the same distances.

You're being generous. I use my Android phone and tablet as if they
were test and diagnostic equipment. I don't know what Apple allows,
but as I recall from using an iPhone 3G for a while, it's not much. I
had to jailbreak my 3G to install something useful. Here's the latest
version:
<https://www.adriangranados.com/apps/ios-wifi-explorer>

Looks like iPerf is available on iOS & Android & Windows & Linux!
https://iperf.fr/iperf-download.php

If you recall, I offered exactly the same song and dance to you about
2 years ago. There were versions for just about every OS available at
the time, but I must admit, were somewhat crude. So, this time,
please run the tests, and you can thank me later.

>I don't have any fast computers - but just basic laptops.

Sorry. You'll need a fairly fast computah if you're going to do tests
with gigabit ethernet or 802.11ac. The idea is to make sure that
everything involved is faster than the wi-fi link. You'll also need
to use iperf3 to get accurate numbers for the higher speeds. However,
we're not interested in how fast you can go. We're looking for when
the data no longer is flowing smoothly or when it drops out. You can
get away with almost anything that looks like a computah and will run
iperf. I have an microSD card that I use on a Raspberry Pi 2 box as a
quick an dirty iperf server. It won't do gigabit, but I usually don't
need such test speeds.

This is good that we an lay two mobile devices on a desk and run the same
iPerf utility to check performance.

Yep, but always have a reference machine handy that you know for sure
that runs fast and well. When everything you test runs badly, and you
don't know if the problem is with everything you're testing, or with
the server, router, network, interference, etc, it's always nice to
have a tie breaker.

>I'd just pick one. Probably iPerf2 for compatibility.

Try jperf for starters. It's the easiest to use and includes the
iperf2 binaries in the package buried in a subdirectory. If you want
to do speed testing, switch to iperf3.

With iPerf, not only Android but even the primitive iOS phones can be
turned into powerful network-troubleshooting tools!

Yep.

http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/FLUG-talk-2015-02-28/802.11gn%20direct.jpg

Are the three graphs (purple, green, and blue) different access points?
Or are they different ports on the computer (1840, 1872, & 1860)?

It was 3 separate runs of the program. The numbers are NOT port
numbers. I was doing some fiddling with the setup and wanted to see
what produced the best throughput.

That's a PERFECT test!
My hypothesis is that the iOS devices will drop in half the distance that
the Android devices will drop - but that remains to be seen in the test.

We shall soon see.

Good luck.

--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

 

[nospam]

In article <aleqpb932uap89en74ckq9rlbj7lhbipk4@4ax.com>, Jeff
Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com> wrote:

In your experience with *both* Android & iOS mobile devices, have you also
found the iOS devices severely lacking in WiFi sensitivity (resulting in
dropped connections when Android devices are still working fine)?

Nope. About the same range. At least the same range within some
reasonable tolerance range, such as +/- 10% or so. Note that I
consider "range" to be somewhat equivalent to your "sensitivity" where
"sensitivity" is limited to receive only and does not involve the
antenna or environmental situations. Also note that anecdotal
evidence of a problem is not definitive as measurements such as
"range" and "sensitivity" tend to follow a bell curve.

This is a question borne out of experience setting up WiFi for dozens of
local neighbors, some of whom use Apple ipads & iPhones, and others who use
Android mobile equipment.

I'll resist the temptation to offer my opinion of Apple engineering
and RF design. Well, maybe not totally. This is my play on the
iPhone 4 antenna grip problem in 2010:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/cellular/cell-test.htm
Steve Jobs was right that all phones have the antenna grip problem. He
just didn't mention that the iPhone 4 had it 10 times worse than the
others.

the iphone 4 was not 10x worse.

it was comparable to other phones and in many cases, those other phones
were substantially worse, even dropping to no service, something the
iphone 4 didn't do.

palm pre drops to no service:
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zft3-Lwh2bo>

droid incredible drops to no service:
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4zbQ3f7H0U>

droid 2 had serious issues:
<https://techcrunch.com/2010/08/13/uh-oh-early-droid-2-units-having-sign
al-issues/>
The signal on one of the two units we received is all over the board,
dipping from full signal down to nearly none whilst sitting in the
same spot (and no, wešre not holding it wrong). Engadgetšs review
says that four out of four of their units show endlessly fluctuating
bar counts, and our buddy Rich Brome of Phonescoop says hešs having
bad luck with his, as well. Thats 6 review units, all showing signs
of signal woes. Not a good sign.

Yes of course. Since I don't like Apple, every Apple is by definition
far worse than Android. Or course, for a nominal bribe, I can reverse
the situation.

that explains everything.

 

[Jolly Roger]

nospam <nospam@nospam.invalid> wrote:

In article <aleqpb932uap89en74ckq9rlbj7lhbipk4@4ax.com>, Jeff
Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com> wrote:

iPhone 4 antenna grip problem in 2010:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/cellular/cell-test.htm
Steve Jobs was right that all phones have the antenna grip problem. He
just didn't mention that the iPhone 4 had it 10 times worse than the
others.

the iphone 4 was not 10x worse.

it was comparable to other phones and in many cases, those other phones
were substantially worse, even dropping to no service, something the
iphone 4 didn't do.

palm pre drops to no service:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zft3-Lwh2bo

droid incredible drops to no service:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4zbQ3f7H0U

droid 2 had serious issues:
https://techcrunch.com/2010/08/13/uh-oh-early-droid-2-units-having-sign
al-issues/

I remember those findings near the end of the whole Antenna Gate circus. It
was comical seeing comparable phones also drop signal when "held wrong". I
recall the Apple trolls denying that reality back then too - just as they
apparently still are today. : D

--
E-mail sent to this address may be devoured by my ravenous SPAM filter.
I often ignore posts from Google. Use a real news client instead.

JR

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Sat, 30 Jul 2016 21:54:55 -0400, nospam <nospam@nospam.invalid>
wrote:

>the iphone 4 was not 10x worse.

Well, you're certainly entitled to an opinion. Personally, I prefer
opinions based on repeatable tests, measurements, numerical results,
and calculations. However, I'll accept your assertion for what it's
worth. However, I did make one mistake. The iphone wasn't 10 times
worse, but more like 6 to 18 times. Citing my web page:
<http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/cellular/cell-test.htm>
"The worst phone I tested dropped the rx signal 16 times
(-12dB). The iPhone 4 rx signal dropped 100 times (-20dB)
to 288 times (-24.6dB). That's a 6 to 18 times worse signal
drop for the iPhone 4... "

One problem was that I didn't have access to an iphone 4 at the time
of the controversy. None of my friends would trust me to jailbreak
their phone just so I could get a signal strength reading in dBm
instead of "bars". So, I had to use the test results from the
Anantech article. A friend has an iPhone 4 that he's not using, so I
could probably repeat my test given sufficient inspiration.

it was comparable to other phones and in many cases, those other phones
were substantially worse, even dropping to no service, something the
iphone 4 didn't do.

Yeah, that was cute. Initially, Verizon phones would stay connected
for quite a while after total loss of signal. I put a VZW iphone 4 in
a shielded box during a call, waited up to about 2 minutes, and was
able to resume the call uninterrupted. Nicely done by VZW. However,
AT&T was initially a different story. I did the same test with an
AT&T phone (not an iPhone) and found that it would disconnect after
only a few seconds. About a month later, after AT&T announced that
they had "upgraded" their network to match capabilities of the new
iPhone, it would also stay connected after 2 minutes of carrier loss.

palm pre drops to no service:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zft3-Lwh2bo

I have an old VZW Palm Pre somewhere in the office. I'll try it on
Mon or Tues.

Interesting test. He's in a weak signal area. Grabbing the phone
drops the signal level enough to produce a loss of connection. That's
not surprising. It would be more interesting if he put the phone in
the Field Test Mode to see how much the signal drops. If the phone is
right at the bitter edge of disconnecting, and the signal drops a few
dB, I would expect it to umm.... disconnect. Note that all the phones
used in my test showed about a 9 dB drop in receive signal from a
death grip, which would produce exactly the same results in a weak
signal area as the Palm Pre.

droid incredible drops to no service:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4zbQ3f7H0U

This is almost as bad as the Pre test. Instead of being in a one bar
weak signal area, he's got 2 bars. I'm not so sure that the HTC Droid
Inedible (VZW only) has the antenna at the bottom. I tried to find it
on the iFixit teardown at:
<https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/HTC+Droid+Incredible+Teardown/42422>
and couldn't find it. Other users are also having problems:
"FIX HTC INCREDIBLE S RECEPTION ANTENNA ISSUES"
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHIdl1qrdkc> (6:42)
Fast forward to 4:35 to see what he's done.
In other words, not the best phone or antenna system. Of course, the
author doesn't care about potential SAR problem.

droid 2 had serious issues:
https://techcrunch.com/2010/08/13/uh-oh-early-droid-2-units-having-sign
al-issues/
The signal on one of the two units we received is all over the board,
dipping from full signal down to nearly none whilst sitting in the
same spot (and no, wešre not holding it wrong). Engadgetšs review
says that four out of four of their units show endlessly fluctuating
bar counts, and our buddy Rich Brome of Phonescoop says hešs having
bad luck with his, as well. Thats 6 review units, all showing signs
of signal woes. Not a good sign.

That's just a crappy phone. It could be anything from bad design, bad
implementation, bad parts, bad metering, or just having a bad day. I
assume that this has something to do with your defense of Apple, but I
lack the wisdom to make the connection.

Yes of course. Since I don't like Apple, every Apple is by definition
far worse than Android. Or course, for a nominal bribe, I can reverse
the situation.

that explains everything.

Even honesty has a price tag.

--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

 

[nospam]

In article <sbqqpbhi3udu1fqdhvuhdlv65v80qib9gh@4ax.com>, Jeff
Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com> wrote:

the iphone 4 was not 10x worse.

Well, you're certainly entitled to an opinion. Personally, I prefer
opinions based on repeatable tests, measurements, numerical results,
and calculations. However, I'll accept your assertion for what it's
worth. However, I did make one mistake. The iphone wasn't 10 times
worse, but more like 6 to 18 times. Citing my web page:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/cellular/cell-test.htm
"The worst phone I tested dropped the rx signal 16 times
(-12dB). The iPhone 4 rx signal dropped 100 times (-20dB)
to 288 times (-24.6dB). That's a 6 to 18 times worse signal
drop for the iPhone 4... "

if the iphone was 18x worse, it would not have sold anywhere near as
well as it did. people don't buy crappy phones.

there were fewer dropped calls with the iphone 4 than the previous
iphone 3gs.

at the time, the iphone 4 was the best selling iphone to date and sold
quite well for the few years it was offered for sale.

once the whole antennagate bullshit blew over, nobody even thought
about it.

it was yet another manufactured problem which was concocted by gawker
media for the traffic, just like the iphone 6 bendgate and hairgate
nonsense.

what comes around goes around, and now gawker media is bankrupt.

haters gotta hate.

One problem was that I didn't have access to an iphone 4 at the time
of the controversy. None of my friends would trust me to jailbreak
their phone just so I could get a signal strength reading in dBm
instead of "bars". So, I had to use the test results from the
Anantech article. A friend has an iPhone 4 that he's not using, so I
could probably repeat my test given sufficient inspiration.

no need to jailbreak to get dbm

Yes of course. Since I don't like Apple, every Apple is by definition
far worse than Android. Or course, for a nominal bribe, I can reverse
the situation.

that explains everything.

Even honesty has a price tag.

you've admitted your anti-apple bias which makes what you say not
honest.

 

[Aardvarks]

On Sat, 30 Jul 2016 20:44:02 -0700, Jeff Liebermann wrote:

Well, you're certainly entitled to an opinion. Personally, I prefer
opinions based on repeatable tests, measurements, numerical results,
and calculations.

Jeff,
This nospam guy is actually one of the smarter ones here, along with Rod
Speed and the smartest guy here, who is David Empson. The problem though,
with nospam, is that his only playbook is verbatim what Apple Marketing
feeds him. He has no other repertoire.

Note that all the phones
used in my test showed about a 9 dB drop in receive signal from a
death grip

Where, for others' benefit, 9 decibels is 3db times 3 which is 1/2 times
1/2 times 1/2 the signal strength, which is 0.125 the original signal
strength (or around 1/8th the original signal strength if I did the math
correctly).

That's just a crappy phone. It could be anything from bad design, bad
implementation, bad parts, bad metering, or just having a bad day. I
assume that this has something to do with your defense of Apple, but I
lack the wisdom to make the connection.

Jeff - you have to understand that nospam thinks *exactly* like Apple
Marketing thinks. Thousands of times, he finds the absolute worst example
he can find in Android land, to compare with Apple.

For example, he tries to compare $50 Android phones to $800 Apple phones,
and then says that the Android phones stink. Or, he picks the absolutely
most expensive Android phone he can find on the planet, to compare with the
iPhone, and says conclusively that iPhones cost exactly the same as Android
phones.

In fact, I have a recent thread where I compare PERFORMANCE of a $300
Android phone to the iPhone 6, and he pooh poos that because I didn't use
the absolutely most expensive Android phones on the planet to make my
performance tests.

At first you wonder why he thinks like Apple Marketing, but then you just
get used to it once you understand that:
a. He buys only on cachet (so anything bad about Apple is a threat)
b. He buys based on fear (so anything outside the walled garden is scary)
c. He can only think of the single solution Apple Marketing gives him

Once you realize *everything* he says is imbued by those three tenets, then
you realize why he sounds exactly like Apple Marketing sounds.

> Even honesty has a price tag.

The funny thing about nospam, Jeff, is that you can be honest with him, but
he will *never* be honest with you.

If you (or I) have a favorable datum about Android versus iOS, we speak it
out, and weigh it proportionately. Nospam is the consummate Apple marketing
guy. He is so afraid of facts, that he will *never* speak anything out
against Apple, even though he surely must be aware of the huge flaws.

At first I couldn't understand his duplicity. I thought it was stupidity.
But he's duplicitous because of the three things I said:
a. He's *protecting* his purchase decision (at all costs!)
b. He's *protecting* against anything *outside* the walled garden
c. He's *protecting* against the one-button-mouse mentality that Apple
Marketing has and always has had.

So nospam will *never* see both sides of the coin.
Never.
And even if he did - he'd never admit it.

On the other hand, you:
a. Buy by priceerformance so performance is just a set of numbers which
is nothing to fear
b. Buy what works for you with the equipment you use, and not necessarily
only one brand of equipment
c. Try every solution that makes sense, and not just the
single-button-mouse solution that one manufacturers' marketing team
specifies

Until you understand these three things, you'll never understand why nospam
writes what he writes (nor most of the other Apple Aficianados).

a. They care only about style
b. They are fearful of anything not told to them by Apple Marketing
c. They can only think of one-button-mouse style solutions proposed by
Apple Marketing (which only work inside the walled garden).

Anything outside those three areas, they "just give up".
In fact, they're so used to "just giving up", that it's not funny in that
is so different than your mental makeup.

 

[nospam]

In article <nnltv2$7if$1@news.mixmin.net>, Aardvarks
<aardvarks@a.b.c.com> wrote:

That's just a crappy phone. It could be anything from bad design, bad
implementation, bad parts, bad metering, or just having a bad day. I
assume that this has something to do with your defense of Apple, but I
lack the wisdom to make the connection.

Jeff - you have to understand that nospam thinks *exactly* like Apple
Marketing thinks. Thousands of times, he finds the absolute worst example
he can find in Android land, to compare with Apple.

For example, he tries to compare $50 Android phones to $800 Apple phones,
and then says that the Android phones stink. Or, he picks the absolutely
most expensive Android phone he can find on the planet, to compare with the
iPhone, and says conclusively that iPhones cost exactly the same as Android
phones.

more of your lies and ignorant trolling.

i've never tried to compare a $50 android phone with an $800 iphone,
ever.

what i said was that similar specs have comparable prices, and they do.

phones with similar specs to an iphone are something like a samsung
galaxy s7 or note 5.

you're also ignoring that apple and google have different business
models, something you refuse to acknowledge, let alone even begin to
understand.

you're also ignoring all of the android phones that are *more*
expensive than the iphone.

the initial price doesn't make matter a whole lot anyway because people
will pay far more than the difference in price in a couple of months of
service fees.

you're a troll, who spews nothing but hate.

 

[Jolly Roger]

On 2016-07-31, Aardvarks <aardvarks@a.b.c.com> wrote:

Jeff,
This nospam guy is actually...
The problem though, with nospam, is...
Jeff - you have to understand that nospam...
The funny thing about nospam, Jeff, is...
Nospam is the consummate Apple marketing...
So nospam will *never* see...

"I'm not obsessed or anything"... : )

--
E-mail sent to this address may be devoured by my ravenous SPAM filter.
I often ignore posts from Google. Use a real news client instead.

JR

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Sun, 31 Jul 2016 13:52:14 -0400, nospam <nospam@nospam.invalid>
wrote:

In article <sbqqpbhi3udu1fqdhvuhdlv65v80qib9gh@4ax.com>, Jeff
Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com> wrote:
Well, you're certainly entitled to an opinion. Personally, I prefer
opinions based on repeatable tests, measurements, numerical results,
and calculations. However, I'll accept your assertion for what it's
worth. However, I did make one mistake. The iphone wasn't 10 times
worse, but more like 6 to 18 times. Citing my web page:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/cellular/cell-test.htm
"The worst phone I tested dropped the rx signal 16 times
(-12dB). The iPhone 4 rx signal dropped 100 times (-20dB)
to 288 times (-24.6dB). That's a 6 to 18 times worse signal
drop for the iPhone 4... "

if the iphone was 18x worse, it would not have sold anywhere near as
well as it did. people don't buy crappy phones.

Without the rubber cover, which is now epidemic, the iPhone 4 was 6 to
18 times worse in signal loss compared to various cell phones. With
the rubber cover, it's about the same as most other smartphones. At
the time when I ran the test, rubber covers for the newly released
iPhone 4 were not available. I can repeat the test if I can borrow an
iPhone 4 from a friend. So can you. It's quite easy but there are a
few tricks. Bug me if you want details.

there were fewer dropped calls with the iphone 4 than the previous
iphone 3gs.

True for AT&T because, as I previously indicated, AT&T would
disconnect if the carrier was lost for only a few seconds. That was
later increased which hid any disconnects caused by carrier loss. You
can test how it works with any cell phone. Make a call and then put
the phone inside a shielded box (microwave oven will do) for varying
amounts of time. Last time I did this on VZW, I could disappear for a
bit less than 2 minutes, and continue my call from where I left off.

I just tried it on VZW at home. I called my house phone from my
ancient LG VX8300 cell phone. I then put it inside the microwave
oven. After 2 minutes, I was still connected. However, I'm not sure
if the signal went to zero. I could see that the phone showed zero
bars through the oven door, but the VX8300 will still work showing
zero bars. I'll see if I can find a weaker signal location and a
better shielded box later in the week.

It's easy enough for you to try the same thing. Note that it doesn't
matter what phone you use. You're testing how the cell site responds
to a loss of carrier. Any phone will suffice.

at the time, the iphone 4 was the best selling iphone to date and sold
quite well for the few years it was offered for sale.

Yep, and sales is of paramount importance. Everything else, including
quality, repairability, product life, and even price are of secondary
importance. If it sells, it must be good (for the company).

once the whole antennagate bullshit blew over, nobody even thought
about it.

I thought about it. I really hate to agree with you, but the
antennagate thing had nothing to do with Apple. Apple's only
contribution was designing a phone that highlighted a bad setting by
AT&T in their cell sites. The problem disappeared when the rubber
bumper made the iPhone 4 act more like other phones of the period, and
when AT&T tweaked their settings. As an added bonus, Apple also
tweaked the relationship between receive signal level and the number
of bars indicated. Later, they graciously allowed users to see the
actual numbers in dBm. Prior to that, jailbreaking was required. You
can read about how it was necessary to get into the field test mode in
order to see numbers at:
<http://www.anandtech.com/show/3794/the-iphone-4-review/2>

it was yet another manufactured problem which was concocted by gawker
media for the traffic, just like the iphone 6 bendgate and hairgate
nonsense.

Those problems were not concocted or in any way fabricated for the
occasion. They were quite real. Whether they were significant or
worth fixing is a very different story.

These days, product lifetimes are sufficiently short that the next
generation of product is already in the pipeline when the previous
product is introduced. In some product areas (i.e. disk storage and
SSD's), there can be as many a 3 generations in the pipeline at the
same time. That means there's absolutely no incentive to fix the
current product when the next generation will be released shortly. If
there are any real problems, current owners are simply told to wait
for the next generation to be released, which will surely have those
problems solved. The reality is often quite different.

>what comes around goes around, and now gawker media is bankrupt.

Hardly. There are plenty of problems still left to solve. For
example, how about product life and servicability?
<http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/fix-out-product-repairs-get-tougher-new-age-obsolescence-n614916>
Did you know that your Apple products are designed for a 5 year
product life?
<https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201624>
Ever wonder what Apple does with cell phones that have been returned
for repair?
<http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-shreds-old-iphones-to-prevent-real-parts-ending-up-in-fakes-2016-2>

>haters gotta hate.

That's only a problem when one hates something specific, like Apple.
It's not considered a problem if one hates everything equally. Don't
worry. I have plenty of bad things to say about Google and Android.

>no need to jailbreak to get dbm

At the time (2010), it was necessary to jailbreak an iphone in order
to obtain signal strength numbers. The field test mode was also
initially disabled in the iphone 4. Read the Anantech article
mentioned above for a memory refresh.

you've admitted your anti-apple bias which makes what you say not
honest.

Excuse me? Since when does hating something lead to dishonesty? I
might hate a vendors products, possibly for good reason, and offer my
opinion on the matter if asked, but I certainly would not poison my
position by lying about what's wrong with their products. I might
also not like a vendor due to political, social, economic, or personal
reasons that have nothing to do with their products. From what I've
disclosed, you would not be able to determine if it's one of those, or
whether it's a quality, service, price, performance, design, or
usability problem that I might have with Apple. Assumption really is
the mother of all such screwups.

Taking your statement at face value, are only people that offer
favorable opinions of Apple allowed to comment because they're
presumably the only ones that are honest? Perhaps you might want to
rephrase your statement.

Drivel: I found my old iPhone 3G and decided to see if it still
works. I charged up the battery, turned it on, and it complained that
it could not make a secure connection. Fine, that's Apple for set the
date and time. Once I did that, I was deluged with about 4 years of
gmail stored on the Google server. That was followed by about 200
reminders and appointments, each of which had to be individually
acknowledged. When I checked for updates, it proclaimed that
everything was up to date. Not too bad for an old phone.


--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

 

[nospam]

In article <m9vspbp0hvep8nokt8u4n4s02d9mjpupc2@4ax.com>, Jeff
Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com> wrote:

Well, you're certainly entitled to an opinion. Personally, I prefer
opinions based on repeatable tests, measurements, numerical results,
and calculations. However, I'll accept your assertion for what it's
worth. However, I did make one mistake. The iphone wasn't 10 times
worse, but more like 6 to 18 times. Citing my web page:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/cellular/cell-test.htm
"The worst phone I tested dropped the rx signal 16 times
(-12dB). The iPhone 4 rx signal dropped 100 times (-20dB)
to 288 times (-24.6dB). That's a 6 to 18 times worse signal
drop for the iPhone 4... "

if the iphone was 18x worse, it would not have sold anywhere near as
well as it did. people don't buy crappy phones.

Without the rubber cover, which is now epidemic, the iPhone 4 was 6 to
18 times worse in signal loss compared to various cell phones.

nope

With
the rubber cover, it's about the same as most other smartphones. At
the time when I ran the test, rubber covers for the newly released
iPhone 4 were not available.

they were available.

I can repeat the test if I can borrow an
iPhone 4 from a friend. So can you. It's quite easy but there are a
few tricks. Bug me if you want details.

i don't need to borrow one since i still have mine.

i had *no* problems whatsoever with reception and no tangible
difference between it and the 3gs it replaced.

there were fewer dropped calls with the iphone 4 than the previous
iphone 3gs.

True for AT&T because, as I previously indicated, AT&T would
disconnect if the carrier was lost for only a few seconds. That was
later increased which hid any disconnects caused by carrier loss. You
can test how it works with any cell phone. Make a call and then put
the phone inside a shielded box (microwave oven will do) for varying
amounts of time. Last time I did this on VZW, I could disappear for a
bit less than 2 minutes, and continue my call from where I left off.

bullshit. no cell carrier keeps a call connected that long without any
connection.

I just tried it on VZW at home. I called my house phone from my
ancient LG VX8300 cell phone. I then put it inside the microwave
oven. After 2 minutes, I was still connected. However, I'm not sure
if the signal went to zero. I could see that the phone showed zero
bars through the oven door, but the VX8300 will still work showing
zero bars. I'll see if I can find a weaker signal location and a
better shielded box later in the week.

put it on defrost cycle.

It's easy enough for you to try the same thing. Note that it doesn't
matter what phone you use. You're testing how the cell site responds
to a loss of carrier. Any phone will suffice.

i prefer real world tests in normal use.

my iphone 4 was not significantly different than any other phone i
have, whether it's other iphones, android and old school flippers, and
that's in both city and fringe areas.

at the time, the iphone 4 was the best selling iphone to date and sold
quite well for the few years it was offered for sale.

Yep, and sales is of paramount importance. Everything else, including
quality, repairability, product life, and even price are of secondary
importance. If it sells, it must be good (for the company).

all of those are contributing factors to sales.

if the product was shit quality, unreliable, etc. it would't sell well.
people generally want quality stuff.

the reality is that the iphone 4 was very reliable, other than the home
button for early production runs, something that was easily fixed and
later modified at the factory to be more reliable.

once the whole antennagate bullshit blew over, nobody even thought
about it.

I thought about it. I really hate to agree with you, but the
antennagate thing had nothing to do with Apple. Apple's only
contribution was designing a phone that highlighted a bad setting by
AT&T in their cell sites. The problem disappeared when the rubber
bumper made the iPhone 4 act more like other phones of the period, and
when AT&T tweaked their settings. As an added bonus, Apple also
tweaked the relationship between receive signal level and the number
of bars indicated. Later, they graciously allowed users to see the
actual numbers in dBm. Prior to that, jailbreaking was required. You
can read about how it was necessary to get into the field test mode in
order to see numbers at:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/3794/the-iphone-4-review/2

jailbreaking was not required to put earlier iphones into field test
mode.

apple removed that in the iphone 4 and then put it *back*.

it was yet another manufactured problem which was concocted by gawker
media for the traffic, just like the iphone 6 bendgate and hairgate
nonsense.

Those problems were not concocted or in any way fabricated for the
occasion. They were quite real. Whether they were significant or
worth fixing is a very different story.

the problem was concocted.

'holding it wrong' is something that affects every single phone, but
gawker media, who had just had its ass handed to it for buying a stolen
iphone 4, decided to attack apple and get its revenge.

These days, product lifetimes are sufficiently short that the next
generation of product is already in the pipeline when the previous
product is introduced. In some product areas (i.e. disk storage and
SSD's), there can be as many a 3 generations in the pipeline at the
same time. That means there's absolutely no incentive to fix the
current product when the next generation will be released shortly. If
there are any real problems, current owners are simply told to wait
for the next generation to be released, which will surely have those
problems solved. The reality is often quite different.

apple often makes changes *during* product lifecycles.

what comes around goes around, and now gawker media is bankrupt.

Hardly. There are plenty of problems still left to solve. For
example, how about product life and servicability?

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/fix-out-product-repairs-get-tougher-new-a
ge-obsolescence-n614916
Did you know that your Apple products are designed for a 5 year
product life?

they aren't.

in fact, i have a 12 year old mac mini running 24/7 as a low end server
and just put an ssd in it because the hard drive was over 10 years old.


> <https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201624>

that doesn't mean they're designed for 5 year life.

it means apple stops supporting products after 5 years, or 7 years as
required in california, where you are.

every company cuts off support after a while, often *less* than that.

look at what android phone makers do, who drop support within a year or
two.

Ever wonder what Apple does with cell phones that have been returned
for repair?
http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-shreds-old-iphones-to-prevent-real-parts-
ending-up-in-fakes-2016-2

don't believe everything you read.

apple recycles phones and even designed and built a robot named liam to
do it.

<http://mashable.com/2016/03/21/apple-liam-recycling-robot/>
Liam is programmed to carefully disassemble the many pieces of
returned iPhones, such as SIM card trays, screws, batteries and
cameras, by removing components bit by bit so theyšll all be easier
to recycle. Traditional tech recycling methods involve a shredder
with magnets that makes it hard to separate parts in a pure way
(youšll often get scrap materials commingled with other pieces).

Liam separates the insides of an iPhone with robotic precision so,
for example, pieces of glass and plastic wonšt be mixed in with
copper. Ultimately, these components can be sold to recycling vendors
that focus on specific materials, such as nickel, aluminum, copper,
cobalt and tungsten (a conflict mineral), and turn them into
something else that can be reused, rather than dumped in a landfill.
Some of these materials take decades to decompose and leak toxic
materials into the ground along the way.

haters gotta hate.

That's only a problem when one hates something specific, like Apple.
It's not considered a problem if one hates everything equally. Don't
worry. I have plenty of bad things to say about Google and Android.

yet you don't.

no need to jailbreak to get dbm

At the time (2010), it was necessary to jailbreak an iphone in order
to obtain signal strength numbers. The field test mode was also
initially disabled in the iphone 4. Read the Anantech article
mentioned above for a memory refresh.

they removed it in the iphone 4 and then put it back in the next
update, which was a couple of weeks later, if that (i'd have to check
the dates).

prior to the iphone 4 it was there.

you've admitted your anti-apple bias which makes what you say not
honest.

Excuse me? Since when does hating something lead to dishonesty?

it means what you say is heavily biased.

I might hate a vendors products, possibly for good reason, and offer my
opinion on the matter if asked, but I certainly would not poison my
position by lying about what's wrong with their products. I might
also not like a vendor due to political, social, economic, or personal
reasons that have nothing to do with their products. From what I've
disclosed, you would not be able to determine if it's one of those, or
whether it's a quality, service, price, performance, design, or
usability problem that I might have with Apple. Assumption really is
the mother of all such screwups.

except that you do lie about them, as you did above.

Taking your statement at face value, are only people that offer
favorable opinions of Apple allowed to comment because they're
presumably the only ones that are honest? Perhaps you might want to
rephrase your statement.

i never said that at all.

every product has good and bad points. nothing is perfect. pick the
best tool for the job.

anyone who repeatedly cites the bad things about one company and
ignores when other companies do the very same thing (or worse) is
dishonest.

Drivel: I found my old iPhone 3G and decided to see if it still
works. I charged up the battery, turned it on, and it complained that
it could not make a secure connection. Fine, that's Apple for set the
date and time. Once I did that, I was deluged with about 4 years of
gmail stored on the Google server. That was followed by about 200
reminders and appointments, each of which had to be individually
acknowledged. When I checked for updates, it proclaimed that
everything was up to date. Not too bad for an old phone.

so much for designing for 5 years.

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Sun, 31 Jul 2016 22:26:43 -0000 (UTC), Aardvarks
<aardvarks@a.b.c.com> wrote:

This nospam guy is actually one of the smarter ones here, along with Rod
Speed and the smartest guy here, who is David Empson. The problem though,
with nospam, is that his only playbook is verbatim what Apple Marketing
feeds him. He has no other repertoire.

I don't care. I don't pass judgment upon the writers of usenet
articles, only on the content of their articles. The author could be
evil incarnate, and I would still take their comments seriously. I
also value their opinions based solely on their ability to
substantiate them. In other words, no numbers, no tests, or no
references, and it goes to recycling.

The funny thing about nospam, Jeff, is that you can be honest with him, but
he will *never* be honest with you.

Not a problem. Everyone lies, but that's ok because nobody listens.

>On the other hand, you:

Ah, my favorite topic... me.

a. Buy by priceerformance so performance is just a set of numbers which
is nothing to fear

Wrong. I hardly buy anything new for myself. I buy plenty for my
customers, but for myself, I buy used, refurbished, and recycled
hardware. Most of my computers were machines replaced by my customers
in an upgrade. Almost nothing I own was purchased new. Performance
(numbers) is way down the list because it is cheaper to tolerate
mediocrity and do battle with the bleeding edge of technology.

b. Buy what works for you with the equipment you use, and not necessarily
only one brand of equipment

Sorta. I have a few brands that I prefer. However, even the best
companies have produced defective products and probably will continue
to do so erratically. There's also quite a bit of private labeling of
other companies products. I do tend to favor manufacturers with which
I have a working relationship, or know someone on the inside, as that
makes it easier to deal with surprises and problems.

c. Try every solution that makes sense, and not just the
single-button-mouse solution that one manufacturers' marketing team
specifies

Sorta. My customers also was ease of use. That makes self
configuring devices, wizards, and one-button connect features
attractive. For myself, they just get in the way of diving into the
menus and making it do what I want. While not a single button
solution, I really like the Chromebook philosophy of letting Google do
everything. I can literally setup a Chromebook in minutes, and have
it ready to use without the hassles of endless updates, virus scans,
malware scans, bloatware, etc. Customers want easy and so do I
(because we're all fundamentally lazy).

>Anything outside those three areas, they "just give up".

Nope. They throw money at the problem. Applecare is all about buying
failure insurance. Out of warranty repairs are very expensive. Flat
rate exchange instead of repair is all about inspiring a premature
upgrade. Some parts are unobtainable. When I fix a PC or PC laptop,
I can get cheap parts from the cannibals on eBay. I can do the same
with Apple parts, but not for current model products.

Incidentally, in Dec 2009, I did a price comparison between various
Apple products and the closest equivalent Dell products:
<http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/crud/Mac-vs-PC.xls>
The 13" MacBook was a bargain at the time, but all the other Apple
products were about twice the price of Dell. Prices do not include
shipping, Applecare, or Dell extended service contracts. I haven't
checked, but I think the situation is much the same today.

In fact, they're so used to "just giving up", that it's not funny in that
is so different than your mental makeup.

Nope, they don't give up. The average Apple product user assumes that
since Apple products are nearly perfect, whatever is wrong must be
something they had done. Although I don't do much work on Apple
products, the few that drift into my office generally start out by
asking if it was anything that they had done wrong to cause the
problem. There's a related problem where users are afraid to ask for
help because they assume that Apple makes things so easy, that if they
have a problem doing something, it must be their inability to
understand, rather than something Apple did wrong.

Apple... making easy things easier, and difficult things impossible.

--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

 

[nospam]

In article <e73tpbhgk9sr1qrp6mo32rlhesev4npqld@4ax.com>, Jeff
Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com> wrote:

Incidentally, in Dec 2009, I did a price comparison between various
Apple products and the closest equivalent Dell products:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/crud/Mac-vs-PC.xls
The 13" MacBook was a bargain at the time, but all the other Apple
products were about twice the price of Dell. Prices do not include
shipping, Applecare, or Dell extended service contracts. I haven't
checked, but I think the situation is much the same today.

in some cases, apple is much cheaper.

for instance, there's nothing comes close to the retina imac 5k.

dell sells a similar 5k display *without* a computer for roughly what
apple sells the entire imac, which now has a wide-gamut display. not
only that, but it's expected to be updated in about a month or so.

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Sun, 31 Jul 2016 20:36:58 -0400, nospam <nospam@nospam.invalid>
wrote:

In article <e73tpbhgk9sr1qrp6mo32rlhesev4npqld@4ax.com>, Jeff
Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com> wrote:


Incidentally, in Dec 2009, I did a price comparison between various
Apple products and the closest equivalent Dell products:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/crud/Mac-vs-PC.xls
The 13" MacBook was a bargain at the time, but all the other Apple
products were about twice the price of Dell. Prices do not include
shipping, Applecare, or Dell extended service contracts. I haven't
checked, but I think the situation is much the same today.

in some cases, apple is much cheaper.

With all due respect, your unsubstantiated opinion does not do much
for me. An example of equivalent PC and Apple products would be more
useful than your astute pontification. Also, you seem to have an
aversion to supplying numbers. A few of these would also improve your
credibility.

It was quite difficult to do the Dec 2009 comparison. I was
recovering at home from surgery and was still somewhat drugged. It
took me all day to nail down the details. Even so, there are
differences between the Dell and Apple products in CPU speeds, memory
types, Firewire ports, and included accessories such as the mouse and
keyboard, which are options on Apple products but generally included
with Dell products. Even with these differences, the ratio was still
about 1:2, except for the 13" MacBook.

for instance, there's nothing comes close to the retina imac 5k.
dell sells a similar 5k display *without* a computer for roughly what
apple sells the entire imac, which now has a wide-gamut display. not
only that, but it's expected to be updated in about a month or so.

Is it really necessary that I have to do all the research? All that's
necessary is for you to include a URL pointing to the two computers
and displays with prices. Ok, I'll do the grunt work this time for
you and see if you're right.

I presume you mean the Apple 27" Retina 5K iMac computer.
<http://www.apple.com/imac/specs/>
The screen is 5120 x 2880.
B&H has it for $1,900.
<http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1190403-REG/apple_mk472ll_a_27_imac_with_retina.html>

I'll also assume that you're referring to the Dell XPS 27 Touch
All-In-One Desktop:
<http://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/productdetails/xps-27-2720-aio?stp=1>
The screen is 2560 X 1440 or 1/4th that of the Apple display.
Prices vary from $1,700 to $2,700.

So, you're correct that Apple is indeed cheaper than Dell for roughly
equivalent computers and with a better built-in monitor. Apparently,
some things have changed at Apple in the last 7 years. I'll try to be
more careful when making price comparisons in the future. I'll
probably update the spreadsheet as time permits.

Of course, this has nothing to do with any alleged wi-fi range
differences between Apple and Android products, which was the original
topic of this discussion.

--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

 

[nospam]

In article <449tpbpvbu5civ5o77ioc33cdvcd3ag56h@4ax.com>, Jeff
Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com> wrote:

Incidentally, in Dec 2009, I did a price comparison between various
Apple products and the closest equivalent Dell products:
http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/crud/Mac-vs-PC.xls
The 13" MacBook was a bargain at the time, but all the other Apple
products were about twice the price of Dell. Prices do not include
shipping, Applecare, or Dell extended service contracts. I haven't
checked, but I think the situation is much the same today.

in some cases, apple is much cheaper.

With all due respect, your unsubstantiated opinion does not do much
for me.

i substantiated it.

An example of equivalent PC and Apple products would be more
useful than your astute pontification.

useful to whom and for what task?

for some tasks, apple is the *only* choice. for others, windows is the
only choice. for most tasks, things are fairly close, but mac users are
generally more productive.

Also, you seem to have an
aversion to supplying numbers. A few of these would also improve your
credibility.

i did supply numbers.

It was quite difficult to do the Dec 2009 comparison. I was
recovering at home from surgery and was still somewhat drugged. It
took me all day to nail down the details. Even so, there are
differences between the Dell and Apple products in CPU speeds, memory
types, Firewire ports, and included accessories such as the mouse and
keyboard, which are options on Apple products but generally included
with Dell products. Even with these differences, the ratio was still
about 1:2, except for the 13" MacBook.

you neglected a few differences, such as that mac os x is equivalent to
windows ultimate, not home.

for instance, there's nothing comes close to the retina imac 5k.
dell sells a similar 5k display *without* a computer for roughly what
apple sells the entire imac, which now has a wide-gamut display. not
only that, but it's expected to be updated in about a month or so.

Is it really necessary that I have to do all the research? All that's
necessary is for you to include a URL pointing to the two computers
and displays with prices. Ok, I'll do the grunt work this time for
you and see if you're right.

i assumed someone familiar with product pricing would know the status
quo.

I presume you mean the Apple 27" Retina 5K iMac computer.
http://www.apple.com/imac/specs/
The screen is 5120 x 2880.
B&H has it for $1,900.

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1190403-REG/apple_mk472ll_a_27_imac_wit
h_retina.html

that's the middle model, but you can always configure to order.

$1799 for the base model:
<http://www.apple.com/shop/buy-mac/imac>

and as i said, the imac is due for an update, expected in a month or
so, which means the above specs are about to change.

I'll also assume that you're referring to the Dell XPS 27 Touch
All-In-One Desktop:
http://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/productdetails/xps-27-2720-aio?stp=1
The screen is 2560 X 1440 or 1/4th that of the Apple display.
Prices vary from $1,700 to $2,700.

you assume wrong.

i specifically said the dell 5k display, which has the same 5120 x 2880
resolution and is $2k msrp:
<http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=bsd&c
s=04&sku=up275k3>

that display was originally $2500, but then apple came out with the
imac 5k and dell had to cut its price.

street price is $1500ish these days, except that's only the display.

you still need a computer that can drive that 5k display, which means a
dual video card and dual cables because one single displayport
currently can't support 5k.

So, you're correct that Apple is indeed cheaper than Dell for roughly
equivalent computers and with a better built-in monitor. Apparently,
some things have changed at Apple in the last 7 years. I'll try to be
more careful when making price comparisons in the future. I'll
probably update the spreadsheet as time permits.

ok.

Of course, this has nothing to do with any alleged wi-fi range
differences between Apple and Android products, which was the original
topic of this discussion.

there aren't any significant differences in normal everyday use.

he's trolling.

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Sun, 31 Jul 2016 22:18:14 -0400, nospam <nospam@nospam.invalid>
wrote:

>i did supply numbers.

No, you didn't. You did in your previous posting, but only after I
guessed wrong as to what you were comparing.

i assumed someone familiar with product pricing would know the status
quo.

Actually, I'm not familiar with current retail PC or Mac pricing. I
don't buy machines for my customers very often. Prices change so
often that I have requote bids several times before the actual
purchase. If I need prices, I get them at as near to the time of
purchase as possible.

I'll also assume that you're referring to the Dell XPS 27 Touch
All-In-One Desktop:
http://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/productdetails/xps-27-2720-aio?stp=1
The screen is 2560 X 1440 or 1/4th that of the Apple display.
Prices vary from $1,700 to $2,700.

you assume wrong.

i specifically said the dell 5k display, which has the same 5120 x 2880
resolution and is $2k msrp:
http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=bsd&cs=04&sku=up275k3

Sorry, but I thought you were comparing the price of equivalent
computers with build in displays, not comparing an Apple all in one
iMac, with a component system from Dell. Your point about pricing is
still correct, but it would be helpful if you would be more specific
about what you're comparing.

Of course, this has nothing to do with any alleged wi-fi range
differences between Apple and Android products, which was the original
topic of this discussion.

there aren't any significant differences in normal everyday use.

Prove it. I supplied two very easy methods where you can test that
assertion using commonly available software (iperf and jperf) that
will run on most any device. I can run the test for you if you can't
seem to load one program on your Mac desktop or laptop, change one
setting in your router, and load one lousy app on your tablet.
However, I don't see why I should run it for you. I suspect that you
would not accept my results and conclusions as you did in my iPhone 4
death grip test. The problem is that you don't really know for sure
what will happen. Well, neither do I. I've run the test many times,
but never side by side comparing the range for various client devices.
It's always been to optimize something in the router, usually for
highest throughput, not for maximizing range.

>he's trolling.

So am I. Sometimes trolling is useful. I'm tired of unsubstantiated
assertions from all sides. Time to test the various claims.

--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

 

[Aardvarks]

On Sun, 31 Jul 2016 18:58:09 -0400, nospam wrote:

you're also ignoring that apple and google have different business
models, something you refuse to acknowledge, let alone even begin to
understand.

Anytime Google wants to subsidize a phone for me, I'm perfectly happy.

In fact, my Android phone doesn't even have a Google ID, and it works just
fine.

I wonder what would happen if I removed the iCloud account from an iOS
device.