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SignalCheck - Android app to monitor your Wi-Fi/2G/3G/4G LTE/5G-NR signal strengths

mikejeep

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ingenium Member Level: 4G WiMax

ingenium

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Google announced the ability today to have bitmap icons for notifications. They basically said it lets you build the icons on the fly, so it should eliminate the need for individual icons for each signal strength and band.

 

Sent from my Nexus 6

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mikejeep
mikejeep

Hello all, I have been visiting S4GRU for quite some time, and one of the most common issues I see popping up is confusion from users--especially when they first get 4G LTE devices and/or LTE servi

mikejeep
mikejeep

It's here! It's here! It's finally here! No, not the Android 4.4.3 update due today.. but it's almost as cool: SignalCheck has received it's long-awaited update. Pro version 4.24 has been pushed out t

mikejeep
mikejeep

The most anticipated software update of your life is finally here.. SignalCheck 4.261 has been released into the wild! It has been pushed to Google Play and should be available within the hour. This i

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EvanA Member Level: 4G WiMax

EvanA

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Just noticed yesterday that SignalCheck Pro said I was connected to an LTE 700 B12 site for T-Mobile, but I was actually connected to a B4 site. There seems to be some sort of error in how it detects B12 for T-Mo.

Bands are identified by GCI patterns. Sprint has a very defined pattern, which makes it easy to ID bands. Unfortunately, T-Mobile does not seem to use any pattern at all for 700MHz, so Signal Check is going to be inaccurate more times than not. The only way to reliably identify T-Mobile bands is by using the engineering screen, if available.
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Jaggrey Member Level: 3G EVDO

Jaggrey

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Bands are identified by GCI patterns. Sprint has a very defined pattern, which makes it easy to ID bands. Unfortunately, T-Mobile does not seem to use any pattern at all for 700MHz, so Signal Check is going to be inaccurate more times than not. The only way to reliably identify T-Mobile bands is by using the engineering screen, if available.

Yea that makes sense. I was wondering what pattern or method Mike was using to have Signal Check identify one verses the other.
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saywhatman Member Level: 1x Advanced

saywhatman

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SignalCheck mostly works flawlessly in M preview! I have been having some problems with the latest version identifying Sprint B41 as Clearwire, but those were true in lollipop as well

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mikejeep Member Level: LTE Advanced

mikejeep

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Google announced the ability today to have bitmap icons for notifications. They basically said it lets you build the icons on the fly, so it should eliminate the need for individual icons for each signal strength and band.

 

Interesting.. do you have a link? I can't find anything about that.

 

Just noticed yesterday that SignalCheck Pro said I was connected to an LTE 700 B12 site for T-Mobile, but I was actually connected to a B4 site.  There seems to be some sort of error in how it detects B12 for T-Mo.

Bands are identified by GCI patterns. Sprint has a very defined pattern, which makes it easy to ID bands. Unfortunately, T-Mobile does not seem to use any pattern at all for 700MHz, so Signal Check is going to be inaccurate more times than not. The only way to reliably identify T-Mobile bands is by using the engineering screen, if available.

 

T-Mobile is sort of reliable, but there are many instances where their conventional ID patterns apparently just got tossed out the window. There is no clear rhyme or reason, so I'm stuck trying to decide how to balance what the app displays.. I'm not happy with showing something that is correct 80% of the time, but I also have a huge demand to show everything possible at the expense of accuracy. SignalCheck intentionally does not display T-Mobile band indicators as frequently as some other apps because my threshold for false indications is higher than most.

 

SignalCheck mostly works flawlessly in M preview! I have been having some problems with the latest version identifying Sprint B41 as Clearwire, but those were true in lollipop as well

Awesome! Could you elaborate a little on the problem you're experiencing?

 

-Mike

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mikejeep Member Level: LTE Advanced

mikejeep

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Mike, what's the ! Mark for?

Hah! That's a leftover remnant of my failed testing to get around the bug where the PLMN does not change immediately. I didn't realize it was still in there. If you see it, I do not believe that site will be logged. A connection reset should make it disappear. I'll get that out of there.

 

-Mike

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nowerlater Member Level: eHRPD

nowerlater

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Hah! That's a leftover remnant of my failed testing to get around the bug where the PLMN does not change immediately. I didn't realize it was still in there. If you see it, I do not believe that site will be logged. A connection reset should make it disappear. I'll get that out of there.

 

-Mike

Thanks for the heads up lol
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kojitsari Member Level: 4G WiMax

kojitsari

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Hah! That's a leftover remnant of my failed testing to get around the bug where the PLMN does not change immediately. I didn't realize it was still in there. If you see it, I do not believe that site will be logged. A connection reset should make it disappear. I'll get that out of there.

 

-Mike

An indicator that a site won't be logged actually sounds kind of like a sweet feature. Unless of course it actually should be getting logged and that's just an error that'll prevent it from being logged.
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ingenium Member Level: 4G WiMax

ingenium

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Does SCP only export logs for the current carrier? I ask because I've verified that I have non-domestic HSPA/UMTS entries in the database file from when I was traveling with a foreign SIM, but no GSM log file gets generated when I export them. Is this a bug or is it by design?

 

Sent from my Nexus 6

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bmoses Member Level: 4G LTE

bmoses

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i get this allot on the g4

 

i get that on my flex 2 a lot too. i've also seen reports of HTC One M9's doing it. As far as i can tell its an android bug, not a signal check issue. When it does that if you check the engineering screens they are all messed up as well. i'm just waiting till my phone gets 5.1 to see if its fixed.

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jshock Member Level: iDEN *chirp*

jshock

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Recently my S4 Triband was updated OTA to firmware OD2 Lolipop.  sing then i have not been able to use the pro version to reset data connection.  

 

I am running a stock rooted firmware.

Any Ideas?

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UPdownLoAD Member Level: 4G WiMax

UPdownLoAD

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Edited Post.

Also, is this a good thing? Or can you not talk about it in the free section of the site?

First rule of (S4GRU) fight club....

 

We sponsors all donated for this valuable info, and we are not going to give it away. Sorry you're missing out!

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travismheim Member Level: 4G WiMax

travismheim

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On Verizon LG G2 SCP will not normally show any band or GCI/PCI/TAC, but LTE discovery is able to gather the info. It I force the phone network mode into LTE/GSM/UMTS and then back to Global, SCP will display the data but I can not do anything with site notes giving an error "LTE PLMN or GCI is invalid or missing; cannot edit site note", and the status bar notification won't show the band. Any idea what the issue might be? Its just my work phone so having the data isn't necessary but I've been curious why LTE discovery could get it and SCP couldn't. Until I messed with the network mode I never saw the data reported in SCP at all.

Sent from my VS980 4G using Tapatalk

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uploadfromtaptalk1433201156459.png

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mikejeep Member Level: LTE Advanced

mikejeep

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Also Mike, are you still aware of the auto refresh issue on non-Sprint SIMs/devices?

 

I'm starting to hear about issues on some devices never updating the screen. It must be an Android bug, because SignalCheck just listens for changes in signal strength using a standard Android method. Do you (or anyone else) know if it happens with other similar apps, like LTE Discovery or Signal Detector?

 

An indicator that a site won't be logged actually sounds kind of like a sweet feature. Unless of course it actually should be getting logged and that's just an error that'll prevent it from being logged.

 

My intention is to show an indicator and not log a site when the app is reporting it might be invalid (like what many of us see for a moment when switching between some Clearwire and Sprint sites), however the code in place doesn't properly recognize these moments -- and the indicator tends to get 'stuck'. I thought I removed all traces of it, but obviously I didn't. I'll get an update out soon that resolves that, and I will keep trying to hunt down a way to ignore those bogus readings.

 

Does SCP only export logs for the current carrier? I ask because I've verified that I have non-domestic HSPA/UMTS entries in the database file from when I was traveling with a foreign SIM, but no GSM log file gets generated when I export them. Is this a bug or is it by design?

 

Hmm, that sounds like a bug. The export feature should dump the entire contents of the database, regardless of the provider you are/were connected to at the time. Can you e-mail support [at] bluelinepc.com with a copy of your database and your exported CSV so I can take a look?

 

i get this allot on the g4

i get that on my flex 2 a lot too. i've also seen reports of HTC One M9's doing it. As far as i can tell its an android bug, not a signal check issue. When it does that if you check the engineering screens they are all messed up as well. i'm just waiting till my phone gets 5.1 to see if its fixed.

 

Just to confirm.. is the issue you are seeing simultaneous 1X and LTE connections on the G4 and Flex 2? Does it happen when you are on LTE, and does the 1X information remain static when it happens? We all know no newer devices have dual radios, so I'm guessing that the 1X display is most likely 'stale' data. Does LTE Discovery or Signal Detector show wacky information too?

 

Recently my S4 Triband was updated OTA to firmware OD2 Lolipop.  sing then i have not been able to use the pro version to reset data connection.  

 

I am running a stock rooted firmware.

Any Ideas?

 

What error do you see? Are you sure the device is rooted? The reset feature requires root, but other than that it is not device-specific. It simply toggles airplane mode on and off.. nothing fancy :)

 

-Mike

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mikejeep Member Level: LTE Advanced

mikejeep

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On Verizon LG G2 SCP will not normally show any band or GCI/PCI/TAC, but LTE discovery is able to gather the info. It I force the phone network mode into LTE/GSM/UMTS and then back to Global, SCP will display the data but I can not do anything with site notes giving an error "LTE PLMN or GCI is invalid or missing; cannot edit site note", and the status bar notification won't show the band. Any idea what the issue might be? Its just my work phone so having the data isn't necessary but I've been curious why LTE discovery could get it and SCP couldn't. Until I messed with the network mode I never saw the data reported in SCP at all.

 

This hiccup is really starting to annoy me! I have no idea why LTE Discovery is showing the information, and SignalCheck is not.. the routines to gather this information are part of the base Android framework on Android 4.2+, and I don't use any crazy tricks to display them unless you're using an older HTC. I do see you're showing that bogus "<!>" indicator that I mentioned in my last post; that's a remnant of beta testing that I need to get out ASAP, and could be the reason you are not able to edit the site note. But the missing GCI/PCI/TAC information is a separate issue that I am completely lost on. I'm going to reach out to Spence and Danial and see if they have something up their sleeve that they might be able to share.

 

-Mike

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bmoses Member Level: 4G LTE

bmoses

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*snip*

 

-Mike

 

relpying to my part, no its not stale data, thats what makes is really weird. the 1x connection does update and does show the correct signal strength and BID and other info for the 1x connection based on where i'm at and what i should be connected to. the only thing thats off with the 1x connection is sometimes (i'm assuming when i'm connected to B26) it will show i'm connected to 1x800 from sites that do not have 1x800 (verified too).

 

on the LTE side its a little different. the signal strength info is accurate but everything else either doesn't display properly or is stale. it never shows the GCI and sometimes will show the PCI and sometimes not but the PCI is always stale and usually the last PCI from the LTE i was connected to prior.

 

i have verified that i am on LTE during this state based on speed tests. I have also tested if calling and data works at the same time, which it does not, obviously, just a curiosity thing because of the weird state.

 

its almost 100% guaranteed when i lose LTE and i reconnect to LTE it will go into this state. during an airplane mode afterwards does nothing, you just have to wait until eventually it fixes itself, without me doing anything, and starts displaying properly. i did send a diagnostic report but its been several weeks now so if you need a new one let me know, its easy to get :)

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