Question Watch 4 Overheating LTE

[Alfiedog]

Hi i have owned Lte galaxy watches then Lte galaxy watch 3 models and now the watch 4 Lte
my post is to comment on watch 4 overheating when connected via gsm networks ....in strong signal areas the watch does not seem to get hot and overheat.
.but if i move to a weaker signal area the watch overheats .....by switching from 3g/4g mode to just 3g tge watch no longer overheats and the data connection is still fast enough to.be useable .......if you are suffering from hot watch syndrome try settingx/connections/mobilenetworks/networkmode/3g only ...it may help

 

[galaxys]

Yep, 3G only can cool the watch sometimes. Cheers

 

[Alfiedog]

More info on GW4 CLASSIC IN 42 and 46mm both with Lte which overheat in poor signal areas or long 4g / 3g voice calls

Well i bought a 4g classic in 42 and one in 46 mm back when they were first available in August 2021.
Both worked fine but if i used an esim in a weak signal area the watch got hot within 2 minutes and shut down as it was on full transmit power over 4g mobile network.
The battery would drop massive amounts in a short time and the watches would give up and overheat....
So i made notes of the furmware ...photographed the inside of both ...filled out a return and sent them both back for repair as this is an issue much reported on the net..

So git them both back and looked at the firmware version ...and looked inside ...

Hmmm well it looks like Samsung know how to fix tge fault with a new redesigned rear cover and a firmware
Update

So as Samsung are quiet about the issue i would recomend that even if you can live with a hot wrist ...you
FILL OUT A SAMSUNG REPAIR / RETURN FORM ONLINE then your pride and joy watch can be collected and samsung can upgrade the thermal heat sink design and reduce the max tx power the watch uses to reduce tge overheating.

I now dont get thermal shutdowns on any of my watches but lte enabled does reduce battery time by about 50 percent

So my advice return to samsung before the warantee expires

Note.. this is just lte models ......bluetooth only models i do not own

 

[Alfiedog]

Ok GW4 42mm classic Lte only no bt wifi gps etc
In a permenant data trandfer to keep link over 4g up is achieving 5hours 35mins from 100percent charge to flat.no iverheating

The 46mm version is getting an extra 2 hours of call over lte as the battery is larger capacity again no overheating.

This should be a worst case as i selected the weakest signal strength location to force the watch to use a higher tx power output

If i disable 4g/lte network connection and use just bluetooth only at 30 feet to the phone its linked to i get

42mm classic watch 4 one day 19hours
46mm classic watch 4 about two days

This shows how much power 4g /3g enabled watches use ....

My old original samsung watch r805f as the battery was larger could manage 3 days

Note ...my tests are with a data transfer taking place all the time to simulate a link to a watch and were done so see if i could cook the watch overheat if after a repair return from Samsung

In a real world with some bt some lte some wifi not sure what yiu may get ...?

 

[Alfiedog]

The point i am trying to make....

When cell coverage is weak the phone increases its output power in an attempt to maintain a connection. A weak signal uses 10 times as much energy as the strongest signal, so it can drain a battery very fast if you are on a call, and it will still drain the battery when not on a call because the phone periodically reports its location to the network so an incoming call can find your phone. To further complicate things, if you periodically lose signal completely the phone sends a "where are you?" page to the network to reconnect. This is sent at full power. If there's no response it repeats the request periodically, with longer and longer waits between pages. However, if it reconnects and then loses the connection frequently, the pages are sent frequently without the longer waits, again draining the battery.

Incresed signal strength generates more heat so if in a low signal area turn off mobile networks to save battery which in a watch is small and it also reduces heat generated by the transmiter power curcuits