Gps never works!

[yochaigal]

Bronze G1 owner, RC30 Official. I live in san francisco.
the gps is turned on, wireless network locater disabled. I am outside. I have tested it in other cities, while driving, etc. It works 1 out of 10 times it says it can't find me. Other apps with gps also don't work. My wife has a black G1, and it Always finds her.
Wtf?

[neverknow012]

I kind of had the same problem, I went to the store and they changed my sim card to a new one, then the gps was waaay better!!!!

you can try that, if youve had your sim for a long time.

[yochaigal]

my sim is brand new, but maybe i'll try that. what kind of problem did you have?

[Shel]

Go to a T Mobile store, and tell them the problem you're having.

If they can't get the GPS to find your location in their store, there is something wrong with your GPS, and you should be able to exchange for a new G1.

[rynosaur]

Bronze G1 owner, RC30 Official. I live in san francisco.
the gps is turned on, wireless network locater disabled. I am outside. I have tested it in other cities, while driving, etc. It works 1 out of 10 times it says it can't find me. Other apps with gps also don't work. My wife has a black G1, and it Always finds her.
Wtf?


I'm curious why you would turn off network locator. That puts the software "in the ballpark" and the satellites help find your seat in the ballpark, plus or minus several meters :)

[NismoG35]

Rynosaur the wireless network locater is an alternative way for apps to "find" you. It finds you be useing the cell towers or via your wifi connection. Of course this is not really a GPS but it can pin point you within a few miles. He turned if off because he wanted to make sure that wasnt interfering with the real GPS.

Since we dont always have a clear view of the sky this would be the only way to do it if your indoors. For example your inside a store and your useing shop savvy. You scan the item and it would pin point you useing towers and in return tell you where the nearest stores that have that item are.

[GasBot]

I'm curious why you would turn off network locator. That puts the software "in the ballpark" and the satellites help find your seat in the ballpark, plus or minus several meters :)
Not only that, but I believe that Google uses the approximate location to speed up acquisition on the GPS satellites. I'd enable it and see how it does.

[rynosaur]

Not only that, but I believe that Google uses the approximate location to speed up acquisition on the GPS satellites. I'd enable it and see how it does.


yeah . . . if you've ever seen a brand-new car with OEM navi try to acquire its location when it hasn't since it was thousands of miles away . . . it takes a comically long time. It takes over ten minutes for GPS to tell a receiver where all 25 satellites are relative to the receiver's real position. And it's not a two way process, so the receiver must listen and then derive its position based on complicated rocket science I'll NEVER understand.

Long story short . . . let the towers point you in the right direction.

[yochaigal]

Well, I ordered the G1 through customer care, so to swap it I'd have to go through the phone. I'll try the sim thing though.

Interesting stuff about the wireless networks helping the gps, can that be verified? It's a darn good idea. Also, my wife NEVER has that option chosen, and she can ALWAYS find herself.

Hmmm....

Thanks!

[yochaigal]

Ok so I left both options checked (network and gps locators), and in about 10 minutes it found me. The thing is, both option were chosen ALL day (before I started this thread) and it couldn't find me.
Thus, this isn't a fix for me 'cause I'll bet that tomrorow it won't work again.
hmmm..

[DDM123]

You live in SF, so just make sure you are a good ways away from tall buildings. I live in NYC and GPS only works well if I'm in the park or in the suburbs, since the buildings in my area are typically 5-12 stories. Get GPS tracker to get stats on # of satellites and accuracy.

[yochaigal]

I have gps tracker. whenever the gps isn't working it says "gps unavailable." Also my wife's G1 works when mine doesn't.