Motorola V3 RAZR radio interference?

I just picked up the Motorola RAZR for Cingular.

I've noticed something peculiar. This phone radiates a ridiculous field
around it, causing radio interference whenever a call or text message is
about to come in.

If the phone is within 10 feet of a radio, you can predict a phone call or
text message about 2 seconds before it actually arrives because whatever you
are listening to becomes garbled with digital RF static.

Anyone else notice this?


--

- Jonathan

FOUR BRAND SPANKIN NEW SONGS FOR YOU!
Added February 2005!
Go to http://www.guestroomproject.com/ to
hear some music from my upcoming solo album,
the Guestroom Project. I play all the instruments.

---

› See More: Motorola V3 RAZR radio interference?

"£ Î Z @ R Ð" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>I just picked up the Motorola RAZR for Cingular.
>
> I've noticed something peculiar. This phone radiates a ridiculous field
> around it, causing radio interference whenever a call or text message is
> about to come in.
>
> If the phone is within 10 feet of a radio, you can predict a phone call or
> text message about 2 seconds before it actually arrives because whatever
> you
> are listening to becomes garbled with digital RF static.
>
> Anyone else notice this?

that happens with all GSM phones... nothing to get alarmed about.

hell, dazzle your friends when you know the phone is gonna ring before it
actually does!

how's the service working out for you?

> that happens with all GSM phones... nothing to get alarmed about.
>
> hell, dazzle your friends when you know the phone is gonna ring before it
> actually does!
>
> how's the service working out for you?

stop following me.

Ah, GSM. so it's a cingular thing, not a RAZR thing? Got it. I've been a
sprint guy for five years...

Service is pretty good. I think Cingular has better coverage in my area
(i.e., it works well in my living room and basement when sprint didn't), but
i experience more occasional static than i did with sprint, almost like
Analog static.


--

- Jonathan

FOUR BRAND SPANKIN NEW SONGS FOR YOU!
Added February 2005!
Go to http://www.guestroomproject.com/ to
hear some music from my upcoming solo album,
the Guestroom Project. I play all the instruments.



"MacDog" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> "£ Î Z @ R Ð" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>>I just picked up the Motorola RAZR for Cingular.
>>
>> I've noticed something peculiar. This phone radiates a ridiculous field
>> around it, causing radio interference whenever a call or text message is
>> about to come in.
>>
>> If the phone is within 10 feet of a radio, you can predict a phone call
>> or
>> text message about 2 seconds before it actually arrives because whatever
>> you
>> are listening to becomes garbled with digital RF static.
>>
>> Anyone else notice this?
>
> that happens with all GSM phones... nothing to get alarmed about.
>
> hell, dazzle your friends when you know the phone is gonna ring before it
> actually does!
>
> how's the service working out for you?
>

I get this with my TDMA phone (nokia 3560) i think this is the nature of
cellular. about to get my motorola 551 TOMORROW!!

--

Susan wrote:
> I get this with my TDMA phone (nokia 3560) i think this is the nature
of
> cellular. about to get my motorola 551 TOMORROW!!
>
> --
This is a nice device, and since the motorola v551 is a smartphone, we
tested and found it works great with an Internet connection and our s/w
from Orb Networks - and it's free. If you run this s/w on your
broadband connected XP PC, you'll be able to see and/or hear any of
your content on your phone like your music, videos, your photos and
even live TV (if you have a tuner in your PC). It streams this to
other devices too, any internet connected PC, PDA, etc...

Once and for all...

This interference is a result of the frequencies used by GSM. If your GSM
handset is near the audio device (speaker phone, stereo, mp3 player or
almost anything with a speaker), you're going to get these sounds whenever
the handset transmits. This occurs periodically when the handset and the
cell site "handshake". That is, the cell site interrogates all handsets
within range and exchanges a small amount of data. Something like (cell
site) "..whomever is out there, identify yourself?". (handset) "...I'm
here and available. My number is xxx-xxx-xxxx".

Also, when someone calls your cellphone, the cell site broadcasts a data
stream to all handsets, looking for yours. Your handset then transmits a
short burst of data, identifying itself. (this is why you can sometimes
tell when the cell phone is about to ring). Then the cell site sends a
ringing signal and your handset rings.

During the time you're talking, the handset is transmitting, so the
interference continues.

Generally, all GSM handsets should cause about the same amount of
interference. The variables are; 1) distance between the handset and the
audio device, 2) shielding of audio components inside the device being
interfered with.
****************************************************************************
***
Since this question comes up about once every 2 - 3 days here, let's just
copy and repost it occasionally.

"£ Î Z @ R Ð" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> I just picked up the Motorola RAZR for Cingular.
>
> I've noticed something peculiar. This phone radiates a ridiculous field
> around it, causing radio interference whenever a call or text message is
> about to come in.
>
> If the phone is within 10 feet of a radio, you can predict a phone call or
> text message about 2 seconds before it actually arrives because whatever
you
> are listening to becomes garbled with digital RF static.
>
> Anyone else notice this?
>
>
> --
>
> - Jonathan
>
> FOUR BRAND SPANKIN NEW SONGS FOR YOU!
> Added February 2005!
> Go to http://www.guestroomproject.com/ to
> hear some music from my upcoming solo album,
> the Guestroom Project. I play all the instruments.
>
>
>
>

In article <[email protected]>,
Craven Morehead <[email protected]> wrote:

In article <[email protected]>,
Craven Morehead <[email protected]> wrote:
>Once and for all...
>
>This interference is a result of the frequencies used by GSM.

Once again ...

GSM, TDMA, CDMA, and analog have all shared various portions of the radio
spectrum, but it's only GSM (and to a lesser extent, TDMA) that causes
such interference on those same radio frequencies.

Why? Because the relevant "frequencies" are the width and spacing of the
data bursts, not so much the radio carrier frequencies.

Here is a relevant posting from the early days:


Date: 11 Mar 94 21:34:21 EST
From: Stewart Fist <[email protected]>
Subject: GSM and TDMA Problems

John Sims <[email protected]> asks about the problems with GSM.

They are pretty much the same as with all TDMA systems, including the
TDMA now being introduced into the USA -- and they'll be worse with
DECT and DCS1800 which are designed to be used indoors in large
offices.

You can look at these problems in a number of different ways and at a
number of different levels. The primary problem is that they were
introduced in competition to perfectly good analog cellular networks,
and they failed to provide any real customer advantages. A system
needs to be better than the one it replaces. The magical name
'digital' doesn't carry much weight with customers after a while.

Coverage area is another major problem, and here the American TDMA has
a better solution than GSM because it emphasised dual-mode handsets
with analog providing coverage where digital wasn't available. GSM
didn't do this, so in most nations with the system (except Germany)
you are limited to a very small coverage area, and a very limited
range of base-stations, often with minimal equipment, and with great
holes in the cells. Drop outs on the Sydney GSM networks seem to
range between 40% and up to 80% for a car crossing the city.

Sound quality in all digital systems seems to be consistent, but only
'acceptable'. While good static-free reception extends to the
boundaries of the cell, they do all suffer from a staccato-like effect
when driving down tree-line corridors (especially after dew or rain)
and they drop the link precipitously, without warning, at the
boundary. This is not how consumers think a phone system should
behave.

Within buildings, they have many more penetration and Rayleigh-fading
problems than analog also. Range of a GSM cell, at present is limited
to 35kms, which is too small for Australia, but this will be fixed in
1996 by slot-stealing.

GSM and TDMA base stations also need to radiate from higher points for
good coverage, but if they do that, they then interfere with other
cells. Capacity is set by the amount of general R/F interference
being introduced, and generally they seem to be only getting two to
three-times that of AMPS.

wants International roaming, because it is used in New Zealand,
Australia, most of Asia, and the America's. What we needed for good
international roaming was a dual-mode AMPS/TACS handset (and the
difference is really only in the R/F stage, so this would have been
easy to do).

The main problems are the R/F interference effects, and these are
common to all TDMA systems (including the new DECT and DCS-1800) and
they are cumulative -- so we see only a few signs of the problems now,
but like automobile pollution growth in cities, it will get worse as
the population of users grows. There are four main problems here:

1. General R/F pollution. Any system that switches its R/F
transmitter on and off rapidly (GSM does it 217 times a second, TDMA
does it 50 times) will scatter EMI throughout the adjacent radio
spectrum. And the sharper the edge of the switch power (on and off),
the wider the band of hash it scatters. These sets need a 3-5MHz
guard-band between them and analog AMPS channels,and they try to ramp
up the power, and still they scatter crap into nearby television
broadcast bands. We've never had anything that generates EMI like a
GSM handset before in these bands. We need large numbers of them like
we need a hole in the head.

2. Audio-Hz interference. The on-off cycle of transmission power will
be read by any analog circuit nearby (with any rectification or
asymmetrical circuits) as an intrusive audio tone of 217Hz, and the
two major harmonics above. This buzz intrudes into hearing aids at
distances up to 30 metres, and is often intolerable at 2 metres. It
also gets into cassette recorder, wireline systems, and into modems as
a carrier tone.

3. Digital byte intrusions. In digital circuits, where the track on a
circuit board is about the length of a GSM antenna, the on-off cycle
of transmission power is often being read as a data-byte. If only one
GSM handset is operating in a vicinity, it will pulse in the first (of
eight) slots in a frame, and so produce a 1000 0000 byte at 217 bytes
(1736 bits) a second. This can also be read as 1100 0000, 0000 0000
at 3.4kbit/s, or 1110 0000 etc. at 5.2kbit/s (and so on).

When two or more handsets are working in the same location, they are
all synchronised to the same base-station (same or different
channels). So amplitude effects (same slot, different channels) are
cumulative: the fact that they may be using different channels is
immaterial, so the range of interference can increase. A number of
handsets will combine to create what amounts to random number
generation (they are also frequency hopping) of power pulses in
digital control circuits nearby.

This seems to hit some electronic equipment (laserprinters, modems,
PCs, TV controllers, possibly air-bag triggers) hard, and have wierd,
and often un-reproducable effects. The randomness seems to be the
problem in detecting what caused some 'event'. It is virtually
impossible to reproduce the conditions.

This is why some people report no problems at all, others say it
knocks out their Powerbook or modem or multiplexer, occasionally, or
every time. Obviously some equipment is far more susceptible than
others -- but not just in terms of needing EMI shielding.

4. The last EMI problems is the remote possibility (and I stress
'remote possibility') that the pulsation of the microwaves can create
a different type, or order, of health problems to analog. Analog is
expected to only have a 'brain and eye-lens' heating effect (but not
everyone is convinced about this).

Digital TDMA introduces a new factor. It is known for instance, that
some enzyme reactions in chemical processes are sped up enormously
when hit by pulsating R/F, but no one seems to know why. This needs a
lot more research, but is no reason for panic. However, it can't be
dismissed, like may technophiles seem to do.

The real problem with both GSM and American TDMA is the way in which
all these problems were kept secret, and the systems were rolled out
slowly and quietly without anyone admitting problems until the press
started shouting. When they play these sorts of games, they have only
themselves to blame when the press reacts strongly and shouts 'foul'
especially when it is likely to be hearing-impaired people who suffer
in office environments.

Later, problems were reluctantly admitted, but always the admission
was associated with "Don't worry, well fix it!" which is just another
of their lies. Most of these problems are intrinsic in time-division
power pulsing.

More recently the tactic has changed once again: now they blame the
lack of shielding on hearing-aids and other electronic equipment, and
want to boost the standard of immunity, rather than reduce their own
emissions.

It's the smoke-stack blaming inefficiencies in gas-masks for the
problems. ETSI is its own worst enemy.

Mike S. wrote:

> Why? Because the relevant "frequencies" are the width and spacing of the
> data bursts, not so much the radio carrier frequencies.
>
> Here is a relevant posting from the early days:

For those who don't want to wade through a long, old post, here's the
short and relevant version:

- GSM operates using a sginalling schemed known as TDMA - Time Division
Multiple access. This means that on the network, conversations are
multiplexed by dividing each digital stream into time slots. Each
digital packet of a conversation is ompressed and sent on its specific
time slot, and no other.

To facilitate this, a GSM or TDMA phone (including Nextel handsets)
operate by transmitting in rapid data bursts - on and off pulses. It is
these rapid on-of pulses that cause the interference that we perceive as
buzzing or ticking noises in speakers, flickering of monitors, and other
interference related problems.

CDMA phones (Code Division Mutiple Access) DO interfere with
electronics just as GSM and TDMA phones do. The difference is that CDMA
multiplexes its conversations via a different method. In CDMA, the
conversation is broken up by spectrum segments, and various parts of the
code is broadcast over different sections of a wideband channel.
Instead of on-off pulses, what appears to be a continuous tranmission
(that also looks a lot like random noise if you don't have the correct
"signal mask" to decode the transmission) is broadcast. Most
electronics can cope with this better than a pulsed transmission, and so
the effects aren't perceived as much.


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