Bought a new Samsung Galaxy S6 Active phone but LTE is not working?

[AstralRaven]

Hello, I purchased a new unlocked Samsung Galaxy S6 Active model SM-G890A on ebay and I checked on willmyphonework.net and entered my IMEI number on the public mobile website which said that LTE should work on the device. This is a AT&T only phone but it was unlocked before purchase.

I seem to be stuck on 4G most of the time after changing the APN settings to the desired Public Mobile APN settings but it's still not connecting to LTE in Mississauga, Ontario. Randomly, it would show "4G LTE" beside my connection bar which would be slower than 4G. 

When running a speedtest on 4G:
Ping: 25
Download: 12.65 mbps
Upload: 4.68 mbps

When running on 4G LTE:

Ping: 19

Download: 0.02 mbps
Upload: 0.04 mbps

The seller also stated that it is indeed compatible with LTE services with Public mobile in Canada so, i'm really at a loss on what to do. 

I have a S7 Edge and it can auto connect to any LTE/WCDMA/GSM network but the S6 Active doesnt have a setting for that. This is what it shows: 

Any help would be much appreciated, thank you.

[youodysseyleif]

Sometimes different phone companies disable certain frequencies on the radioes in their software for the phone. Before wiping your phone and loading a ROM (that's a pretty big process - I'm using a TMobile phone and haven't bothered with that) try this:

On your phone you can access the test menu by going to your phone dialer and calling *#2263#

It should immediately load up a program called "Service Mode". Go slowly in here, you can muck things up.

One of the options should be LTE Band Preference. It has a number beside it like [4] LTE Band Preference.

• You press the three verticle dot menu and select "key Input".
• Then you type 4 on your keyboard and press enter.
• In that menu I think the safest thing to do is select (using the same method) the option for "Auto"

[AstralRaven]

Nothing, just took the phone outside and then lost service entirely as in there wernt any bars, only a circle with a line between. I restarted the phone and reset the APN settings and re entered the public mobile APN which brought up the 4G LTE again but at
Super slow un usable speeds.

[zhadj030]

What did you change between yesterday and ? 

[AstralRaven]

Now the data on the phone isn't working at all. I Can't send sms texts which was working yesterday and "4g LTE" full bars is giving 1 Mbps download and 0.50 upload speed. Just yesterday it was 20 download and 9 upload.

Flashing a Canadian Rom would be the best solution? I'm afraid I don't know much about the topic, do you recommend any websites or forums that would help me learn about flashing Canadian Roms?

I'll keep testing it and doing my own research with Roms in the meantime. Thanks for the help

[zhadj030]

@AstralRaven Glad to hear that there is at least some improuvement.. While LTE around 20 Mbps is what I am getting I would imagine that this is the speed in your area.

If you want to do more I hightly suggest what @Mofokid mentioned, Flash a canadian ROM that would make life easier.

Dont forget to accept as solutions once your problem is fully resolved

Have a great day

[AstralRaven]

I did a factory reset and now instead of 4G it shows 4G LTE. It was weird but now the speed seems better than yesterday with 20 Mbps download and 9 Mbps upload. It's not as fast as it could be compared to the full LTE+ on my own phone but I guess the speed should be fine for my mother who only texts and occasionally watches videos.

If there are any other suggestions I'm still open to them, thank you for the help!

[Mofokid]

You answered your question alread, "4G LTE" is LTE, the reason you're seeing "4G LTE" is because its using a at&t rom, if you had a telus phone it would show LTE not 4G.. You might want to think about flashing a Canadian provider rom to your S6, rogers should work with at&t phones.. your choice.

[zhadj030]

Hello

While I am not sure why both Icones 4G and LTE are showing up in the same time I would suppose that its a software glitch. Since it is only supposed to show one and I know that on the AT&T software it will show WCMDA  as 4G (while it is really just 3 or 3.5 G)

That would explain why at least it shows LTE for (real) 4G  

But once you mentionned that the network mode is absent aka mising the LTE/WCDMA/GSM (auto connect ) option I was convinced that there is some kind of blocking software somewhere in their softwares to maybe discourage people from moving from them. 

Anyway I would encourage you to take a full phone backup (if you have important data) and maybe do a factory reset, that should start showing the hidden options.

You can take a look at this if you want :

http://forums.androidcentral.com/samsung-galaxy-s6-edge/533283-s6-edge-network-mode-missing.html

Let us know what happens, and community members will keep an eye on the situation