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droid phones can't see gps satelites


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done it a few times today and it is automatically downloaded at least once a day.. no luck.

 

now while it was working earlier, the accuracy on the nuvi was rockin.. when it went away, the nuvi accuracy got worse..

 

really makes me think it's with the signal and not the phones. wish i knew some other cachers with smartphones in the area.

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I've checked 2 Verizon phones, Wirefly (also verison), Virgin Moble and AT&T. no gps satelites on any of them and definately no lock.

 

I hope it's the testing the FAA notified us about.

 

I have been using mine to cache all day today. Got a new thunderbolt I'vs been dying to try caching.

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I've checked 2 Verizon phones, Wirefly (also verison), Virgin Moble and AT&T. no gps satelites on any of them and definately no lock.

 

I hope it's the testing the FAA notified us about.

 

I have been using mine to cache all day today. Got a new thunderbolt I'vs been dying to try caching.

 

what part of the country are you in? there may not be a problem in your area.

 

A friend of mine was in Dallas over the weekend and never got a lock. Here in Tyler, we have nothing.

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I've checked 2 Verizon phones, Wirefly (also verison), Virgin Moble and AT&T. no gps satelites on any of them and definately no lock.

 

I hope it's the testing the FAA notified us about.

 

I have been using mine to cache all day today. Got a new thunderbolt I'vs been dying to try caching.

 

what part of the country are you in? there may not be a problem in your area.

 

A friend of mine was in Dallas over the weekend and never got a lock. Here in Tyler, we have nothing.

 

Yea I'm all the way on the east coast.

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google "verizon gps outage" there are some people on an XDA forum or something that have alot more information.

 

Verizon is finally taking ownership of the Alltel towers.. somehow this has screwed up gps reception. it's rumored to be back tomorrow.. we'll see.

 

also after the towers are up, it'll take the google database awhile to repopulate or update or something. dont' know what that is either.

 

anyway.. they know.. they won't tell us directory and i think someone knows someone who said they are working on it.

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google "verizon gps outage" there are some people on an XDA forum or something that have alot more information.

 

Verizon is finally taking ownership of the Alltel towers.. somehow this has screwed up gps reception. it's rumored to be back tomorrow.. we'll see.

 

also after the towers are up, it'll take the google database awhile to repopulate or update or something. dont' know what that is either.

 

anyway.. they know.. they won't tell us directory and i think someone knows someone who said they are working on it.

 

This doesn't make sense. I keep reading in these forums that these phones have true GPS chips and that they do not rely on cell towers. Besides, Verizon's cell towers have nothing to do with the performance of your Nuvi.

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I hear what you're saying and I agree. Just reporting what they are saying over there.

 

I'd like to understand it all myself. Evidently the htc phones work fine in airplane mode. Droids do not.

If you continue having these outages in specific areas or from time to time across multiple devices I would report them to the FAA... There is something fishy that should be looked at...

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google "verizon gps outage" there are some people on an XDA forum or something that have alot more information.

 

Verizon is finally taking ownership of the Alltel towers.. somehow this has screwed up gps reception. it's rumored to be back tomorrow.. we'll see.

 

also after the towers are up, it'll take the google database awhile to repopulate or update or something. dont' know what that is either.

 

anyway.. they know.. they won't tell us directory and i think someone knows someone who said they are working on it.

 

This doesn't make sense. I keep reading in these forums that these phones have true GPS chips and that they do not rely on cell towers. Besides, Verizon's cell towers have nothing to do with the performance of your Nuvi.

Semi-true - most smartphones do have true GPS units (At least anything Qualcomm gpsOne based) that don't rely 100% on the cell towers - HOWEVER they have fairly weak/primitive correlators. As a result their time to first fix is absolutely horrendous without crutches compared to proper GPS units. (Ephemeride preload, time injection, location injection, SUPL). Ephemeride preload doesn't require towers, time injection doesn't either. Loc injection does, SUPL absolutely does.

 

Most endusers don't know this since they almost always have SUPL augmentation, but when you are running an OS that is missing SUPL support (I'm running Android on a Qualcomm MSM7200-based device that was originally intended to run Windows Mobile, as an example), performance goes down the tubes.

 

However, if even a Nuvi is acting screwy, it sounds like there is some sort of local interference.

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Still nothing.. was working earlier, but we were on a small road trip. when we got closer to home, it was dead again.

 

I hope it comes back.

Sounds like the problem tends to be close to home. Any chance you live near someone who drives for a living - likely you'd notice a logo'd truck - and has decided they don't want their boss to know where they've been? Those GPS jammers play hell with a regular GPS unit in any kind of proximity at all.
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My NUVI would regularly get accuracy of 12 ft or less attached to my windshield. 9 at a red light. Now its around 20 ft. plus.

 

My droid x was getting 6ft at a redlight.

 

I have no choice but to give it more time.

One comment: Never trust reported accuracy. It's arbitrary and varies from unit to unit.

 

The various DOP numbers are the only real accuracy measurements that have any non-arbitrary trustable meaning, and these should be identical for all GPS units at a given time unless one is receiving satellites another isn't (since DOP is purely based on sat geometry).

 

Another somewhat useful measurement (but not always comparable from unit-to-unit) is SNR reporting.

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