Cell phone bars (3G, ATT, device, wifi)

[robertpasa]

I want to confirm that the "bars" you see on any cell phone show you the strength of the signal between you and the closest cell tower. But that's all it means. Hence if you're downloading internet pages, the speed of that downloading is not always correlated to the bars.

Also, if the bars are down to one bar, it will still be a limit your internet speed. But other things clog the internet because your data goes through different nodes.

Also, the bars are exactly correlated to ASU/dBm, is that right? You can go to About Phone and see the current dBm, but it would always be the same as the bars. Unless you need to see an exact number.

The past two days my internet on my ATT/3G phone got insanely slow, but the bars remained at 3-4. I downloaded the Ookla speed test and my downloading speed was around 0.2M which is terrible but a few hours later it was 4.0M. I think 1.0M is the minimal for decent internet usage without having a hernia.

[robertpasa]

Note: the above has nothing to do with wifi. I don't use wifi with my phone.

[shmoov_groovzsd]

What time did you data speeds slow down? Typically in the evenings, base station will go through its maintenance period.

Additionally, if you are trying to use your device during high traffic times, you will see that kind of impact on speeds.

The cellular strength in bars on your device doesnt necessarily correlate to your data speed. The cell bars only represent how much signal you are receiving from the nearest tower. So in theory you could be standing right next to a tower will full bars, but data speeds are not great because of network congestion.

If it so happens the tower you are sitting on is serving a lot of users because another tower might be down, that will also impact speeds.

[robertpasa]

My speeds are usually at a decent level but I had problems the last two afternoons. Don't know why.

[shmoov_groovzsd]

Could have been anything. Those kind of speed drops, at least in my experience tell me that some work was being done at the base station. They will throttle down power in those base stations during those types of periods such as maintenance or upgrades.