The Dell Streak Review
by Anand Lal Shimpi on August 15, 2010 6:59 PM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Dell
- Streak
- Gadgets
- Mobile
Cellular and WiFi Performance
The Streak only supports 802.11b/g and WiFi performance isn’t very good. Connected to an access point less than 6 feet away the best transfer rate I could get from a locally hosted PDF was 1.76Mbps. I tried copying directly to the microSD card over USB and got over 50Mbps. This may be an Android 1.6 limitation however as the Speedtest app managed 5 - 7Mbps consistently (on my desktop I get 17 - 20Mbps running the same test on the same network).
The Streak uses Qualcomm's QSD8250 SoC with integrated cellular radio:
| Dell Streak Network Support | |||||
| UMTS | 2100 / 1900 / 850MHz | ||||
| GSM/EDGE | 1900 / 1800 / 900 / 850MHz | ||||
| HSDPA/HSUPA | 7.2Mbps / 5.76Mbps | ||||
Cellular network performance was pretty good. Using the SpeedTest.net app I managed 2204Kbps down and 1007 Kbps up.
Cell signal attenuation was also in line with most other phones we’ve tested:
| Signal Attenuation Comparison in dB - Lower is Better | |||||||
| Cupping Tightly | Holding Naturally | On an Open Palm | |||||
| Dell Streak | 14.0 | 8.7 | 4.0 | ||||
| Droid X | 15.0 | 5.1 | 4.5 | ||||
| iPhone 4 | 24.6 | 19.8 | 9.2 | ||||
| iPhone 3GS | 14.3 | 1.9 | 0.2 | ||||
| HTC Nexus One | 17.7 | 10.7 | 6.7 | ||||
The Streak doesn’t appear to drop signal any more than comparable Android phones, and of course less than the iPhone 4. The wireless radio stack is less sensitive than the iPhone 4 but in line with other Android phones I’ve tested. I could hold calls at -109dBm but had mixed results below that point.
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araczynski - Sunday, August 22, 2010 - link
palm's still in business? still relying on their crappy email programs? they're down there with blackberry (and their retarded server licensing fees for exchange setups) in my book.strange to see dell churning out a phone, let me guess, the browser homepage is their website and its riddled with tracking cookies.
but it is nice to see them pushing past the envelope of ridiculously tiny screens.