Airvana Airave connection problems with blackberry curve 8530

**underpsi1234** · 10-11-2010, 10:27 PM

My wife and I both have Blackberry curve 8530 and both are having the same issues. I got an Airave because of a weak signal inside the house. We have had it about 2 weeks and it seems to connect and disconnect to the phones intermittently. I have only heard the airave's 3 beep tone a hand full of times when using the phone since we had it. The unit always has 3 green lights on steady for broadband, gps, and mobile unless I get lucky and it conects to a phone, then the mobile light blinks rapidly when in the process of making the call. The signal in the house varies greatly from 3 bars to no bars depending on where you are in the house, and sometimes it starts roaming. If you walk around the house you will drop the call so I really want this to work properly. I have spent hours with tech support trying to get it to work properly and the last answer I got was that there is a problem with the airvana airaves that they are working on and that a software update will be sent to it when it becomes available, but there is no eta of this update. Here is what we have done so far. First reset the modem with airave and wireless router disconnected. Then powered up modem and let it initilize then powered up airave which is directly connected to the modem, and after it initilized I powered up the router which is hooked up to the airave. Verified that the internet works on wireless laptop and it is ok. Next, powered up the phones after a battery removal. Still nothing. Switched the phone to home only and then updated the perfered list. Another battery pull and this time it connected. Walked down the street during a call and when I got 2 houses down, it droped the call. Check *99 and phone was out of range from my airave. Went back home and waited 15 minutes for the phone to connect and it never would even though I was standing right in front of the airave with the phone. Switched phone back from home only to automatic and then updated preferred list and then another battery pull. It connected again so I went for another walk till it was out of range and it dropped the call again. Came home and after 15 min it still was not connected to the airave. Did another battery pull and held the phone a foot away from the airave and it connected this time. I went into the family room to watch tv for about 30 min and went to make a call and it was no longer connected. Sometimes if I stand next to the airave and turn the radio on the phone off, then back on it will connect but not always. Sometimes updating the preferred list will let it connect but not always. If it does connect, it never stays connected and it will never connect on it's own with out me having to do something to the phone. Also it should connect back to a sprint tower when I am out of range instead of drop the call. After I am out of rage and the call is dropped, I have 3 or 4 bars on the phone so there is no reason it should have droped the call. The last person I spoke with said the Samsung airaves did not have these connectivity issues but they are on backorder till next year so until there is an update available for the airvana, I'll need to update the preferred list and restart the phone every time I return to the house. This is such an inconvience espically when it doesn't even stay connected when I am home. Any ideas?

**AL13NS3XT0Y** · 10-12-2010, 11:13 AM

i had the same issue , customer service wasnt much help .. so i said screw it and unplugged my airave.. its still unplugged.

**underpsi1234** · 12-11-2010, 10:28 PM

This is still an issue for me. Sprint has now told me that there is connetion issues with the Blackberry and airave and the problem is under investigation. Has anyone else had this problem and had any luck with sprint replacing the phones with something other than a Blackberry? I don't know why they are being so stuborn about swaping our our phones.

**Shizam76** · 12-13-2010, 04:28 PM

A friend of mine has the 8530 with Boost and my Airvana lets him on the web, but will not let him do talk or text. When calling sprint they blame boost...calling boost they blame sprint. Go figure that one

**underpsi1234** · 12-13-2010, 07:25 PM

They sent me out another airave and it still doesn't work right

**Shizam76** · 12-14-2010, 11:05 AM

Originally Posted by underpsi1234

They sent me out another airave and it still doesn't work right

What did they say was your problem?

**underpsi1234** · 12-14-2010, 01:25 PM

They sent out another airave because they said they could not "see" the old one on their system to run the trace on it. I didn't think this new one would be different as the old one worked fine with other phones just not the blackberrys. They are doing a software update over the air to our phones again now. I will see how this goes when I get home.

**LTApaulie** · 12-14-2010, 07:57 PM

Welcome to the world of Airave. I have one and 2 Samsung Moments. The airave will sometimes work great, sometimes make phone calls have about a 2 second delay in my outgoing voice. Texts sometimes don't send and sometimes I have a huge delay in receiving them. It is literally the biggest piece of garbage I have ever used. This thing is not even close to consumer ready, and I sometimes unplug it and just suffer with the dropped calls just so I can get texts out. It is making my wife who uses the most nuts and makes me want to leave Sprint. I just do not understand why they cannot fix the damn thing with a firmware update so it actually works?!

**snowboardguy711** · 01-02-2011, 04:59 PM

I had the same problem with blackberry 8530's not connecting. In our house we have two blackberrys. When I entered into our house. It would seem that neither would connect or if they were connecting it was completely random. Well I think I found a solution that works for me and I didn't have to provision my phone each time. First I updated to the latest version of the OS 5.0.0.1030. Second I had my Network Selection Mode set to automatic. To Set this go to Options->Mobile Network->Network Selection Mode set this to automatic. I think airave support will tell you to set this to Home but I got it working with Automatic. Now to get the phones to connect to the airave device I simply set it down right next to the device. If I set them right next to the device for about 2 minutes I would notice that the top light would blink the signal strength go to five bars would then the device would connect. Calling *99 would confirm that the device is connected and my calls would sound clear. When I did both at the same time only one phone would connect so I would do one at a time. I hope this help.

**Shizam76** · 01-03-2011, 03:33 PM

Were they Sprint branded Blackberrys or Boost branded?

**snowboardguy711** · 01-04-2011, 10:21 AM

Sprint blackberrys. I think the airave device is kind of dumb in the age of everyphone having wifi on their phones. Check out what tmobile allows with the exact same phone.

http://t-mobile-coverage.t-mobile.co..._coverage_wifi

http://www.umatechnology.org/overview/

I want to start a petition to see if we can get sprint to support this. UMA is the way to go in my opinion.

**Shizam76** · 01-04-2011, 02:52 PM

Yeah calls over my own wifi would be easier.

**NGeorge** · 06-15-2012, 09:56 PM

Originally Posted by underpsi1234

This is still an issue for me. Sprint has now told me that there is connetion issues with the Blackberry and airave and the problem is under investigation. Has anyone else had this problem and had any luck with sprint replacing the phones with something other than a Blackberry? I don't know why they are being so stuborn about swaping our our phones.

Anyone have updates on this? My work Blackberry 9650 hates my Airvana Airave with a passion. It seems like it finds the Airave signal--then decides it doesn't like it, spends a few minutes trying to sit on a basically useless signal from the tower, then sits on the Airave signal for a minute and repeats the process. Outgoing calls aren't as big of a problem because it will usually scan for a good signal when I hit send, take 20 seconds or so to connect the call and routes it through the Airave. On the occasions it can get a signal out via the tower, I hang up on the first ring (if it doesnt drop fist) and it rescans and I redial when it finds the Airave. Somewhat annoying for outgoing calls, but incoming calls are either straight to voicemail, or I call right back--unless I'm lucky and it has found the Airave when the call comes in... In other words, pretty much useless for incoming.

It doesnt help that my BB is via CBeyond, so Airave support doesn't know crap. I called CBeyond who said they are a 'second tier MVNO' which means as far as Sprint is concerned it's a Sprint phone and they just resell Sprint (I already knew this so was surprised to get someone who knew what they were talking about) without any different network routing or PRL. There's a Cbeyond Evo at work so I brought that home--and it works flawlessly with the Airave. I have no issues with my personal phone which is a Samsung Epic via Sprint directly so everything should be functioning.

This is obviously this is a Blackberry/Airave issue. Anyone else have BB/Airave problems/solutions? It has been particularly frustrating this evening so I did some searching and found this thread (possibly again since I've been living with this for some time--although when I had a CBeyond Tour 9630 it wasn't as bad and happened much less often as with the Bold which I've had for around 6 months now)

Would also be interested in hearing with people who have a 9930 since CBeyond will be getting it soon and I have notes for a free one because of this lol (they are slow as hell to get new phones but the CS is awesome and we get be hell of a retention bundle deal with data cards and a couple of the management's smartphones which is why I've kept them--everyone else has Sprint directly)

Nat

**cg1812** · 06-25-2012, 07:22 AM

I have an airave in my house. Have had it for about a year. I really haven't had to many issues with after the first setup. It connects to my iPhone 4s, HTC EVO, HTC EVO Shift, LG Remark and Samsung galaxy tab. I did have to have Sprint send a refresh signal to it once. My major complaint is that text messages sent from home will loop continually on all the HTC devices. I unplug it and it's fine for a week or so then have to do it again. Sprint has said they are aware of that issue and are working on it. My brother and and friends that have Virgin
mobile or Boost

**cg1812** · 06-25-2012, 07:24 AM

Can not connect to it no matter what. Even going to the web site and adding there numbers to the approved list will not work. Neither of them can call, receive calls or texts while in my house. So in thoses cases I unplug it while they are here.