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Kimmie92592

macrumors member
Feb 13, 2013
57
21
California
I agree and normally I'm one of them. This is the first beta software I've ever installed only because I heard it helped with connectivity issues and so far so good, no issues yet. But I completely understand waiting until the official release.
I’m getting desperate. I think I should like to install this and try it. Where do I go to find it? Thank you.
 
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alent1234

macrumors 603
Jun 19, 2009
5,689
170
Bought an XS Max last night and switched to t mobile

Checked it in low signal areas where my att 8plus didn’t work and the new phone works fine.

The problems are most likely related to the phone and the local carrier networks
 

mightymo

macrumors newbie
Nov 21, 2018
2
1
Holy. Crap.

It worked. Beta 3 finally fixed my upstream issues on my XS. Up until now my XS side by side with my 7 would exceed it in downstream tests but would be 10% of it upstream tests. Now their upstream is equal with the downstream still being much better.

At this point I had almost given up, but I think it's actually fixed.
[doublepost=1542373146][/doublepost]
I mean, it IS a downgrade, otherwise they wouldn't charge more for the XS. But the upgrades the XS/XSM provide clearly aren't worth it to you. **Secretly envies the cool colors of the phone ;)** Glad you're happy!
I'm on my 4th iPhone in less than 2 months and on Verizon. I upgraded from iPhone 6 to XS experienced all kinds connectivity issues mentioned here and was given a new iPhone XS 3 times. I was about to give up and Apple store manager persuaded me to try the XR. I've had it for 4 days and it's worse!!!! Call quality is awful and I keeping dropping to 3G in places where I always had 4G/LTE.

What exactly does the trick to toggle to and from airplane mode do? And what did Beta 3 fix for you? Please I'm at the end of my rope here!!
 
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archer75

macrumors 68040
Jan 26, 2005
3,116
1,746
Oregon
I have beta 3 and my wifes phone isn't on the beta. Both Xs Max's. Driving around the other day and holding the phones side by side I can see as we switch towers and bands that my phone is much quicker to lock on and have more bars than hers. Eventually her phone will lock on and the bars will go up but it's quite a delay.
So the beta does make a difference.

Last year I was in a building at this time with my 8 plus and AT&T and in this building, in a major city, no reception at all. This year I was back in the same building but with my Xs max and on T-mobile and my reception was perfect.
 

calexandre

macrumors member
Sep 21, 2008
50
59
Joining this club, unfortunately: I bought my XS Monday and had terrible reception all that day and yesterday. Even with a few bars on LTE, data was nonexistent. Upgraded to the beta; no difference. Did a network reset; no difference.

I'm on Project Fi as my physical SIM (defaults to T-Mobile in an iPhone) and have an EE virtual SIM, although it won't activate until I head back to the UK, so I'm not sure whether I'd fare any better on EE's network. My 7 works perfectly on Project Fi.

Such a shame-- I like everything else about the XS, but if it doesn't actually WORK, then it's going back.
 

vinegarshots

macrumors 6502a
Sep 24, 2018
968
1,332
Joining this club, unfortunately: I bought my XS Monday and had terrible reception all that day and yesterday. Even with a few bars on LTE, data was nonexistent. Upgraded to the beta; no difference. Did a network reset; no difference.

I'm on Project Fi as my physical SIM (defaults to T-Mobile in an iPhone) and have an EE virtual SIM, although it won't activate until I head back to the UK, so I'm not sure whether I'd fare any better on EE's network. My 7 works perfectly on Project Fi.

Such a shame-- I like everything else about the XS, but if it doesn't actually WORK, then it's going back.

Why are you using Fi on an iPhone? It’s not officially supported and some of the functionality is gimped even if you get it working (apparently MMS won’t work properly, and neither will network switching, for example). You’d be better off just getting T-Mobile
 

calexandre

macrumors member
Sep 21, 2008
50
59
Why are you using Fi on an iPhone? It’s not officially supported and some of the functionality is gimped even if you get it working (apparently MMS won’t work properly, and neither will network switching, for example). You’d be better off just getting T-Mobile

Fi works perfectly on my 7, including MMS. No reason it shouldn't on the XS.

I'm out of the US between 2-3 weeks every single month. T-Mobile's prices make no sense for my usage case, and why would I want T-mobile's edge roaming speeds when I can have full LTE with Fi when I'm not in the US or UK?

ETA: I was on T-Mobile for 13 years. Left after some really bad customer service while I was abroad and my line was hacked, and I haven't looked back from Fi. So much faster and cheaper than T-Mobile for my particular needs.
 

vinegarshots

macrumors 6502a
Sep 24, 2018
968
1,332
Fi works perfectly on my 7, including MMS. No reason it shouldn't on the XS.

I'm out of the US between 2-3 weeks every single month. T-Mobile's prices make no sense for my usage case, and why would I want T-mobile's edge roaming speeds when I can have full LTE with Fi when I'm not in the US or UK?

ETA: I was on T-Mobile for 13 years. Left after some really bad customer service while I was abroad and my line was hacked, and I haven't looked back from Fi. So much faster and cheaper than T-Mobile for my particular needs.

Point being is that it’s not officially supported.

Also, there’s no way it’s faster than T-Mobile because you are only able to use T-Mobile right now
 

calexandre

macrumors member
Sep 21, 2008
50
59
Point being is that it’s not officially supported.

Also, there’s no way it’s faster than T-Mobile because you are only able to use T-Mobile right now

So your point is that I should use T-Mobile, because I'm currently only able to use T-Mobile, so if I use T-Mobile, things will be better? Hmmmm.

And I specifically mentioned speed in the context of roaming. Project Fi uses unthrottled roaming. T-Mobile does not. If you think those are equivalent, you don't travel much.
 
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vinegarshots

macrumors 6502a
Sep 24, 2018
968
1,332
So your point is that I should use T-Mobile, because I'm currently only able to use T-Mobile, so if I use T-Mobile, things will be better? Hmmmm.

And I specifically mentioned speed in the context of roaming. Project Fi uses unthrottled roaming. T-Mobile does not. If you think those are equivalent, you don't travel much.

No, my point is that you’re probably not going to be able to get Google or Apple to help you out with your problem. Google will probably tell you iPhones aren’t supported so too bad, and apple will probably tell you iPhones aren’t supported by Fi, and that you need to try a sim from a proper provider. Very high likelihood.

Also, did you manually re-enter all of your APN settings in your new phone correctly?

(I missed the roaming mention in your other post— good point on that)
 
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BPK17

macrumors newbie
Nov 22, 2018
1
0
iOS 12.1.1 beta 3 upload is still terrible. Did network reset etc no improvement.
 

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calexandre

macrumors member
Sep 21, 2008
50
59
No, my point is that you’re probably not going to be able to get Google or Apple to help you out with your problem. Google will probably tell you iPhones aren’t supported so too bad, and apple will probably tell you iPhones aren’t supported by Fi, and that you need to try a sim from a proper provider. Very high likelihood.

Also, did you manually re-enter all of your APN settings in your new phone correctly?

(I missed the roaming mention in your other post— good point on that)

THANK YOU-- you just solved my problem! I stupidly didn't deal with the APN settings after installing the beta and clearing the network settings. Now the XS is much fleeter than my 7. Can't believe I didn't think of that, but I'm grateful that you did.

Point taken about unsupported carriers. My thinking is that if Fi becomes unworkable on the iPhone, I can just switch back to T-Mobile, but these reception issues seemed likely to affect both networks the same, since Fi pushes the iPhone onto T. In the event my illicit Fi SIM somehow bricks my XS in the future, I'll just have to remind myself that Fi has saved me the equivalent of an XS's price in charges this year, so it's been a die that makes sense for me to roll so far.
 
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wineandcarbs

macrumors 6502a
May 2, 2008
904
137
Is this reception issue most likely hardware or software? I've read speculation about each but do we actually know yet?
 

vinegarshots

macrumors 6502a
Sep 24, 2018
968
1,332
THANK YOU-- you just solved my problem! I stupidly didn't deal with the APN settings after installing the beta and clearing the network settings. Now the XS is much fleeter than my 7. Can't believe I didn't think of that, but I'm grateful that you did.

Point taken about unsupported carriers. My thinking is that if Fi becomes unworkable on the iPhone, I can just switch back to T-Mobile, but these reception issues seemed likely to affect both networks the same, since Fi pushes the iPhone onto T. In the event my illicit Fi SIM somehow bricks my XS in the future, I'll just have to remind myself that Fi has saved me the equivalent of an XS's price in charges this year, so it's been a die that makes sense for me to roll so far.

Awesome , glad to have helped!
 
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decypher44

macrumors 68000
Feb 24, 2007
1,812
2,987
Orange County, CA
Is this reception issue most likely hardware or software? I've read speculation about each but do we actually know yet?

Nobody *knows* yet. Still speculation. It doesn’t help that Apple hasn’t said a word, and no tech blogs are following up with them for comment. They all want to cover their ears, close their eyes and pretend none of this is happening.
 
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vinegarshots

macrumors 6502a
Sep 24, 2018
968
1,332
Nobody *knows* yet. Still speculation. It doesn’t help that Apple hasn’t said a word, and no tech blogs are following up with them for comment. They all want to cover their ears, close their eyes and pretend none of this is happening.

I’m at my in laws for Thanksgiving, in their basement where I always sleep this time of the year. My iPhone 7+ was totally unusable down here, and I always had to connect to their WiFi during previous trips. On my Max, I’ve had 1-2 bars of functional LTE the entire time, and it hasn’t dropped to no service at all. I can even play YouTube videos without much trouble.

I think it’s safe to say it’s not a design flaw like a lot of people were originally assuming. Which is probably why it’s not being treated as a big story by tech media. The two youtubers who mentioned having connectivity issues originally both said that theirs were working fine after updates, and so their interest in the matter ended. Others probably haven’t seen the problem at all (look at the unbox therapy guy... if this were a huge legit issue, he’d have no problem making a loud, overbearing video about it that would get several million views. He’s not even invited to apple events...)

Like I’ve said before, some people are certainly having problems, but it’s not universal enough to cause widespread outrage
 
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jona2125

macrumors 6502a
Jul 12, 2010
780
651
I’m at my in laws for Thanksgiving, in their basement where I always sleep this time of the year. My iPhone 7+ was totally unusable down here, and I always had to connect to their WiFi during previous trips. On my Max, I’ve had 1-2 bars of functional LTE the entire time, and it hasn’t dropped to no service at all. I can even play YouTube videos without much trouble.

I think it’s safe to say it’s not a design flaw like a lot of people were originally assuming. Which is probably why it’s not being treated as a big story by tech media. The two youtubers who mentioned having connectivity issues originally both said that theirs were working fine after updates, and so their interest in the matter ended. Others probably haven’t seen the problem at all (look at the unbox therapy guy... if this were a huge legit issue, he’d have no problem making a loud, overbearing video about it that would get several million views. He’s not even invited to apple events...)

Like I’ve said before, some people are certainly having problems, but it’s not universal enough to cause widespread outrage

I wish it wasn't universal for me :(

So far I have noticed less reports of no signal, but half of the time I can't use the signal that's offered. I'm on my 3rd XS and 2nd Max. My XR however has been absolutely flawless and I'm still using it as a daily device for that reason.
 
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Otflyer

macrumors 65816
Nov 14, 2017
1,474
999
SF Bay Area
I returned two XS Max’s due to poor cellular connectivity. I now have a XS (decided XS Max was two big). I live in a good signal area and the XS has been perfect though I had concerns as to whether I would have good reception outside my area. Well, yesterday we went to the country for Thanksgiving. On my previous 8+ I had no service unless connected to Wi-Fi. My XS showed 0-1 bars and I could text and use data though speed was a little slower. I’m very satisfied with this phone now. I’m on Verizon and iOS 12.1.
 
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vinegarshots

macrumors 6502a
Sep 24, 2018
968
1,332
I wish it wasn't universal for me :(

So far I have noticed less reports of no signal, but half of the time I can't use the signal that's offered. I'm on my 3rd XS and 2nd Max. My XR however has been absolutely flawless and I'm still using it as a daily device for that reason.

It’s just so weird. I’ve seen several people on the forums and Reddit complaining of the same thing with their XR, too, which makes it even more perplexing.

It could be bad yields on some component in the phones, but if replacing a phone 3 times doesn’t get a working unit, statistically that would be over 75% defect rate. But on the flip side, there are people like me who got a working phone first time, and the other 3 phones in my family and friends circle also work fine, which shouldn’t be possible if the defect rate is that high.

The other possibility is that the 4x4 mimo functionality is a more complex system on the software/firmware/carrier side, and there are a bunch of carrier/location variables that haven’t been accounted for since this is Apples first time with a 4x4 setup. Mix that with a potentially slightly above average defect rate, and you could end up with the weirdness we are seeing here. But who knows
 
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jona2125

macrumors 6502a
Jul 12, 2010
780
651
It’s just so weird. I’ve seen several people on the forums and Reddit complaining of the same thing with their XR, too, which makes it even more perplexing.

It could be bad yields on some component in the phones, but if replacing a phone 3 times doesn’t get a working unit, statistically that would be over 75% defect rate. But on the flip side, there are people like me who got a working phone first time, and the other 3 phones in my family and friends circle also work fine, which shouldn’t be possible if the defect rate is that high.

The other possibility is that the 4x4 mimo functionality is a more complex system on the software/firmware/carrier side, and there are a bunch of carrier/location variables that haven’t been accounted for since this is Apples first time with a 4x4 setup. Mix that with a potentially slightly above average defect rate, and you could end up with the weirdness we are seeing here. But who knows

I definitely think it's related to the 4x4 MIMO for sure. Hopefully it's just software but I've been dead in the water for support after sending my phone to Apple. They haven't followed up since on anything and as I was told have seemed to drop the workload on the subject internally.
 
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