revelated
Member
Those who discount the power of the Droid RAZR, or question its long term capabilities.
I recently relocated to northern Washington from Southern California. For those not aware that's a 18-20 hour drive in GOOD conditions, all Interstate 5. In my case it took 26 hours, due to frequent stops along the way. I had two ways of communicating - the RAZR and the Galaxy Tab 10.1 Wi-Fi. I do have a Samsung 4G MiFi that I use as primary since everything connects to it perfectly. The RAZR of course has the whole "1400 MTU" glitch that has not yet been fixed. As a result I could not use the RAZR as a hotspot for the Galaxy 10.1. But I was able to use it by itself.
As a disclaimer it was connected to a car charger about 80% of the time since I left full GPS and screen brightness on with whatever data I could get. It was estimating 4 hours every time I unplugged it and I know full GPS alone would have been murdering the battery had I not had it charging constantly. It also was off whenever I stopped somewhere. Reason I left so much stuff on was due to Google Latitude which I left on for a friend to keep tabs on where I was in case something happened to me.
Just for the record Verizon's signal coverage is to be commended. I had cell phone signal all the way without a single break and without roaming (I never enable it, it never seems necessary). Even during questionable areas such as the remote Yreka, CA area (Google It. It's a wide area of nothing) or the obscenely dangerous Avenal, CA (known only for its prison and a lone 76), I still had cell phone signal. I actually jumped when I received a phone call with two massive mountains to either side of me because I expected the phone to be out of signal.
4G popped in and out as I entered/left major cities which was what I expected to see. I never dropped 4G while in a major city. Stockton had it, Bakersfield had it, LA had it, and Sacramento had it. I'd say 3G was on about 90% of the trip. I even had 3G in places like those ridiculous mountains between Redding, CA and Yreka, CA, had 3G in the silly Siskiyou Pass, had 3G in the forested mountains driving through Oregon, it just kept on going. The only place it really consistently died was a wide stretch of farmland that is just outside of Seattle, WA, which is to be expected, since they probably had no way to bridge the signals across. There were no power lines or anything out there, just grass and fences.
When I got to my new place, of course I don't have internet until tomorrow (Comcast). So the 4G hotspot had to serve me until then (now that I can use my computer and set the MTU to 1400, it's fine). The Washington State area is saturated in 4G signal for some reason, and I am using the RAZR constantly. It's getting 28Mbps down and over 17Mbps up, speeds I couldn't even come close to in Southern CA (17Mbps down, 12Mbps up). I'm talking ridiculously fast. It's not dropped to 3G at all since I got here yesterday. Of course the battery is taking a bigger hit due to this, but that's okay. It's at the point I'm almost convinced to just keep using the RAZR instead of getting home internet service, but I know that'd be problematic for the long term.
I still say that those who are skipping the RAZR because they think it's fragile, or that its not going to last them long term, are shorting themselves, and I submit that it will truly be the device that people have few complaints about down the road. It just works.
I recently relocated to northern Washington from Southern California. For those not aware that's a 18-20 hour drive in GOOD conditions, all Interstate 5. In my case it took 26 hours, due to frequent stops along the way. I had two ways of communicating - the RAZR and the Galaxy Tab 10.1 Wi-Fi. I do have a Samsung 4G MiFi that I use as primary since everything connects to it perfectly. The RAZR of course has the whole "1400 MTU" glitch that has not yet been fixed. As a result I could not use the RAZR as a hotspot for the Galaxy 10.1. But I was able to use it by itself.
As a disclaimer it was connected to a car charger about 80% of the time since I left full GPS and screen brightness on with whatever data I could get. It was estimating 4 hours every time I unplugged it and I know full GPS alone would have been murdering the battery had I not had it charging constantly. It also was off whenever I stopped somewhere. Reason I left so much stuff on was due to Google Latitude which I left on for a friend to keep tabs on where I was in case something happened to me.
Just for the record Verizon's signal coverage is to be commended. I had cell phone signal all the way without a single break and without roaming (I never enable it, it never seems necessary). Even during questionable areas such as the remote Yreka, CA area (Google It. It's a wide area of nothing) or the obscenely dangerous Avenal, CA (known only for its prison and a lone 76), I still had cell phone signal. I actually jumped when I received a phone call with two massive mountains to either side of me because I expected the phone to be out of signal.
4G popped in and out as I entered/left major cities which was what I expected to see. I never dropped 4G while in a major city. Stockton had it, Bakersfield had it, LA had it, and Sacramento had it. I'd say 3G was on about 90% of the trip. I even had 3G in places like those ridiculous mountains between Redding, CA and Yreka, CA, had 3G in the silly Siskiyou Pass, had 3G in the forested mountains driving through Oregon, it just kept on going. The only place it really consistently died was a wide stretch of farmland that is just outside of Seattle, WA, which is to be expected, since they probably had no way to bridge the signals across. There were no power lines or anything out there, just grass and fences.
When I got to my new place, of course I don't have internet until tomorrow (Comcast). So the 4G hotspot had to serve me until then (now that I can use my computer and set the MTU to 1400, it's fine). The Washington State area is saturated in 4G signal for some reason, and I am using the RAZR constantly. It's getting 28Mbps down and over 17Mbps up, speeds I couldn't even come close to in Southern CA (17Mbps down, 12Mbps up). I'm talking ridiculously fast. It's not dropped to 3G at all since I got here yesterday. Of course the battery is taking a bigger hit due to this, but that's okay. It's at the point I'm almost convinced to just keep using the RAZR instead of getting home internet service, but I know that'd be problematic for the long term.
I still say that those who are skipping the RAZR because they think it's fragile, or that its not going to last them long term, are shorting themselves, and I submit that it will truly be the device that people have few complaints about down the road. It just works.
