Bionic 4g/3g compatibility issues

[West24l]

I upgraded to the new Droid Bionic on Wednesday, and I am continually having issues with the 4g/3g compatibility. When I bought the phone at the store, everything seemed to be working great. However, when I returned home with my new phone, I noticed that I was able to receive phone calls and text messaging, but I could not connect to the web or access my email and social networking sites. I immediately took the phone back up to the verizon store, and everything seemed to be working great. After speaking to a verizon wireless associate, he informed me that a lot of the Bionic owners are having issues with their phone's being backwards compatible with 3g. When the phone is in a 4g network, everything works great and smoothe. However, when you leave the 4g network and enter into a 3g network the phone automatically loses data connection. I have tried several times shutting the phone off and rebooting when in the 3g network, but I still cannot get it to work. Does anyone have any solutions? Also, the customer service department mentioned something about an upgrade that is supposed to fix this problem.....does anyone know when this upgrade is supposed to happen? This issue is really ticking me off because I love my phone but with no data network it is useless to me (I live AND work outside of the 4g network).

[dankbionic]

Not sure how long it will be until they fix this.  I have had my Bionic for a week, and it has trouble with 4G as well.  It will be in 4G at my house or work with a nice strong signal then will suddenly drop to 3G.  If I toggle airplane mode, it will not go back to 4g, however if I reboot the phone it comes back up in 4G and will stay that way until I lock the screen.  (Then it goes back to 3G)  I have tried all the tricks in the discussion boards including turning on the Data Roaming and reseating the SIM card to no avail.  By the looks of other internet discussion boards this is an issue that other Bionic iusers are having.  Any suggestions Verizon?  *228 doesn't work with sim cards.

[mgoblue2003]

I'm having the same issue. Once I go to 3g, I can't get back to 4g unless I reboot my phone. Is there a fix coming?

[mgoblue2003]

I should've started, I also have the Bionic

[crweaks23]

Just adding my experience to the mix... I live in a 4G area but sometimes lose the 4g... then I don't get ANY data connection for a period of time.

Does this happen on other LTE phones?

[thagrrrl79]

I've had the Bionic for just over a week & have had connectivity issues from day one. It's not so much switching from 4G to 3G or vice versa as it is just randomly loosing signal period. It frequently happens after I've been on the phone; I get off the phone & go to check Twitter or send a text message & I have no connection. Some days are better than others, but I'm having to restart it as much if not more than the Droid it replaced. It's frustrating because I'm really loving the phone, except for that. Oh, and the fact that if I move apps to the SD card the phone thinks it's not installed any more, but that's another forum post.

[AntonioC_VZW]

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West24l wrote:

I upgraded to the new Droid Bionic on Wednesday, and I am continually having issues with the 4g/3g compatibility. When I bought the phone at the store, everything seemed to be working great. However, when I returned home with my new phone, I noticed that I was able to receive phone calls and text messaging, but I could not connect to the web or access my email and social networking sites. I immediately took the phone back up to the verizon store, and everything seemed to be working great. After speaking to a verizon wireless associate, he informed me that a lot of the Bionic owners are having issues with their phone's being backwards compatible with 3g. When the phone is in a 4g network, everything works great and smoothe. However, when you leave the 4g network and enter into a 3g network the phone automatically loses data connection. I have tried several times shutting the phone off and rebooting when in the 3g network, but I still cannot get it to work. Does anyone have any solutions? Also, the customer service department mentioned something about an upgrade that is supposed to fix this problem.....does anyone know when this upgrade is supposed to happen? This issue is really ticking me off because I love my phone but with no data network it is useless to me (I live AND work outside of the 4g network).

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Hi West24l,

I am sorry to learn of the 4G/3G connectivity issues you are experiencing. Since you don't live in a 4G area (as per your post) I would recommend to change your phone settings to connect to 3G only and only change it to 4G when you visit a 4G area. Doing this should resolve your connectivity concerns. You can set data connection to 3G only by following the path below:

Menu>Settings>Wireless&Networks>MobileNetworks.NetworkMode then select CDMA only. For online instructions please click on this LINK

[jason2302]

That has NOTHING to do with it.

The REAL problem is that Motorola shipped many Bionic devices with faulty radios, as if they weren't already bad enough. My advice is to return the phone and wait for either the HTC Rezound or the Galaxy Nexus, both of which will have 720p screens and better CPUs, instead of the Bionic's cheap screen and old processor.

But if you MUST keep the Bionic, exchange it for a new one and hopefully it will be fine. But still, the radios on most of Verizon's phones are complete crap. You will constantly find yourself losing signal strength/signal alltogether.

[#9]

Thank you everyone for sharing your experiences. Our product team and Motorola are aware of this issue and investigating a resolution. A fix is expected in the first maintenance release for the device. We don't have a date for the resolution at this time. If you are still within your 14 day worry free guarantee, I encourage you to try exchanging the device as this does not seem to affect every Bionic to the same magnitude. I appreciate your patience as we work to resolve this issue. 

[MobileMoghul]

I am using a BIONIC which i got after returning my CHARGE as it was hanging, not responsive and restarting oftern after a months use. Now with the BIONIC i am having a lot of signal issue in all the places(My Home) that had a solid 4G network with my CHARGE. Now I am missing calls and the phone toggles between 4G and 3G all the time. This BIONIC is only 2 days old and I am not sure if i should return it or is there a fix to it. Is it even possible to fix this issue without a Hardware update?