I normally get a 5 bar 2G signal in my house with the phone set to "dual" mode. I occasionally see the signal go to between 3 & 5 bars on 3G and occasionally 3.5G (but normally only after I've been outside and then come back indoors - if I stay inside the dual mode always seems to land me with 2G).

I've recently discovered that while my phone is showing 2G on dual mode in my house, I can still force it into 3G mode (via the settings, or more quickly via querty12's excellent 2G/3G control panel applet) and obtain a much faster data connection.

I'd assumed that the dual mode would do this for me whenever possible, but it seems to be pretty crap at it (I wonder how frequently it checks the network/signal & what the thresholds are for auto-switching?).

Anyway: if you are dependant on GPRS for data & your phone is showing 2G on dual mode, AND you will be "static" for your session ... try forcing to 3G. You just may find that there is sufficient 3G signal where you are to switch to that mode despite what the 'dual nanny' thinks.

Largel academic for me as I normally use WiFi at home, but if I do go onto GPRS, overriding the dual mode 2G selection consistantly gives me about 1.5Mb/s on 3G as opposed to about 35 Kb/s 2G, so well worth a quick try

I get alot of 2G in my house too, I'll try switching it to 3G only, see how it goes!

A small note:-
Just using 3G mode, will use your battery up that little bit quicker...

yes, understood. i'm suggesting this only as a manual override, for times when you would really like faster data (eg. if you needed to make an urgent skype call or download a big email attachment etc.)

the reason for the slow switch is that the 3g signal in your home is not quite as strong, if the phone kept switching to 3g everytime it sniffed a 3g signal then it will be switching between 2g and 3g all and kill your battery in no time. so it only switches when the signal is at a decent strength

i know what you mean, but my 3G is minimum of 3 bars, normally 5, but it will stay on 2G literally all day if left in dual mode.

Anyway, the useful point is that you may (in some circumstances) have access to a x30 boost in d/l speed when desired, simply by overriding the default.

I usually find, as with all previous handsets, that if automatic is not choosing 3G its for a damn good reason - because despite how many bars its showing it just isn't actually strong enough.

I too get 2G in the house but can force it to 3G. But forcing it to 3G does no good whatsoever as the signal is just too poor to establish a usable data connection. Believe me I have tried and I just get timeout after timeout in the web browser. No-matter how much we would like to think otherwise, dual mode knows what its doing most of the time.

As you said though, it does depend on a lot of things so on rare occasions you might be in an area where its just strong enough but dual mode is playing it safe knowing that any slight change would make it unusable. After all, it has to assume you are roaming around not stationary so it will probably be slightly pessimistic.