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gps not working?

J

joos99

Lurker
I bought a used phone about a month or so ago and tried to use the google navigator app today and it never found a gps. Had searching for gps on the bottom of the screen the entire trip. I tried another gps based app and it stated no gps signal. I have the gps turned on and the little icon is flashing in the upper bar. I am now wondering if I got stiffed with a phone with a bad gps. Is there anything else that I can check or change? Thanks for any advise.
Jeff
 
GPS Essentials and GPS Status, both free at Play. But I suspect that your GPS isn't working. If it's working but not receiving satellites (GPS Essentials will show you that) it could be something as simple as a bent antenna contact. (But please don't try fixing that yourself - paying to repair the damage you cause doing it will be more than the original repair.)
 
Also, I know this might sound silly and obvious, and you may have already tried this. Have you powered the phone off and then back on? The reason I ask is, I occasionally will have this problem on my HTC One. It will not lock to any satellites in any app. I reboot, and everything starts working again. It has happened 3 times since I bought the phone (shortly after it was released).

Other than that, Rukbat's reply is good info to go with.
 
I did indeed reboot the phone several times. I also tried both apps. I tried the status app this mourning and It was able to download a fix. But this after noon I cant find a single sat. even with the essentials app. Anymore advise? This is an older samsung fascinate I just bought for $70 used on ebay. I would like to have the gps to work but dont know what it would cost or even if it can be fixed?
thanks
Jeff
 
joos99 said:
I did indeed reboot the phone several times. I also tried both apps. I tried the status app this mourning and It was able to download a fix. But this after noon I cant find a single sat. even with the essentials app. Anymore advise? This is an older samsung fascinate I just bought for $70 used on ebay. I would like to have the gps to work but dont know what it would cost or even if it can be fixed?
thanks
Jeff
Click to expand...

That doesn't sound promising then. Usually with the GPS, it either works or it doesn't. If those two apps aren't able to get anything, it kind of points to a hardware issue. I don't know that it is cost effective to try and repair it. Since you bought it from ebay, you don't likely have any kind of warranty, so any repairs would be at your own cost. Not sure how repairable that particular phone is, assuming you have the skills to fix it in the first place. I know I don't know enough about it to be able to repair it, even if it is just a broken antenna.

The only other thing I can think of is a factory reset, although I would guess that it already had one of those when you got it. Maybe someone else here has some better ideas.
 
This may sound stupid but theres a well known cure for bad GPS on the Galaxy s3. Tighten up the screws under the battery cover. Worth a try :)
 
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