Soak test invites going out for Droid Turbo

[Ollie]

The Note 4 doesn't do Volte?

 

[bsweetness]

I've seen this noted multiple times when people talk about the Turbo being able to do voice and data simultaneously. However, as I understand it (and I'm SURE I'll be corrected if I'm mistaken) in order for VoLTE to work (and therefore to have simultaneous voice/data) BOTH parties on the call must be on VoLTE. How many phones are there in users hands right now that can do VoLTE? I suspect that it will be quite some time (years?) before the majority of phones are so equipped.

Sent from my Droid Turbo

That's something I've seen conflicting information on. Both the calling and the receiving phone must have VoLTE in order for HD Voice calls to work. That's a certainty.

But I've seen comments which say VoLTE will still work for calls when you're not calling a VoLTE-enabled handset, it will just do so at a lower, non-HD Voice quality. Verizon eventually plans to kill off their CDMA network, so VoLTE calls will have to work when calling non-VoLTE phones (such as land lines and phones that might be on another carrier).

I'm sure that someone here will be trying it out as soon as they get the update and will be able to confirm one way or another.

 

[bsweetness]

The Note 4 doesn't do Volte?

Nope. I was hoping today's small update would add support for it, but it didn't.

 

[Ollie]

That's strange that Verizon is launching these phones without it already working.

 

[bsweetness]

That's strange that Verizon is launching these phones without it already working.

They've run into issues along the way getting everything up and running. They had planned on having most devices launching with it by now (which is why the Turbo hasn't been able to do simultaneous voice and data since launch), but things haven't been as smooth as they had hoped. So they've had to decide between delaying the launch of most smartphones or delay the implementation of VoLTE on those phones.

 

[cr6]

Both the calling and the receiving phone must have VoLTE in order for HD Voice calls to work. That's a certainty.

Correct.
But having voice & data at the same time has nothing to do with VoLTE. At least it never has on my previous Sammy phones as I have had voice & data since my S3 days. I keep VoLTE turned off on my S5 to save battery life, since I only know a couple people (1 of those being my significant other) that have a compatible devIce, and I can still use voice & data at the same time with it disabled. Perhaps it's different for Moto IDK.

S5 tap'n

 

[FoxKat]

Correct.
But having voice & data at the same time has nothing to do with VoLTE. At least it never has on my previous Sammy phones as I have had voice & data since my S3 days. I keep VoLTE turned off on my S5 to save battery life, since I only know a couple people (1 of those being my significant other) that have a compatible devIce, and I can still use voice & data at the same time with it disabled. Perhaps it's different for Moto IDK.

S5 tap'n

Actually I'm not sure if the S5 is the same. Motorola Turbos only have one set of radios and so can't communicate on 4G LTE and 1X at the same time whereas I thing l think the S5 still has the former dual radio architecture. So in your case simultaneous voice and data is resident where the Turbo needs to do both over 4G.

 

[bsweetness]

Correct.
But having voice & data at the same time has nothing to do with VoLTE. At least it never has on my previous Sammy phones as I have had voice & data since my S3 days. I keep VoLTE turned off on my S5 to save battery life, since I only know a couple people (1 of those being my significant other) that have a compatible devIce, and I can still use voice & data at the same time with it disabled. Perhaps it's different for Moto IDK.

S5 tap'n

For older phones and new phones with two antennas, you're correct. But for some newer phones like the Turbo, simultaneous voice and data is only possible with VoLTE. As FoxKat said, this is because the Turbo only has one antenna, and only one radio can access it at the a time. With devices that have two antennas (such as the S3 you mentioned and the more recent S5 and Note 4), voice can run over CDMA and data can run over LTE at the same time. Thats not possible on devices that only have one antenna.

So with single antenna devices, simultaneous voice and data is 100% dependent on VoLTE.

 

[cr6]

Thanks for the info guys! Good to know.

S5 tap'n

 

[FoxKat]

For older phones and new phones with two antennas, you're correct. But for some newer phones like the Turbo, simultaneous voice and data is only possible with VoLTE. As FoxKat said, this is because the Turbo only has one antenna, and only one radio can access it at the a time. With devices that have two antennas (such as the S3 you mentioned and the more recent S5 and Note 4), voice can run over CDMA and data can run over LTE at the same time. Thats not possible on devices that only have one antenna.

So with single antenna devices, simultaneous voice and data is 100% dependent on VoLTE.

And @bsweetness, I have seen you say several times one antenna, and I don't doubt you. Still, I thought it was one less radio (not antenna). I'll have to go back and read again.

 

[bsweetness]

And @bsweetness, I have seen you say several times one antenna, and I don't doubt you. Still, I thought it was one less radio (not antenna). I'll have to go back and read again.

In the case of the Turbo, it has multiple radios: LTE, CDMA, and GSM/WCDMA. But it only has one antenna that's shared between those radios. This is confirmed in the FCC documents, most notably this report. Here's an image from the report that shows a layout of the antennas in the phone that shows only one WWAN (cellular) antenna:

By contrast, if you look at the FCC documents for the Droid Ultra and MAXX (specifically this report), it shows two separate cellular antennas, one for LTE and one for CDMA/GSM/WCDMA:

Also, if we want to look at another phone using the same Snapdragon 805 processor that the Turbo has (which means the exact same radio setup, although some bands may not be active on one or the other), here are the FCC documents for the Sprint Galaxy Note Edge (I couldn't find the documents for the Verizon Note 4 or Note Edge, so another CDMA carrier will likely have the same setup). This report shows multiple cellular antennas that allow for the use of the CDMA and LTE radios simultaneously:

I have the Verizon Note 4 which has the same Snapdragon 805 processor that the Turbo has, and I can confirm that simultaneous voice and data over CDMA and LTE does indeed work. It has exactly the same radios as the Turbo, but it has an additional antenna that makes the simultaneous usage of CDMA and LTE possible.

I hope that helps to explain why I keep talking about the Turbo only having one antenna.