Earlier this week on Wednesday the folks from Verizon Wireless pushed out a rather large update for the Samsung Galaxy S III. One that brought a host of improvements and new features. Sadly, we’re also hearing this update killed or severely weakened 4G LTE for many, and data speeds have slowed way down.

You’ll be on Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean still, and the build is listed as VRBMD3, and it started arriving Wednesday evening for many. If you haven’t received it yet you might want to hold off as we’re getting loads of complaints and tips about the new radio causing issues with data speeds and 4G LTE connectivity. Read on below for more details, and a potential fix.

So along with multi-screen, multi-window, best shot camera features, improved WiFi hotspots and much much more you’ll also be losing 4G LTE. That’s a drag. According to multiple tips flooding our inbox many people are barely getting 1-2 bars of LTE, and even when they do speeds are dead slow, or randomly really fast, but certainly no where near stable. Others are reporting no 4G LTE at all, with their devices being stuck on 3G continuously. Toggling airplane mode, rebooting, and even factory data resets hasn’t fixed the problem for many.

We’ve also received praises from the update, with many having absolutely zero issues here, so we’re not exactly sure what to make of it. The latest update rolling out this week sets your network mode settings to Global by default (as you can see in the image above) when most US devices are set at LTE / CDMA originally.

We know global support was already available, but not enabled by default. A few tips in our inbox have suggested going into settings > more networks > mobile networks > and change the “network mode” to LTE/CDMA instead of global. This is getting 4G LTE back for many, but not everyone is having the same luck. That should pull it out of being stuck in global GSM (no 4G) roaming only mode.

It sounds like Verizon might have messed things up here, and hopefully this gets addressed asap. Let us know if you’re having issues in the comment section below. -Thanks for the tip Michael