I Now that we have a real h/w engineer commenting, what are your thoughts GernBlanston?
First, I'm no hardware engineer, I work in telecomm doing point-to-multipoint broadband wireless, point-to-point microwave, some LMR, and some mesh radio network design and lots and lots of project management. I'm not the guy who designed the radios, I'm the guy that specifies how tall the tower is, where the antennas are mounted, what levels we can use, etc., and I make predictions as to the performance of the install that mean a lot to people whose money I spend doing that. I'm not in the specific realm of designing consumer electronics, but the performance of a wireless network or device is something I can at least comment intelligently on.
I will say this: You can't judge a system's performance on one piece of anecdotal information or another; You have to look at a consensus of several, look at available data, and use common sense before you come to a conclusion. While some of us can point to a given Prime in a given environment and say, "Here is one that is working just fine!", I must point out the issue in coming to the conclusion that it is a problem limited to a given batch.
For one, if there's a single thing I've learned about radio, it is that it can take hundreds, sometimes thousands of data points to map a given wireless environment, as there are all manner of attenuators, natural and accidental waveguides, horns, reflectors, sinks, etc. all around you. The noise floor in your particular area may be completely different from hour to hour, day to day, etc. In testing one device against another, there may be all manner of frequency choices made, threshold levels reduced or made larger, hopping schemes abandoned or enlisted, etc., all behind the scenes and unbeknownst to you. While signals tend to fall off in a predictable fashion as you move away from their source, there are anomalies galore...Your favorite easy chair, 40 feet from your router, and through several walls, can end up looking rather like the environment in your office 10 feet from your router, or it could end up looking like a desert wasteland for wireless.
For the most part, however, for a given frequency and spectrum usage model, you end up making general predictions by using common sense and experience. No, I can't say with 100% certainty that the metal backing is holding back the performance of wireless and bluetooth significantly...but imho, as we say in the radio world, I'd give that statement at least two nines of reliability.
The reasons I feel we can point to the metal back as a culprit are:
1. There are
many reporting poor wireless and bt issues. Not all, but many. Those that are reporting problems rarely report catastrophic failure, but rather, poor performance when engaged in specific activities. There is little evidence to support this being a problem of software or chipset design beyond a smattering of anecdotes and third-hand info here and there, and nothing by way of a definitive statement by an engineer at Asus.
2. Asus has admitted to the metal plate being a major factor in the performance of GPS. While GPS and wifi/bt are on different frequencies, the fact remains the back of the tablet is metal and encompasses the guts of the tablet. Within limits, one can infer things about the performance of wireless from the device with this info alone, especially if the two antennas are in proximity and therefore subject to similar surroundings.
For myself, I've had nights where I can stream HD (and by that I mean full bitrate 1080p) to my tablet from my server no problem, and I've had nights where I couldn't do it to save my life, all in a similar network throughput scenario on the same spot on my sofa. Receive levels are what I call weak, but definitely usable in most cases I run into. I don't have an overall problem with wireless performance on my Prime, but I completely understand those who are frustrated by it.
