My Experience with the Nokia E71′s Signal

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My Experience with the Nokia E71′s Signal

Posted on 06 August 2008 by Mitchell Oke

I saw a report on The Boy Genius stating that the E71-2 has a “horrible signal problem”, and I wanted to reinforce my experience. I’ve been using my E71-1 for about a month and in that time I haven’t had any troubles with my signal strength. My previous phone was the N95 8GB, the best phone I have ever used when it comes to signal, and the E71 shows the same amount of bars as it did. The signal bars certainly aren’t a scientific measure, heck the Nokia battery meter is pretty much a joke, but I can safely say it holds it’s signal well, and coasts along when other phones drop out.

TBG’s device may be faulty, or maybe there is some other difference between the E71-1 and E71-2 other than available bands, but my E71-1 is working great on HSDPA. For those interested my E71-1 has the 100.07.76 firmware, dated June 8th, 2008.

EDIT: After reading petesonline’s comment, I ran a 1MB speed test of my own and this was the result:

That is one of the fastest speed tests I’ve had on one of my phones, if not the fastest. AT&T’s network mustn’t be as good as Three here in Australia.

This post was written by:

Mitchell Oke - who has written 208 posts on Gear Diary.

Mitchell Oke is a 22 year old Bachelor of Creative Technology (Digital Video Production) from Sydney, Australia. He's previously worked for News Ltd as a Multimedia Producer, and currently works as a freelance editor and videographer. He has a great love for gadgets and cars, always wanting to have the latest and greatest phones, notebooks and other electronic toys. He is a huge fan of Star Trek, Top Gear and Seinfeld, citing them as his favourite TV shows. In December 2006 he became a Mac convert, having used Windows since he was 5.

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petesonline
Mitchell you saved the day. This morning I read your review of this phone, at the same time I got an email from bu*.com that the phone was on sale for 399, since I was in the market to retire my Treo 750 I decided to take the leap of faith (I was going to buy the Jesus phone, but it seems like there are too many issues ,i.e reception problems, with that phone at this time). With mastercard in hand I made my purchase. I also saw TBG’s video review of this phone which was very positive. After, work I started visiting the Nokia forums and googling other sites to get a better feel for my purchase. WOW, my joy of owning this new phone fell like a house of cards, when in the search field I entered e71 and problems. Yup the first item was TBG’s post about the e71 and reception problems. I avoided the Jesus phone for this very reason. After feeling in the dumps and hours of googleing to see how extensive this issue is and debating on whether to keep the phone or sending it back, I came across your latest post. I’m sticking with you and the e71 (at least until the return period is about to run out). Wish me luck.
markntravis
Since your firmware is dated today yours may very well be different than TBG’s.
http://www.geardiary.com Mitchell Oke
Haha, I actually meant June 8th. Here in Australia we write dates dd-mm-yyyy, not mm-dd-yyyy, can cause some confusion on these here internets.
markntravis
Since people that write for blogs may be from places all over the world writing out the name of the month is a must I think.
markntravis
I should add that your ROM may still be different than his. I didn’t read his report so don’t know if he noted his ROM version.
http://www.geardiary.com Mitchell Oke
It likely is, and that can make the world of difference when it comes to signal. HTC devices can be very different depending on the ROM version you use.
petesonline
Very disappointed, the phone is very slim and sexy, but the 3g reception is horrible. I tested the Nokia E71-2 against a Treo 750. Using dslreports.com/mspeed and a 400kb test file tested each phone 3 times, the average score was: Nokia scored a 27kb on ATT’s 3g network (the indicator did show 3g) while the Treo 750 scored 257kb on ATT’s 3g network (the indicator did show 3g).
This is my phone info:
100.07.76
8-6-2008
RM357
Nokia E71-2(30)
The phone is super sexy and it just feels awesome in my hands, the icons are dated and bland but you can download better ones with ease. At $399 I’ll have to pass and send it back for a refund.
petesonline
WHATTTTTTT! I have to do a second take. Okay just becasue I hate to give up and the fact that I can’t belive how a company like Nokia would mess on quality control by not testing the phone thoroughly, I checked into adjusting the phones settings. Tools, settings, phone, network, network mode, (what is this option: dual mode, UMTS, GSM) my phone was on dual mode so I switched it to UMTS and ran the speed test again x3 average 512kbs. This option might drain the battery quickly and not allow me to make calls outside of the 3g netwok, but the phone is speedy. More testing to come. The voice quality is very nice and phone calls are clear and crisp. Looks like I might change my mind after all.
http://www.geardiary.com Mitchell Oke
Petesonline, I updated my post with the speed test I did on my E71-1, and as you can see it’s bloody quick for me!
The information screen shows these details for my phone:
100.07.76
08-06-2008 (meaning June 8th)
RM-346
Nokia E71-1 (27)
I must say that’s a very poor result for the Treo as well, I got double the speeds at least when I had it!
petesonline
Michell, I agree with you, my Treo 750 on our ATT network is a dog, the highest I ever got it was 850kb’s.
I think I found the problem with my E71, the ATT network is overcrowded as a result of the iphone. I set my E71 to dual mode early this morning and I got the fastest results I ever got with any phone to date 1215. I didn’t even think it was possible. Thanks for your post it helped me make my mind up E71 is my main phone now.
PS, I have nothing but huge respect for BG I have been reading his posts for a long time now. But what he uncovered wasn’t a huge discovery. If anyone looks in the E-71 manual you’ll see that Nokia has a warning and disclaimer that covering the back top or bottom portion of the phone may cause reception problem or battery drain due to the phone working extra to connect to the network.
The E71 is super nice and the size is unbelivable, when you consider what is in it. I put it up there when Moto Razer first came out and it seemed to deify reality. I wish we as americans including me weren’t trained through years of marketing that big equals good. This phone is super slim and is superior in quality and options to most phones twice the size of this.
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Acey
My E71-1 has a problem. It says sim card registration failed. on google, it says my phone’s blacklisted or has a hardware problem but it worked once and lasted a day because i have to turn the phone off. when i turned it on again, it’s back to registration failure… I’ve tried many sim cards they also worked once then turn off then on, it’s back to the problem…
and also, which is better, dual mode or gsm. gsm is familiar to me from my phones before. My e71 is set to dual mode.