As of yesterday, no longer connecting to 4G and today I realized I can't send text messages

[zskaik]

So I have a Samsung galaxy S7 and I can't connect to 4G anymore and I can't send any texts. I have been getting reminders continuously to update to Android 7.0 but I am already on 7.0, not sure if this is related. I am currently connecting to HSDPA and UMTS only. Fido agents attempted to reset the network on my device multiple times with no success. I have an official Fido software build installed. Not sure what to do at this point.

***Edited to add labels***

[Cawtau]

Hello Zskaik,

  Welcome to the community!

  Did you purchase your phone from Fido? I understand your device already has Android 7.0, however, have you verified whether there are any updates? That is, which version of firmware is your device running? There are a number of different Fido firmwares for Android 7. As far as I can tell, the most recent firmware is G930W8VLU2BQH1 (see here). Most of the differences seem to be security patches, but there may also be a newer firmware addressing your issues.

Hope this helps

Cheers

[zskaik]

I have G930W8VLU2BQH1.

[FidoPamela]

Hey @zskaik!

Have you tried to restore your phone to the factory settings to see if that helped?

[zskaik]

Yes I did a factory reset and still not getting 4G!

[FidoPierre]

Hey @zskaik, 

Can you let us know what comes up when you try a manual network search on your phone? 

You should be able to do this by selecting the following: 

>Mobile networks
>Network operators
>Search Network

[zskaik]

Sure, so I did as you said and this is what I see: 

Fido

Fido-EXT

Fido-EXT

Videotron

Videotron

Freedom

[zskaik]

Just to be clear, I have no issues connecting to Fido, I have issues connecting to 4G only.

[FidoAlyson]

Thanks @zskaik

I went back to the thread and don't see an answer to the question so I'll send it back you way.

Are you using a Fido phone or is it an unlocked device from another provider?

[zskaik]

Hi,

I don't know if it's a Fido phone or not. It is unlocked I believe and I bought it from someone else.

[ubereverything]

Mine is also an S7 and it is from Fido but I don't have any issues sending texts.  My only issue is that I can't get 4G data because Fido is not letting me connect because it thinks I'm on a lower version of Android.  That's what I was told by chat.

I will be calling into tech support and am going to try and either have them remove the block or give me a credit since I am not able to get a service that I am paying for.

I am curious what is happening to people that use their own phones with Fido.  Have all of them lost 4G because Fido can't "detect" their OS version?

[zskaik]

Is your S7 a Fido device? 

[ubereverything]

It was new when I got it and the first time you put a SIM in, it locks it to that network.  So I guess it's a Fido device but I'm still not exactly sure what that means.  

[Cawtau]

---

@ubereverything wrote:

It was new when I got it and the first time you put a SIM in, it locks it to that network.  So I guess it's a Fido device but I'm still not exactly sure what that means.  

---

Hello Ubereverything,

  That does not necessarily mean the device was purchased from Fido. Devices sold from third party retailers will lock to the provider of the first SIM that is inserted. The relevance of whether or not it was purchased from Fido is that the IMEIs of devices sold by Fido would be in their inventory database. It's possible that Fido has only pushed the update to the devices with IMEIs in their database.

  It might be a similar issue to unlocked phones not having access to certain features like voLTE and Wifi-calling. As far as I am aware, only devices purchased from Fido have access to those features -- also because the IMEIs of unlocked devices is not in their inventory database.

Hope this helps

Cheers

[ubereverything]

Either way I don't think it's right that they are blocking access to their 4G network based on what OS version they think they have pushed to the phone.  That essentially means anyone without a "Fido" phone (or custom firmware) has lost 4G access because they can't determine what version of Android we have.

There must be other ways for them to check for the version.  I just googled "check my user agent" on my phone and it was able to tell me I'm on 7.0...  come on Fido!

[FidoNick]

Was this resolved @ubereverything?

Keep us posted! 

[zskaik]

I have the same issue as ubereverything lol. And it has not been resolved. I was simply told non-Fido devices cannot be guaranteed, so due to changes Fido made in their network, it looks like I will never have LTE until I buy a Fido phone, which is pretty disappointing. 

[ubereverything]

I called customer service yesterday and was transferred to tech support.  They asked me to confirm several settings (Android version in "About Device>Software information" and Network mode in "Mobile networks) and told me that everything was ok with them.  They are going to look into it further and opened a ticket.  They said they would get back to me within 72 hours.

I'm surprised they are telling people with non-Fido phones that they are cannot guarantee 4G.  I can understand that some phones (European and Asian models) may not have the right network bands to get 4G with Fido but if I had a phone that supported it I would expect to get 4G.

I was told that their network should be able to detect a phones OS version and that the 4G blocking wasn't based on what their system thinks got pushed to the phone.  If @zskaik's S7 was able to get 4G before the network upgrade, I would call back and try to get to tech support to see if they can resolve it.  That is unless they really do have a policy of not providing support to non-Fido phones (which mine is).  

[ubereverything]

Got a text message from Fido saying that my issue was resolved.  It wasn't... so I called back and got to level 2 tech support again where they told me that my IMEISV (IMEI Software Version) had to be at 41 or above.  Mine is at 35 so I now I need to figure out how to update that.  I'm going to try to fully reflash the latest firmware and hope that fixes everything.

[FidoAmanda]

Thanks for the update, ubereverything! 

Don't forget to let us know that helps!

[ubereverything]

So I flashed the latest firmware from sammobile.com using all 4 files in Odin (BL, AP, CP and CSC), did a factory reset (wipe data)  and LTE is back.  I seem to also have access to OTA updates again so that's a bonus.  My IMEISV is 57 now.

It may have had something to do with losing my carrier information during my previous flashes because I saw that my CSC information was blank.  I didn't mind having to do the wipe since I was having battery issues anyways and it seems to have helped.

And that's all folks...