Sensorly is the only truly useful 3G/4G coverage map

Cellular provider's coverage maps can be a real exercise in frustration. Beyond the expected exaggeration of their coverage zones, they often are quite obtuse in their user interfaces, as well as slow.

A coverage project called Sensorly makes me really happy. It delivers clear coverage maps based on actual user's experience. Sensorly maps are automatically updated by folks who carry the app in their phones, so the data is raw and unmanipulated. And from what I've seen so far, crazy accurate.

Sensorly has it's limits--it pretty much just shows coverage on roads that have been traversed by its app users, but once you get the hang of it, interpolating these maps into real coverage zones is pretty easy. I highly suggest a quick look-up before heading our to do that next 4G remote in a new area.

Sensorly predicted VZW 4G coverage at Comrex headquarters

Provisional Support for those modems we've been promising

We've got test firmware for our LiveShot video codec that supports the latest LTE modems from Sprint and AT&T. As you might recall, I blogged about these over the summer, and although it wasn't easy, we've integrated the drivers and they seem to be working. LiveShot support is available currently only in our "unstable" branch firmware, but if you're eager for these contact our support department and they'll set you up.

ACCESS support is a bit more complex, but we're on the path. It required a Linux kernel upgrade on our side, which has the potential to break any number of the dozens of ACCESS features, so we're testing that now. We should have support for ACCESS 2USB within weeks, and ACCESS Portable Classic (Hopefully) sometime over the winter.

The UML295 is an ornery critter

Comrex cleverly added support for the Verizon flagship modem UML295 to our products the week it was released. We found the previous modem (UML290) lacking in several regards and were eager to have folks use the newer, better version as soon as possible.

But we got blindsided by a firmware update that's now being applied to these modems by "Big Red". In our driver for ACCESS codecs, it turns out we send a command that is interpreted differently once the new modem firmware hits, and the results aren't pretty.

Note the modems won't update on their own--you need to attach them to a PC and explicitly authorize that the firmware be updated.

But once that's done, the next time you apply the modem to your ACCESS, it will become locked in a mode that will kill future LTE connections. Even when attached to other devices. That's not good.

You'll notice a big banner on our website these days warning of this situation. We'd hate to be the cause of modem heartache, so we're trying to get the work out as quickly as we can.

The fix is easy--upgrade your ACCESS to new firmware (2.8p24 or higher) and the next time you plug in your modem it will instantly heal itself.  Other fixes are listed in our appnote on the topic.

The culprit

Off Topic-Adventures in Product Support

It's a pretty big challenge providing support for hardware in the broadcast market--we need to supply top level people at the basic support level (no script monkeys) with high amounts of training. This is expensive and not conducive to the current employment environment where people expect to work somewhere for a few years before jumping ship.

And our support is free to the customer, which means that the customer often now assumes you can grapple all his IT issues, related to product performance or not.

Another field where all this is true is consumer devices like phones and tablets. Unlike computers, the expectation of the customer is free support for their device, and I'm certain that with the vast spectrum of technical capability of the average iPad user, this can be quite the handful. Wouldn't it be tempting to aim your mother-in-law toward the local genius bar instead of trying to figure out why Facetime isn't working for her down in Florida?

I suppose folks like Apple have thought hard about this, and I imagine the prices one pays for their products builds this cost in, as do the products built and sold by Comrex.

I got a little education on this last night. Now, I'm an Android fan and have big issues with the restrictive nature of the iProducts, but I certainly see their value in equipping non-techie wives and children with devices they have less chance of messing up. But my wife's iPhone 5 went rouge this week, suddenly downloading multiple gigabytes of nothing from the app store for no reason I could discern. Verizon had no clue and couldn't tell me the nature of the data, so I found the switch within the OS to turn off app store capabilities over cellular.

Well that's not a very elegant fix, so when we found ourselves in the local mall, I thought to stop by the Genius Bar to inquire what could cause such a thing. My grouchy engineering nature always re-appears when met by those bluetooth wearing, iPad toting, way-too-eager kids milling around the Apple store, but I hunkered down and entered. The "greeter" asked if he could help, and I inquired if I could speak to a Genius briefly.

"Do you have a reservation?" he asked, the ear-to-ear grin not flinching. Odd, I thought, but pressed on. "No, we were just walking by". His expression changed to one of concern.  "Walk that way and talk to Johnny. I'm sure he can help".

"How to I find Johnny?" I asked. "Easy!" exclaimed the greeter, his smile returning. "Johnny has the green iPad cover!". Apparently, the color of your iPad cover signifies your rank in the iStore. Kind of like a Star Trek uniform. At least it wasn't red.

So we ventured further into the store, and found Johnny located near the end of the Genius bar, studiously tapping on his green-covered iPad. I re-inquired about talking to someone about the rouge iPhone.

"Do you have a reservation?" he asked, displaying what I started to label an iGrin. "No". Johnny looked down at this iPad, which I could now see was running a calendar system with lots of colored blocks on lots of grids. He started scrolling. And scrolling. Johnny scrolled for about 10 straight seconds. This was not looking good.

"The next Genius I have available is at 8:30 PM". It was 6:30 PM. I made my grouchiest engineer face (I'm very good at that, I'm told). I turned to my wife and told her (with no effort at volume reduction) "That's ridiculous and annoying. Let's go."

On my way out, I heard Johnny doing his best to appease. "If you make it back, call for an appointment ahead and you'll have an easy time" he called.

Although I left pretty unhappy, on reflection I can sympathize with Johnny and the gang. Offering deep tech support in a mall has got to be a challenging effort. And no doubt the support load comes in fits and spurts during peak hours. And there's also no doubt that the typical iPhone customer enters with an expectation that the "Genius" will solve all their phone or data-related issues, whether it's Apple's fault or not.  And I guess making a reservation isn't the dumbest idea given these factors.

At Comrex, we've taken to bringing one of our support personnel to our NAB stand. This is mainly due to the expectation that some customer's have that we're there to discuss issues they're having with our products. It helps us meet those expectations, while still able to do all the other good NAB stuff, like selling, learning about customer's needs, and general hobnobbing.

My experience at Apple was definitely colored by my personal "ick factor" when presented with overly-helpful staff. Maybe I'll give the Genius bar another try (with a reservation).