Socket is a big company with many dealings, software and big customers in the medical field. I imagine they are busy. I haven't spent 3 months though communicating with them on this so their software will work properly with our devices. We paid for it and in good faith they are now finally working on it. In fact I just got more communication on this from them (the engineering folks) and we should have a fix very soon. The field test I did on the patch I'd say we're 95% there!
As far as them developing their own device? It's called free enterprise just like Palm and the rest. Just fix ours first lol!. ;)
Results of my field test with the new WFC "patch". for the X51v with A!2..
I did some pretty extensive field and range testing. The only problems I found were...
1. As stated earlier because of Dell's programming of their WLAN and thr A!2 ROM WFC can only report what the WLAN reports which is 0, 25, 50, 75 and 100% readings. The only thing missing was the 75% factor/reading. I did several slow meticulous range tests and it would hop from 50% to 100%, and visa versa never obtaining the 75% reading. Should be an easy programming fix.
2. I went to a location I know that has several hot spots. before WFC would only see half of what the Dell WLAN would see. Now WFC sees them all and in one case more lol!
3. After looking over WFC's PDF manual I discovered I was missing one of graphs on the graphs page. I was also missing a reading on the "Rates" page. These also should be a fairly easy programming fix. More than likely a code repair. They are probably there, but something keeping them from showing up.
4. I also observed the signal strength indicator nearly mirrored the Dell WLAN in as afar as the number of bars shown on signal strength.
Sockets's engineering folks are working on these issues. I reported everything yesterday morning and got an immediate reply work was in progress. i expect a finished product soon. maybe even today, but most likely early next week. We'll see.
From everything I see, once they make the "repairs" we'll have one great utility for the X51v's! I really went through the program and found it provided a great deal of information and unlike WiFifoFum WFC connects to your hotspot. In my opinion it is a bit more user friendly than Dell's own WLAN and offers a much better graphic interface and does some neat little things I didn't see before.
Well you have the latest. shouldn't be long now. I'll tell you I have spent a lot of time dealing with this issue and eagerly await the final fix!:)
Thanks for all your work on this thefiredude. I found an interesting glitch this morning with the latest WiFiCompanion. I have several waps setup around the house. Two used to be on channels 6 and 9. I changed them to 7 and 10 when I found a couple of my neighbors have very strong signals on 6 & 9 (using WiFiFoFum). This morning when I connected to my channel 7 wap, WiFiCompanion was showing it as channel 6. I know it's my wap because the SSID is correct and I'm using WPA-TKIP. Strange.
Thanks for all your work on this thefiredude. I found an interesting glitch this morning with the latest WiFiCompanion. I have several waps setup around the house. Two used to be on channels 6 and 9. I changed them to 7 and 10 when I found a couple of my neighbors have very strong signals on 6 & 9 (using WiFiFoFum). This morning when I connected to my channel 7 wap, WiFiCompanion was showing it as channel 6. I know it's my wap because the SSID is correct and I'm using WPA-TKIP. Strange.
Sockets engineers have a link to this thread and I'll pass it along as well for something for them to look at!
OK well it looks like we're almost there. I received the following below from Socket today. While it won't be perfect as I hoped for it is a great improvement over wehat we had. Looks like they've done the best they can with the way Dell has the WLAN and values programed. Hopefully maybe some dialog will develop between them and Dell in the near future. After my extensive field tests with the patch they sent me I can say it works better, not perfect, but a lot better. Like I said above I went to an area where before WFC would miss have the hot spots. Not any more. I did my best and feel they did as well. for now I'm happy it will work better and improved. We'll see what the future brings. I'll post and advise soon as I hear the patch is ready and where to get it. While i didn't accomplish my goal 100% here I feel it was a definite improvement! Did my best gang. here's the info I received today....... Tony
From socket today.....
Thanks, Tony. I sent your feedback to our engineers.
As for the 75% issue, from what I gather, this is an outstanding issue with the Dell radio that we may not be able to work around. This is what I was told from our engineering team:
" I sent log last evening that had captured the signals for over 10mins and had a miss on -60, which is translated to 75% signal Q. This is an issue of Dell’s built-in WiFi, not Socket’s WFC. We can’t fool around this number and provide a misleading patch. What’s underlying driver doing, WFC acts on that only.
In short, 75% will be missing unless we define a new algorithm and keep history of RSSI readings from built-in drivers and provide misleading information on the WFC to create 75% signal strength indication. "
" It’s not that a step is missing, as much as a value is missing. The granularity of RSSI values goings by 10’s: 50(100%), 60(75%), 70(50%), 80(25%), 90(0%).
However the dell driver never sends a RSSI value of 60. "
As for the rate screen, only signal quality will show. We will need to update our documentation to reflect that.
Thanks again for your feedback. We appreciate your diligence as it has helped us refine our software the best we can.
Best regards,
Mario
Socket Mobile, Inc.
Technical Support
I received the below from Socket Communications. They've done the best the6y can with the way Dell has programmed the x51v A12 ROM and the WLAN. It's not quite qhat we would all want, but much better than it was. The only way to get fine granular signal strength reporting would be and SD WLAN card Like Sockets and disable the Dell WLAN. Anyway see the message below. I've put a tremendous amount of effort and time into this over the last 4 months and hope it works out as well as possible for everyone. Here's the link you need to watch for the next couple days fo0r the latest release. http://www.socketcom.com/support/dow....asp?Type=WiFi
See the note I got from Socket Com today below.....
Hi Tony,
It has been signed off and we expect it to be on our web site by Wednesday. I don't foresee any delays but if it's not up by then, feel free to check with us.
Best regards,
Mario
Socket Mobile, Inc.
Technical Support
Socket acknowledged my field test results of the patch I sent last night and they advised engineering would look at it and I should hear something soon. Looks like the wait for us X51v A12 owners is nearly over.:) of the things I noted I wouldn't think it would take long to finish and fix.
thefiredude - you totally rock! Thanks for your work on this:approve:
Looking forward to the fixed version.
It's the best we'll get given Dell's WLAN in the X51v A12 ROM. I can say from my field tests it sure sees more hot spots than before. The info on the link explains thing better.
Tony
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