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All things GPS

Is this a poll?

  • Yes, it looks like a poll.

    Votes: 42 26.3%

  • No, there is no way this is a poll.

    Votes: 31 19.4%

  • Why in the world is there a poll here?

    Votes: 87 54.4%
  • Total voters
    160
gary1949 said:
I'd like t try the procedure described above by wampro, but I'd like to back up my contacts first on the AT&T website. Each time I try to access the login for AT&T Contacts I get a "Secure Connection Not Available" message. Anybody know what that's all about? :confused:

Has anyone else tried this procedure, and if so, what were the results?
Click to expand...

I'm willing to bet this is the same as every other fix. It works for a while and then it stops working.
 
Made the setting changes and unless I did something wrong, I cant see or lock onto virtually anything now. Will update if that changes.
 
I got an interesting reply about the GPS problem from someone with a SGS. He claims to be in contact with Samsung. I'm not going to participate in a discussion of credibility or anything like that.

But as it is quite interesting, here it is for your reading pleasure:


Re the problems with the Galaxy S:-
The problems are all down to the new combined Broadcom chip which is used to cover GPS, BT & Wifi.
As you already know both the GPS & Wifi have issues on the Galaxy models.
This has been found to be a driver issue with the Broadcom chip.
Samsung passed the problem to Broadcom who fixed the drivers and then handed it back over to Samsung.
Now problem one.... Samsung then had to engineer the fix into the Filesystem but this was then found to also be in error.
This was fixed and was just about to be released as the GPS fix (which would also have corrected the Wifi problem) but just at the last minute it was halted as Froyo was about to be released and this had yet another different Filesystem which was found would alter all the hard work on putting the new drivers onto the system.
So a decision was made to halt the release, work the fixes into Froyo and then release it this time as a combined Froyo and GPS/Wifi/Filesystem/Lag fixes.

However..... last minute checks found an error and this has put it back.
It should now make it to mid October and I am confident this will happen.

As to does it fix the problems...... No idea.
Is it already out in one of the other releases..... Absolutely not.
None of the present releases holds any of the 'official' fixes, be that GPS/Wifi/Lag/Filesystem.
​



End Quoteing...I tried to indent his comments, but it isn't working for some reason.

At any rate, it may be true, may not be. But I would expect Captivate to come later than that, but who knows.

Too bad Samsung won't enlighten us. Setting customer expectations goes a long way toward alleviating customer dis-satisfaction.
 
Thank you.

I opened the gps.conf in the text editor of root explorer and my settings are as follows (im in the US).

NTP_SERVER=us.pool.ntp.org
XTRA_SERVER_1=north-america.pool.ntp.org
XTRA_SERVER_2=http://xtra2.gpsonextra.net/xtra.bin
XTRA_SERVER_3=http://xtra3.gpsonextra.net/xtra.bin

Did I miss something?
 
Andyman10 said:
Hi,

The way I did it was to turn GPS off, airplane mode on first and then GPS on to get a good solid lock, that way any AGC circuit won't be basing it's tracking on noise from wireless components, then turn airplane mode off and see what the difference is.
Click to expand...


Andyman10, I missed the GPS off at the first time. I thought there was no significant difference of SNR values. Actually the differences existed statistically after one more tests.

This is actually a good practice. I should turn off GPS when I do no use it. When I use, I should remember turn off all wireless components before using GPS. It is important to keep quite by turning off other interference components and also no conflict of usage. BCM4571 is a highly sensitive GPS chip according to Bradcom product description.

For a user-friendly procedure, Samsung should design a one-step GPS boot up menu for executing the sequence internally GPS off, flight mode, GPS on, lock first to make it ready for location-based uses, and then flight mode off.
 
I just tried this and it does lock more sats faster. Of course the test will be driving tomorrow ;)

I used Root Explorer, copied the file to my pc, edited it and paste it back (have an original on my pc)
 
OK, here are my results from this fix (and a couple of other changes). This is BY FAR the best my GPS has ever worked. I dont get it, I did this change the first time and nothing...switched the file back to the original, rebooted, did it again and it worked.

It was like it had to download things, it took a long time the first time to find sats and lock. Then after about 3-4 minutes it had about 8-9 sats and was locked on most. Now, it hits them right off.

I also changed my gps settings as follows:

SERVER & PORT to supl.google.com and port 7276
and set accuracy to 100

I have NEVER seen my GPS perform that solid. It is funny, I see less sats but man navigation was dead on and earlier today, twice following this same route, it was horrible.

Great job!! I hope this lasts!!
 
NJR said:
Mr. GPS I am copying this from another thread as it seems perintent here..do you concur with my views:

I have come to the conclusion that the GPS reception is just not as strong as others. I had a BB Bold on my front seat running ATT Nav. I had the Captivate with update, on the dashboard running Google Nav for 30 minute trip. As long as the Captivate stayed on the dash my navigation was pretty good although there were a couple of drops. When I put it on the seat next to the BB it lost lock very often. The BB never dropped. That seems to me to indicate a week GPS antenna system-- hence a hardware problem so I think, although as others have said the GPS is now optimized, and does perform better, I don't think it can ever be as good as say a BB or other smart phone. I hope I am proven wrong.
Click to expand...


I missed your post at the first time. But it is the right time to explain it as a good example for external interference to Samsung Galaxy S GPS after Andyman10 mentioned the internal other component interferences.

I found out the Samsung GPS SNR values are quite sensitive to the areas of front external speaker (near top AT&T logo place for Captivate) and back external speaker. I guess that this GPS antenna design uses the speaker tunnels as more reliable ways to get GPS signals. If messed up these areas (for example, cover up by hands), the perceived SNR values could be very low. As I mentioned in previous post, I can push the perceived SNR values < 20 in the same location, maintain that way by hand cover to make GPS unfixed.

I also found out the microwave oven radiation has quite interferences on the perceived SNR on those speaker areas. I could not get the first fix if facing my phone near the front door of my microwave oven unless I turn off the microwave oven. I think that my old microwave oven has a strong radiation leak. (Maybe I could develop a "novel" Samsung GPS application to check microwave oven's safety by the success of first fix ;))

Time magazine (issue March 15, 2010), has a report about cell phone radiation comparison. BB 8820 is on top of that phone list for emitting radiation. It is almost near FCC-mandated maximum absorption rate of 1.6 watts per kilogram of body tissue in US. I guess BB Bold also has strong radiation, which creates interferences to your Samsung phone's speaker locations when putting them together based on your description.
 
gocats7 said:
Thank you.

I opened the gps.conf in the text editor of root explorer and my settings are as follows (im in the US).

NTP_SERVER=us.pool.ntp.org
XTRA_SERVER_1=north-america.pool.ntp.org
XTRA_SERVER_2=http://xtra2.gpsonextra.net/xtra.bin
XTRA_SERVER_3=http://xtra3.gpsonextra.net/xtra.bin

Did I miss something?
Click to expand...

Looks like you got it all
 
Has anyone tried to return their device to the place of purchase at this point? As far as I have heard from a friend at AT&T they are still taking the captivate back even outside the thirty day period, A cell phone provider cannot sell a product that does not perform the services advertised. If you go to whatever store you bought your phone from they will take it back,you may have to be persistent but they will take it. Even if they only offer an exchange, you can then go back twice a month and keep doing exchanges, how many phones do you think you will get before your provider starts calling Samsung. For the nay sayers, I assure you that my wife will not take no for an answer and it has worked to are advantage MANY times. My wife exchanged her backflip over a random dropped call issue (maybe 2 minutes maybe 20) called motorola found out it was a software bug she exchanged the phone 6 times, AT&T got so sick of her showing up they told her she could upgrade to any phone in the store, YEAH heres the unbelievable part ,she chose the Iphone4. I spoke with AT&T a few days ago inquiring about an exchange they said if there was no fix by the end of the month I could come on in. Although I will not be exchanging, between Ryans OCLF and the gps hack here http://androidforums.com/samsung-captivate/187594-all-things-gps-7.html its pretty good now as I could originally not get the file to save, GPS is running good enough. Even with a crappy GPS , RyansOCLF made this phone a keeper for me.
 
Ok guys it's been 5 days now and my gps is still locking just as quickly as before, I have noticed that if I turn off the phone or the gps, the phone will take about 25 seconds to lock the first time, but after that switching between apps it will only take between 3 and 15 seconds to get a lock. My usual accuracy is between 16 and 49 feet indoors and out doors its usually 16 to 32 feet depending on cloud cover. I've tested without using wifi and with wifi and also over the mobile networks, I get the same results. The google navigator still works like it did when I first did the GSM reset. If it does lose signal like going under a bridge or under alot of powerlines it will catch up within 15 seconds.

As far as the pics and music, I did back mine up before doing the reset, but I never lost them on my phone. They are on the internal SD card, not the internal storage or an external SD card. For those of you who did lose your pics did you have them on the internal storage or the internal SD card? If it was the internal storage, maybe that is why they were not recoverable. I apologize to you all for not stating that more clearly.

Someone asked me if the Samsung level three guy said it was a gps fix, no he didn't. I did say to him that my gps wasn't working at all and the phone was running like crap but he never said the update did or didn't fix the gps. I just assumed it did based on everything I've read. What I can say is what ever the update was suppossed to do, my gps works almost flawlessly, my phone runs much quicker, and my battery actually lasts longer.
 
Robert, I had the same issue as you, I called Samsung and they had me do a GSM reset, it's a little different than a factory data reset which you can do from your settings menu. Back up your contacts, pictures and music, then go to your dialer and type in *2767*3855#. This will take your phone into a complete factory reset. It worked for me and others in this forum, but others have not had any luck with it. I don't know if they are doing it correctly as pointed out by another poster, but hey what have you got to lose? You can re download all of your apps that you purchased, unlike apple. Just go to the market, hit menu, tap downloads and all the apps you downloaded for free, plus the ones you purchased will be there to re download and install. I hope this helps out.
 
sarun2010 said:
The following had been posted by another user
Writing here because the thread was locked.

Disclaimer: I am not responsible if something breaks or you end up bricking your phone.

=============================================
Find your optimal pool server here: pool.ntp.org: NTP Servers in North America, north-america.pool.ntp.org
For US the optimal server is: us.pool.ntp.org

Reference other threads I (http://ip208-100-42-21.static.xda-de...d.php?t=731462) I recommend you do the following:

Use Root Explorer or some other method (I use Root Explorer as it has a built in Text Editor and automatically backs up the altered file.) to go to here:
system/etc/gps.conf
Use the text editor to alter the gps.conf file to this (if you are in the US):

NTP_SERVER=us.pool.ntp.org
XTRA_SERVER_1=north-america.pool.ntp.org
XTRA_SERVER_2=http://xtra2.gpsonextra.net/xtra.bin
XTRA_SERVER_3=http://xtra3.gpsonextra.net/xtra.bin

If you are NOT in the US go to here: pool.ntp.org: How do I setup NTP to use the pool? and look at the links in the center of the page to navigate to the closest pool to your geographical location and use that pool for the top server entry.
======================================================

This fix was awesome my gps locked on within 5 secs. Tried the navigation from work to home (around 30 miles). was extremely accurate.

This is what i did.

My phone already has the latest update being pushed by AT&T.
(updated using Kies 1.5.3)
Still the GPS was not working.
The phone is rooted.
Tried 2 different root file explorer apps (Free ones ;)). Those did not work.
Had to shell out $3.50 for app "ROOT EXPLORER". So far looks like a good investment.

Once the app is installed. browse to system/etc. change the permissions for the file gps.conf. then open in text editor and make the changes as suggested by the original poster "bigcraig4u".

save the file. the old info will be automatically backed up.

Reboot your phone.
Try to get the GPS status from either "GPS Status" or "GPS Test" or "LbsTestModeLauncher".

Hope this helps.

My only issue with captivate was the GPS. Now this also works fine for me.

Note: I did turn off the option "Use wireless networks" under "location & security" in settings. Hence my location is being computed from satellite info alone. :D
Click to expand...

Ill definitely be adding this to my ROM before I release it. Thanks man for the find....XDA is another great forum besides this one....

UPDATE: DONE!!! I'll make an update.zip for it....so people won't have an issue flashing it....I'll PM you the link to the host so you can update the OP....
 
For those of you that thought I was run off, no I was not. I just told the guy that I was offering a solution that worked for me in the hopes that it may work for them. The reason I haven't been on for the last few days is that I wanted to make sure the fix was solid before I reported anything back. I'll post again in another five days to let everyone know how it's going. So far so good...I owned a 3gs, almost bought the 4, but I am so glad I own a captivate. Love this phone!

One other thing, I've noticed that some of the widgets and tweaks available on the market seem to not mesh very well with the TW interface. I had a few widgets on my phone and began to experience the randon shut downs. I also noticed intermittent freezing. I took all the widgets that made any type of modification to the Touch Wiz UI off the phone and haven't had any problems whatsoever. I'm not a programmer so I don't know if this does or does not have anything to do with it, just thought I'd throw some food for thought.
 
sarun2010 said:
The following had been posted by another user
Writing here because the thread was locked.

Disclaimer: I am not responsible if something breaks or you end up bricking your phone.

=============================================
Find your optimal pool server here: pool.ntp.org: NTP Servers in North America, north-america.pool.ntp.org
For US the optimal server is: us.pool.ntp.org

Reference other threads I (http://ip208-100-42-21.static.xda-de...d.php?t=731462) I recommend you do the following:

Use Root Explorer or some other method (I use Root Explorer as it has a built in Text Editor and automatically backs up the altered file.) to go to here:
system/etc/gps.conf
Use the text editor to alter the gps.conf file to this (if you are in the US):

NTP_SERVER=us.pool.ntp.org
XTRA_SERVER_1=north-america.pool.ntp.org
XTRA_SERVER_2=http://xtra2.gpsonextra.net/xtra.bin
XTRA_SERVER_3=http://xtra3.gpsonextra.net/xtra.bin

If you are NOT in the US go to here: pool.ntp.org: How do I setup NTP to use the pool? and look at the links in the center of the page to navigate to the closest pool to your geographical location and use that pool for the top server entry.
======================================================

This fix was awesome my gps locked on within 5 secs. Tried the navigation from work to home (around 30 miles). was extremely accurate.

This is what i did.

My phone already has the latest update being pushed by AT&T.
(updated using Kies 1.5.3)
Still the GPS was not working.
The phone is rooted.
Tried 2 different root file explorer apps (Free ones ;)). Those did not work.
Had to shell out $3.50 for app "ROOT EXPLORER". So far looks like a good investment.

Once the app is installed. browse to system/etc. change the permissions for the file gps.conf. then open in text editor and make the changes as suggested by the original poster "bigcraig4u".

save the file. the old info will be automatically backed up.

Reboot your phone.
Try to get the GPS status from either "GPS Status" or "GPS Test" or "LbsTestModeLauncher".

Hope this helps.

My only issue with captivate was the GPS. Now this also works fine for me.

Note: I did turn off the option "Use wireless networks" under "location & security" in settings. Hence my location is being computed from satellite info alone. :D
Click to expand...

Ill definitely be adding this to my ROM before I release it. Thanks man for the find....XDA is another great forum besides this one....

UPDATE: DONE!!! I'll make an update.zip for it....so people won't have an issue flashing it....I'll PM you the link to the host so you can update the OP....
 
Here's a link until its updated in the OP....
GPS Fix
Please!!! Please!!! Do a nandroid BACK-UP before installing this..... It's been getting mixed reviews.....most working, some still aren't. I also think it may vary firmware to firmware..... be careful guys/gals...

You can flash this in clockworkmod recovery....just delete the letters before "update".
 
wampro said:
. Back up your contacts, pictures and music, then go to your dialer and type in *2767*3855#. This will take your phone into a complete factory reset. It worked for me and others in this forum, but others have not had any luck with it. I don't know if they are doing it correctly as pointed out by another poster, but.
Click to expand...

How could one do this incorrectly? It's a one step process!

I'm hypothesizing that what this does is return the gps settings to factory defaults. Many people were experimenting with those settings before the update and that could have conflicted with the update changes.

I haven't tried this myself and my gps does not work.
 
As far as the pics and music, I did back mine up before doing the reset, but I never lost them on my phone. They are on the internal SD card, not my phone.
Click to expand...

Warning: GSM Reset DOES delete all your music, videos, photos, etc.

This just happened to me and I didn't back up. All my stuff was on my internal sd card.
 
Mr. GPS said:
Andyman10, I missed the GPS off at the first time. I thought there was no significant difference of SNR values. Actually the differences existed statistically after one more tests.

This is actually a good practice. I should turn off GPS when I do no use it. When I use, I should remember turn off all wireless components before using GPS. It is important to keep quite by turning off other interference components and also no conflict of usage. BCM4571 is a highly sensitive GPS chip according to Bradcom product description.

For a user-friendly procedure, Samsung should design a one-step GPS boot up menu for executing the sequence internally GPS off, flight mode, GPS on, lock first to make it ready for location-based uses, and then flight mode off.
Click to expand...

Ah, that makes sense then, I couldn't believe that people would see no difference when turning off all that high power drain, noise emitting circuitry. I should have made that process a bit clearer.

It all does unfortunately point to a rather poor design in the first place., you would absolutely expect some shift in noise floor (and therefore GPS SNR) with major components like that switched on or off, but the changes I see suggest that it's way too high on this device. That in turn suggests poor de-coupling or filtering of the power supply and/or poor 'buffering' via capacitors of peak demands for things like GSM transmit. I suspect as well that minor manufacturing component tolerances make one phone work considerably better or worse than another as they accidentally filter noise better, or don't! Certainly fits all the anecdotal evidence.

On the up side since I started enabling GPS this way it has worked way better for quite a few days now and is actually quite usable whereas before it was completely useless. Quoting just my experience isn't very helpful I know but the difference in performance for me is quite startling and does suggest that it may be possible with careful pre-sampling and timing of the initial GPS set-up in the driver to get much better, or at least fit for purpose, results automatically. If so, it's a bit of a fudge for poor design in the first place but hey, who cares if it works.
 
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