Database Users

[Q] Is GPS working for you? (time to get signal)

It routinely takes ~5min to get a GPS signal, and sometimes it never happens at all. This severely affects the usefulness of GPS for me.
tmous hd2 1024
mattc 1.5b
chuckdroidrom
radio: stock 2.10.....

alantak said:
Are you happy with GPS performance on your HD2/Android combo?
It routinely takes ~5min to get a GPS signal, and sometimes it never happens at all. This severely affects the usefulness of GPS for me.
tmous hd2 1024
mattc 1.5b
chuckdroidrom
radio: stock 2.10.....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It pinpoints me perfect to within a couple of feet, but by complaining & adding a poll could pi$$ people off who are working hard on developing android to work on our hd². You've got to consider that less than 2 months ago it wasn't even a thought that it would work on our phones never mind a stable version. I haven't booted into windows for days considering that i would have to soft reset quite often with it. So i say each day is bringing android closer to a full build.

11calcal said:
It pinpoints me perfect to within a couple of feet, but by complaining & adding a poll could pi$$ people off who are working hard on developing android to work on our hd². You've got to consider that less than 2 months ago it wasn't even a thought that it would work on our phones never mind a stable version. I haven't booted into windows for days considering that i would have to soft reset quite often with it. So i say each day is bringing android closer to a full build.
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Whats with peoples complaints. What do you accomplish by asking these questions.
Its just like If your parents buy you a brand new dell laptop. You then proceed to complain about the color.
They didnt have to buy you jack crap but instead they took what hard earned money they made while working and bought you this computer.
I'm just saying

Maybe you're just not standing in a good area?
Mine seems to lock on fine. Maybe not instantly like it used to with QuickGPS on WinMO but certainly within a minute or so. I wouldn't go back to WinMo because of it put it that way.
I've been a happy daily user of Android ever since it first became available. Just keeps getting better.

Wow, talk about a smack in the face. Are you satisfied with GPS?
Are you kidding me? Satisfaction at this point in the game is almost irrelevant. You didnt buy the HD2 with Android running on it, did you forget that? Do you know what ALPHA's and BETA's are? Do you know that you dont even have to run Android at all? Go back to winmo or sell your phone and buy a real Android phone. Until things are out of BETA or the not working stage...even then, I am not sure you have grounds to complain about work that SOMEONE else has done and GIVEN to YOU free of charge hoping to make YOUR experienced on YOUR phone BETTER.
Learn to develop and fix the issues yourself if your unhappy with the current state of things otherwise put your bottle back in your mouth and stop whining.

I managed to get a gps fix indoors by a window in well under 5 minutes. This fix was also not aided by data networks as those were disabled purposely for this test. Overall the gps works at least as well on android as it did on windows. I am using IGO Motonav because it utilizes the 480x800 resolution.
Maybe you can try enabling location services via data networks to get a fix sooner.

I used the GPS a few times.
What I noticed is that sometimes it takes too much time to initialize.
I believe it fails somehow but doesn't give a message that says so
So I just close and re-launch Navigation.
Sometimes 2 or 3 times and it usually works at that point.
Everytime I used the GPS I have been amazed by how accurate it is.
Imagine that 2 months ago I had a crappy cell phone and I've never used a GPS before so everything my HD2 can do I think is cool now LOL

give this guy a break..
I had the problem myself. His goal was maybe to receive information from other users who ARE satisfied, E.G. setups that DO WORK.
I can't get GPS to work properly, it shows the GPS icon but the road I'm getting is like 30 km's next to where I am.
Though, it works on some builds, I once had a build that worked almost flawless but can't remember which.. The build I'm using now doesn't work for a meter.
Imho, I'm not complaining, I just use winmo for GPS. But please, don't attack every new post. Maybe the op can change the title to 'Working GPS builds'/somthing like that..

Ducter said:
Wow, talk about a smack in the face. Are you satisfied with GPS?
Are you kidding me? Satisfaction at this point in the game is almost irrelevant. You didnt buy the HD2 with Android running on it, did you forget that? Do you know what ALPHA's and BETA's are? Do you know that you dont even have to run Android at all? Go back to winmo or sell your phone and buy a real Android phone. Until things are out of BETA or the not working stage...even then, I am not sure you have grounds to complain about work that SOMEONE else has done and GIVEN to YOU free of charge hoping to make YOUR experienced on YOUR phone BETTER.
Learn to develop and fix the issues yourself if your unhappy with the current state of things otherwise put your bottle back in your mouth and stop whining.
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Thank God someone else with the same outlook as myself, you cannot expect everything to work but IMO most is considering its fairly new & not native to this phone.

11calcal said:
Thank God someone else with the same outlook as myself, you cannot expect everything to work but IMO most is considering its fairly new & not native to this phone.
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yes, that's a fact, but there is no need to exaggerate 11calcal.
I think everyone here has respect for the devs, it's not like he actually ment to insult anyone with his post. Only answer if it's related to the OP's question.

Admittedly, the question was worded poorly. Rest assured it was in no way meant to be a complaint to the devs (who I have donated to).
I posted a poll because it is the only thing that is really problematic for myself but seems to be regarded as working fine by everyone.
I think that in this whole endeavor its important to not cloud development, testing and user-feedback with flame wars, so I apologize if mine came across that way unintentionally. Text via the interwebs is a poor medium when it comes to emotions, don't you think?
And to clarify, once triangulated the GPS is accurate as ever, its just the time it takes to triangulate thats bad. It takes seconds in WinMo for me.

alantak said:
Admittedly, the question was worded poorly. Rest assured it was in no way meant to be a complaint to the devs (who I have donated to).
I posted a poll because it is the only thing that is really problematic for myself but seems to be regarded as working fine by everyone.
I think that in this whole endeavor its important to not cloud development, testing and user-feedback with flame wars, so I apologize if mine came across that way unintentionally. Text via the interwebs is a poor medium when it comes to emotions, don't you think?
And to clarify, once triangulated the GPS is accurate as ever, its just the time it takes to triangulate thats bad. It takes seconds in WinMo for me.
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ok it was worded in a manner that sounded ungrateful. All i was stating is as its still developing things will become better through builds/zimages etc, it wasn't meant as a flame. As i said mine is quite good so we'll leave things said in the past.

Sorry for jumping to conclusions, and honestly its not my work to defend so I suppose I was just as wrong.

You need to edit the gps config file in system /etc to your local sever it will then find signal as quickly as winmo. There is a thread somewhere I think its called quick gps or something like that with further details. Basically you need to unmount the system and edit the file, making sure it stays, (CHMOD 777) I think its defaults to US.pool.org.
My only wish is that it didn't drain battery so fast I need to use a charger now, and no TomTom, but I have not used winmo since.

moving on then and sticking with the original question...
I think a fair amount depends on which particular sat nav program you're trying to use...I've so far loaded Co-Pilot,Navigon,N-Drive and Sygic McGuider and the time to first fix,purely using GPS and not AGPS, varies depending on which I choose to use (obviously environmental factors will influence this as well). If your particular program isn't upto scratch,either try another one of find one that someone with a similar set up recommends. (and NO...I haven't got time to run a series of tests and publish best first fix results ) You also need to bear in mind that while another type of sat nav may have a better ttff, it might not work in a manner you like or have features you feel you need! My only complaint is aimed at TomTom for not releasing an Android version of their software yet
p.s. Please don't ask me for info on getting GPS software..Nearly been banned for that before

11calcal said:
It pinpoints me perfect to within a couple of feet, but by complaining & adding a poll could pi$$ people off who are working hard on developing android to work on our hd². You've got to consider that less than 2 months ago it wasn't even a thought that it would work on our phones never mind a stable version. I haven't booted into windows for days considering that i would have to soft reset quite often with it. So i say each day is bringing android closer to a full build.
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Click to collapse
Q&A - name of the forum... Should I pretend that I don't have problems just to please developers? That's insane...

Swapping my SGS with a new one.

So I've got one of the many Vibrants with the flaky GPS, and none of the fixes out there seem to improve the problem. My local T-Mo store is understanding and quite willing to swap it with a new one since I'm still within the 14 day policy. The only catch is I want to put the phone as close to stock as possible before I do the trade so they can't say it was something I did to it. Right now I've rooted deodexed, and I've got clockwork ROM manager going. I've also deleted almost all the stock cruft and swapped the calendar / camera apps. Because I was so eager to make it "mine", I also failed to make any backups BUT my wife happens to have a totally stock SGS from which I can scavange from but I'd like to do it without having to root it or anything. Is this possible? If not would thread 739091 ("True Stock 2.1 firmware for vibrant"; sorry I can't post links since my account here is still new) get me there?

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=734475&highlight=stock is what you're looking for. Just flash this with Odin and you'll be fully unrooted.

Awesome, I really appreciate that. I'm not timid when it comes to making the phone my own (I was an early adopter of CyanogenMod for my old G1) but I just returned from a deployment and the whole 'scene' has changed a lot more than I expected lol.

Hehe. you might want to give the new T-Mobile Vibrant firmware that was leaked, it fixes the GPS problem (result may vary). Returning your SGS for a new one isn't going to fix your problem. It's not hardware related, its firmware.

An exchange won't fix your GPS issues anyway so you mine as well keep the one you have. Trust me, we try to swap them out customers all the time at my store.... It's a known issue and Samsung is SUPPOSED to be sending us an OTA soon
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App

ShanDestromp said:
Awesome, I really appreciate that. I'm not timid when it comes to making the phone my own (I was an early adopter of CyanogenMod for my old G1) but I just returned from a deployment and the whole 'scene' has changed a lot more than I expected lol.
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Just want to say thank you for serving.

zephiK said:
Returning your SGS for a new one isn't going to fix your problem. It's not hardware related, its firmware.
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Click to collapse
briguydj32 said:
An exchange won't fix your GPS issues anyway so you mine as well keep the one you have.
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Click to collapse
Hmmm, quite a few people I'd talked with locally that have the vibrant said swapping worked for them. Is it possible that newer firmware has been released for phones with a newer "birth" date than mine? Then again who should I trust more, people who hardly utilize their phones, or the people who drool over the prospect of new mods and hacks? hehe. I guess I'll just call T-Mo back and let them know I wont be bothering with a swap after all.
Droidicus said:
Just want to say thank you for serving.
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Hey, my pleasure. If nothing else, I have the Army to thank for bringing me out to Hawai'i and giving me the chance to meet my now wife hehe.

ALL out of the box Vibrant's have the same firmware. You need to update to the newest firmware version, it works really well. GPS is better than it is on my CLIQ.

I dunno, i've heard reports of GPS working perfect out of the box for some, and the new firmware doesn't seem to do much for my GPS,
10m accuracy at most unless I leave gps on for about an hour and maybe i'll get 6-7m accuracy, but driving, it SKIPS, (still at 10m) instead of gliding along like my G1 did.
So i'm considering perhaps swapping mine.

QwertyAccess said:
I dunno, i've heard reports of GPS working perfect out of the box for some, and the new firmware doesn't seem to do much for my GPS,
10m accuracy at most unless I leave gps on for about an hour and maybe i'll get 6-7m accuracy, but driving, it SKIPS, (still at 10m) instead of gliding along like my G1 did.
So i'm considering perhaps swapping mine.
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Click to collapse
10M of accuracy is not bad and if you want to get technical, GMaps interprets the data differently. What shows in GMaps as 10 meters will show up as 7 under GPS test. I've got my Vibrant here at 6 Meters under GPSTest and 10 under GMaps. Get a grip people.

heygrl said:
Get a grip people.
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I wont speak for Qwerty, but in my case I was LUCKY to get 10m accuracy; usually the best I could get was 40m; usually after 5-10 minutes of 'searching' and when you're driving an unfamiliar city such as Washington DC Like I was this past week, 40m is far too inaccurate for navigation. Your 'get a grip' is completely tasteless and uncalled for in this thread.
That said, I took zephiK's advice and just flashed the new 2.1 (thread 780935), and I must say its a lot better. I can get a 10m fix indoors in less than 5 seconds from a cold start (EG without GMaps knowing where I am at all); before being indoors I would never get less than a 1000m 'fix'. As soon as I get mine fully tweaked, I'll be sure to flash my wifes phone as well since she's got the same issue.

ShanDestromp said:
I wont speak for Qwerty, but in my case I was LUCKY to get 10m accuracy; usually the best I could get was 40m; usually after 5-10 minutes of 'searching' and when you're driving an unfamiliar city such as Washington DC Like I was this past week, 40m is far too inaccurate for navigation. Your 'get a grip' is completely tasteless and uncalled for in this thread.
That said, I took zephiK's advice and just flashed the new 2.1 (thread 780935), and I must say its a lot better. I can get a 10m fix indoors in less than 5 seconds from a cold start (EG without GMaps knowing where I am at all); before being indoors I would never get less than a 1000m 'fix'. As soon as I get mine fully tweaked, I'll be sure to flash my wifes phone as well since she's got the same issue.
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No thats what im saying about.. He does have the update on his Vibrant
Sent from my SGH-T959

Anyways, Qwerty I just hope you get lucky with your swap and get a working gps and hardware recovery.I've been poking around and quite a few people are saying some of thenew vibrants have issues getting into recovery and down load mode
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App

Yeah, i'm still considering doing the swap, sometime this week, perhaps even today, got up this morning, and phone was off, (Charging Battery Symbol on the screen),
I'm not running any of the custom roms nor am i OCing. Just worried if I do the swap I may end up with even more problems. I don't know what it is with the Samsung phones, if perhaps a lot of the phones have hardware problems or what. I have only used the original stock rom, and the leaked samsung rom.
I don't mean to be picky with my phone, but I remember my 2 year old G1 getting easily 3m lock as soon as i open up the maps inside my room, and navigating with it, was extremely accurate as well. I also never had restart issues with the phone, till after dropping the thing really hard, and then even the restart thing went away.
Today, I'm lucky to get even 40m lock again, on that same leaked updated firmware. My gripe with the samsung vibrant is that there seems to be some sort of hardware problem with the phone and samsung is not saying a thing about it.

I'm telling you guys... don't bother with a swap... I work in a very high volume store and have seen almost every customer come back with GPS issues. We won't even swap them anymore for customers because TMO has listed it as a known issue, and Samsung has announced the firmware update soon... A swap WILL NOT fix the issue, but if you decide to swap it, don't go whining to us our TMO about how you "keep exchanging it and none of them work..." They know this, and YOU know it.

For those still having GPS problems after DK05 radio flash

I still could not get a GPS lock even with the new radio and the DK05 ROM was still to buggy for me. So I went back to stock then back to 4.2 release of Froyo. I needed the GPS so I flashed the radio to the DK05 release and got 12 Sats in just a few seconds. This was the only combination hat has worked for me. Maybe it's just a fluke but it works for me even after reboot. Just thought I would share. I don't know why the rom version would matter 4.2 and DK05 radio gives me orking GPS.
Hope this helps someone......
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App

Well known fix for a well known bug. Don't use GPS for a few days, then try it and report back, please.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App

herzzreh said:
Well known fix for a well known bug. Don't use GPS for a few days, then try it and report back, please.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
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I feel like there should be a flashing red line at the top of every forum post
"If you reboot your phone and your gps works, ITS NOT FIXED!"

herzzreh said:
Well known fix for a well known bug. Don't use GPS for a few days, then try it and report back, please.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
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I understand where your coming from but that's not what I was referring to. My point was that I could barely EVER get a GPS lock until now. I tried the "leaked GPS fix" in the other thread and if it worked it wouldn't after I rebooted the phone. I was simply reporting that with this combination of Radio and ROM that it worked very well. Before it would stop working when I rebooted but it locks right on now.
I am very aware the "Well known fix for a well known issue". This was different for me and I thought it might work for someone else still having issues.

I wasn't trying to be a **** or anything. What you did just forced a complete cache wipe and then a download of new data. Unless you use it daily and unless you have it set to cold start, I guarantee you that your issues will be back.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App

herzzreh said:
I wasn't trying to be a **** or anything. What you did just forced a complete cache wipe and then a download of new data. Unless you use it daily and unless you have it set to cold start, I guarantee you that your issues will be back.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA App
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No problem. I guess my whole point was I had done the cache wipes many times with no positive outcome. This was really the first time I was able to use the GPS on my phone. Maybe it was just coincidence but I tried the cache wipe and anything else I could find to get the GPS to lock and this was the only thing that ever worked for me.

No GPS satellites in view
I wanted to share since I have the same problem...
I am now on my third epic as the first two would not even see a satellite for anything. Not sure if anyone else may be this unlucky but the first two were definitely defective. Third one works like a charm.
I do work for Sprint, and I've seen how shoddy quality control can be for some of the devices, but it seems like they almost rushed these out of the factory. Only had two customers come in that actually required a replacement, as the others were just the standard GPS issues, but man is it frustrating for this kind of phone.
I remember when I got my original touch that didn't even have gps enabled yet! How many years old and even with froyo on it, gps works near instantly for all tests.
But anyway, just wanted to share as I don't know that everyone who has been having issues has verified if they are even seeing satellites available.

ramsestut said:
I wanted to share since I have the same problem...
I am now on my third epic as the first two would not even see a satellite for anything. Not sure if anyone else may be this unlucky but the first two were definitely defective. Third one works like a charm.
I do work for Sprint, and I've seen how shoddy quality control can be for some of the devices, but it seems like they almost rushed these out of the factory. Only had two customers come in that actually required a replacement, as the others were just the standard GPS issues, but man is it frustrating for this kind of phone.
I remember when I got my original touch that didn't even have gps enabled yet! How many years old and even with froyo on it, gps works near instantly for all tests.
But anyway, just wanted to share as I don't know that everyone who has been having issues has verified if they are even seeing satellites available.
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Thanks. I was seeing 0/0 in GPS Status. No matter what I did I had nothing. I was swapped out a few times as well but for the capacitive buttons. I got it working pretty good now. Now I get 12/12 outside and like 7/7 inside. Stas seen/Sats locked

I'm unclear on which version is "froyo 4.2". Do you mean the DJ29 leak? NVM. I didn't put 2 + 2 together; you were referring to the 4.2 revision of leaked DJ29.
I'm basically in the same boat OP was, I'm flashed all the way up to the latest DK05 ROM and modem but GPS is still a crapshoot.
At least it's finally looking like the next OTA will for-sure fix the GPS problems. With Samsung supposedly never acknowledging the problem I was worried.

Poryhack said:
At least it's finally looking like the next OTA will for-sure fix the GPS problems. With Samsung supposedly never acknowledging the problem I was worried.
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From reading the anecdotal reports of uncontrolled testing here, I've seen no evidence of that at all. Maybe it's fixed, and maybe it isn't. You should still be worrried.
People are overcoming the novel problem particular to installing the leaked version. This problem, apparently an artifact of the way the leaked firmware is installed, was breaking GPS completely at the outset.
But that is not the same thing as saying that Samsung has fixed the longstanding GPS bug on the Epic. In fact, having the GPS work initially is a symptom perfectly consistent with that bug. (You can get the same effect just by doing of factory reset of your stock Epic running Eclair DI18.)
The Epic's GPS bug occurs over time, as the GPS almanac and ephemeris cache becomes out of date or corrupt. As far as I can see, no one running the leaked firmware has tested the use cases that can replicate the bug on the stock Epic.

boomerbubba said:
The Epic's GPS bug occurs over time, as the GPS almanac and ephemeris cache becomes out of date or corrupt. As far as I can see, no one running the leaked firmware has tested the use cases that can replicate the bug on the stock Epic.
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I'm not doubting that this is a bug, but my Epic has NEVER been able to get quick and accurate locks, and I have tried after countless wipes. Unless it's just bad hardware there is more then one bug in play here.
The OP's situation seems near-identical to mine so I'm hopeful that trying this might actually have results.

Poryhack said:
At least it's finally looking like the next OTA will for-sure fix the GPS problems. With Samsung supposedly never acknowledging the problem I was worried.
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Click to collapse
First the fact that samsung hasn't acknowledge the problem is not "supposed" it is a documented fact. They refuse 100% to acknowledge the problem and in fact say on the record all GPS issues on Epic were fixed at release.
Second there is zero evidence that the next OTA will do anything for GPS on Epic, where do you even get the slightest indication that is the case?

Poryhack said:
I'm not doubting that this is a bug, but my Epic has NEVER been able to get quick and accurate locks, and I have tried after countless wipes. Unless it's just bad hardware there is more then one bug in play here.
The OP's situation seems near-identical to mine so I'm hopeful that trying this might actually have results.
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the OP situation is totally different an yours, it has to do with flashing, which killed the GPS on many Epics. IE not an issue with time to first fix, interrmtant falure to fix, or accuracy, but a total killing of GPS.
The fix implemented restores GPS to the same function state as the rest of ours, generally working with some number of failures to flush cache and thereby no fix locaiton on occassion

My 1st gen Vibrant, advice

Hello,
I really love the screen on this phone, the hardware capabilities (720p rec, etc.) and although newer and better processors in phones are coming out I like this 1 enough to hold me over for a long time.
so here is my issue:
I purchased my vibrant about 2 weeks after came out, and the biggest problem I faced initially was the problem with the gps. At this point I have not even use gps is the first month I bought it, instead I just use google maps in follow the directions it gives me.
Since that time, I have rooted my phone. I was really happy to get the first update that was rolled out, even though it was rooted. I have heard of all the difference solutions to fix the gps but is it really worth the effort to practically void my warranty even further than rooting it by opening it up and trying to solder whatever antenna is in there.
Now I know my phone is covered under samsung warranty. I should also mention the other big problem I have with it is the battery life. If I can fix these 2 issues I would love the phone forever.
here's my question:
is it feasible and worth the effort to get my phone returned back to samsung so that the battery and gps are of the newest generation?
does anyone have experience doing this and how willing is samsung to work with me?
Finally if I do end up getting a replacement then I know I will have to un root my phone before I send it to samsung. I'm not stupid but I just haven't flashed any roms before. if I did get my phone back to stock settings, then would I lose all of the applications and I paid for and all the customization I have done to the phone (contacts, accounts, data)?
also just curious but I haven't received the 2.2 over the air update yet am I even going to get it since my phone is rooted? I figure I may as well try 2.2 before I actually send in the phone.
I know these are a lot of questions but I really like this phone and I want to get it to work.
thank you and I appreciate any suggestions or advice for me.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App

New and old Vibrants alike have GPS problem.
I don't have an answer to all your questions, but what I can tell you is that you should not wait for your phone to update to 2.2 because it is an over-the-air update.
Follow these instructions if you want to update your phone:
http://forums.t-mobile.com/t5/Samsu...-upgrade-to-Android-2-2-Froyo-now/td-p/678871

As far as I've heard the newer ones after 10/10 don't seem to have the same problem. It may be worth it to take it to the store and show them how bad the GPS is. They may exchange it for you. I'd unroot and go back to stock first.
That won't address the battery issue, but that's generic to most of these newer phones. You can do tweaks to get more life out of them, but that seems to be about it.

if I unroot and go back to stock is it going to erase my applications and contacts, and settings?
I bought it online so I would have to send it back to letstalk.com, I'll have to check out the return policy.
thanks for the replies.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App

You will not lose your paid apps, they are tied to your google account. Use titanium backup before you unroot your phone to backup all your data, including app data. When you get your new phone, you will have to reroot and then you can restore everything from titanium.
You can try to get a warrantly replacement from Samsung rather than using letstalk, I think it's a pain to exchange with them, but I'm not sure.

As said above, Titanium backup will handle it. I have my phone from someone on this board, so I had to go directly with Samsung. Once I could get the tech support person to understand the phone just didn't work it was easier. Don't know how that would go with the GPS. Mine was for the phone not working as a phone, ie, no connection to the network.

zharptitza said:
As far as I've heard the newer ones after 10/10 don't seem to have the same problem. It may be worth it to take it to the store and show them how bad the GPS is. They may exchange it for you. I'd unroot and go back to stock first.
That won't address the battery issue, but that's generic to most of these newer phones. You can do tweaks to get more life out of them, but that seems to be about it.
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I find that to be incorrect. My Vibrant has a 11.01 (2011 January) build date on it and the gps is horrible. I've tried every rom, but I do notice the gps being a little more better with certain roms.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App

Here is my story:
I phone up t-mobile and say my GPS doesn't work. They made me go through a four day dance trying stuff, but if it doesn't work, it doesn't work.
They then replaced it with a brand new phone.
And they charged me $10 shipping & handling for the new phone.
Before the phone never could reliably get and hold on to a GPS lock; afterwards it locks in seconds and never drops.

Hmm, threads I had seen were saying it was better. I have an older one that I just fixed myself. I was hoping they'd gotten their act together and fixed their antenna construction. Its such a simple thing to fix, you'd think they'd do it at the plant.

False
zharptitza said:
As far as I've heard the newer ones after 10/10 don't seem to have the same problem. It may be worth it to take it to the store and show them how bad the GPS is. They may exchange it for you. I'd unroot and go back to stock first.
That won't address the battery issue, but that's generic to most of these newer phones. You can do tweaks to get more life out of them, but that seems to be about it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
False, I've personally used Vibrants made after 10/10 and the GPS is no better than ones produced earlier.
There is no change in hardware, and it has never been proven that a hardware revision on the GPS was made on phones manufactured after 10/10. Just speculation and rumor.

SamsungVibrant said:
False, I've personally used Vibrants made after 10/10 and the GPS is no better than ones produced earlier.
There is no change in hardware, and it has never been proven that a hardware revision on the GPS was made on phones manufactured after 10/10. Just speculation and rumor.
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Click to collapse
Yeah, I think I've got to agree on this one.
In the gps case, I really think it is really a hit or miss issue. My gps works pretty decently but my hubby's doesn't work at all. Even when we were both stock, I could lock on some birds but his was never able to. On top of that, when I flashed Nero onto my phone, my gps got even better. Granted, I don't think it would ever see a thing if it was working on standalone; but with wireless networks on, this thing would (and has) pinpoint(ed) me on a moving train accurately.
Aside from firmwares (now), the only difference between them was the build dates: his - 07/10, mine - 09/10.

[Q] Stock Recovery Image SGH-I437 Samsung Galaxy Express

Hello, I have a samsung galaxy express sgh-I437 with AT&T that I've somehow managed to eliminate the recovery image on. I've tried to create my own CWM recovery image, but as I have no idea how to create one didn't succeed, i did however create an image through CWM that Odin pushes through fine and it raises my counter, but still no recovery image, and I have scoured the world looking for even a stock recovery image and can't find one anywhere. If some one could help me or even point me into the right direction on how to create the image or where to find one I would be greatly appreciative. All of this because I deleted some stock apps and now I can't update to JB, even after reinstalling missing apps (ChatOn)
Thanks guys and everyone here is awesome, this is and has been my go to site since i started in the android world with my HTC Inspire

Join the crowd of Galaxy Express owners hoping that someone is able to delve into this somewhat decent device and make some magic with it (recovery, stock ROMs, custom ROMs, whatever). So far it just doesn't seem to have much interest sadly, but there are quite a few searches I've noted (right now the advanced search showed 40, yesterday when I checked there were over 70, the day before over 115, etc).
It'll either get some support or it won't - I'm considering selling mine already and I've only had it for 2+ days. My worry is that if I do decide to sell the thing that 5 minutes later someone will announce they're going to develop for it or already have some custom ROM ready, I don't know but I've had that happen in the past: get a device, nobody cared about it, sold it, then literally the same day someone starts working on it and it turns out to be a fantastically capable device for experimentation and development.
Oh well, such is the flux of Android devices and development I guess. :silly:
As for your issue(s), I upgraded mine to Jelly Bean on Saturday night and I've had issues with GPS and the CPU not downclocking as it should (sticks at about 1.1 GHz and won't go lower) so if you're still on ICS, stick with it - that's my suggestion.
(and hope someone takes an interest in the Galaxy Express, soon)

Respectfully request some help on the Express...
br0adband said:
Join the crowd of Galaxy Express owners hoping that someone is able to delve into this somewhat decent device and make some magic with it (recovery, stock ROMs, custom ROMs, whatever). So far it just doesn't seem to have much interest sadly, but there are quite a few searches I've noted (right now the advanced search showed 40, yesterday when I checked there were over 70, the day before over 115, etc).
It'll either get some support or it won't - I'm considering selling mine already and I've only had it for 2+ days. My worry is that if I do decide to sell the thing that 5 minutes later someone will announce they're going to develop for it or already have some custom ROM ready, I don't know but I've had that happen in the past: get a device, nobody cared about it, sold it, then literally the same day someone starts working on it and it turns out to be a fantastically capable device for experimentation and development.
Oh well, such is the flux of Android devices and development I guess. :silly:
As for your issue(s), I upgraded mine to Jelly Bean on Saturday night and I've had issues with GPS and the CPU not downclocking as it should (sticks at about 1.1 GHz and won't go lower) so if you're still on ICS, stick with it - that's my suggestion.
(and hope someone takes an interest in the Galaxy Express, soon)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I noted in your sig that your Express is unlocked.What about rooting? Can you tell a very new noobie, what method can be used to root the Express? And can you tell me if it is possible to root it now AFTER I have let it update to Jellybean 4.1.2? I would really appreciate the information. I noticed your post and noted that you are the one person I have found that can hopefully tell me something about rooting the Express. I keep searching the internet and I can find nothing definitive. It seems it was an easy matter to root it when it was still on ICS, but now that I have updated I found one video of rooting an S3 with 4.1.2 and he says in the video that it should work on any Jellybean 4.1.2 device. But the rooting method used is with ODIN using a rooted img file (I looked inside the tar file). My gut tells me that I don't want to use an image file for an S3 to root my Express, but as I said, I am a noobie and maybe this is possible. Any help is greatly appreciated.

I haven't even attempted to root it. There are several threads mentioned here (in those searches I talked about) and several methods are talked about but it doesn't appear to have a proper working root at this time. That might change if someone takes an interest in this phone but, since none of the methods I've read about are confirmed to work - one person says method A worked for them, another person says method B worked, five other people say none worked at all, etc - I'm not taking any chances on bricking this thing since it's in pristine shape and I can (hopefully) sell it. I've got it listed on craigslist at the moment actually, so...
Unlocking it was cake, it uses the same method the Samsung Galaxy S3 does: enter the code to get to the hidden menu, bring up one or two of the menu options, wait 30 seconds or so, go back a step, wait a minute or so, then reboot, that's it, unlocked. Doesn't get much simpler than that, and it works with T-Mobile's recently activated (just last week) 4G LTE network here in Las Vegas without a hitch too.
But while I wouldn't mind rooting it (have a few apps that need root) I'll wait, or I'll end up selling it with the first good offer from the craigslist ad. At this point it doesn't matter I suppose, it just seems like a decent device that's getting ignored, but there could be a reason for it (some screwy new protection mechanism from Samsung, who knows, I did read that the recovery partition isn't where it should be or it's hidden, something to that effect).
Bleh... my advice for the present time: leave it alone, with ICS, unrooted, until someone potentially comes up with a breakthrough that gets things rolling.

Unlocking and it's already updated....
br0adband said:
I haven't even attempted to root it. There are several threads mentioned here (in those searches I talked about) and several methods are talked about but it doesn't appear to have a proper working root at this time. That might change if someone takes an interest in this phone but, since none of the methods I've read about are confirmed to work - one person says method A worked for them, another person says method B worked, five other people say none worked at all, etc - I'm not taking any chances on bricking this thing since it's in pristine shape and I can (hopefully) sell it. I've got it listed on craigslist at the moment actually, so...
Unlocking it was cake, it uses the same method the Samsung Galaxy S3 does: enter the code to get to the hidden menu, bring up one or two of the menu options, wait 30 seconds or so, go back a step, wait a minute or so, then reboot, that's it, unlocked. Doesn't get much simpler than that, and it works with T-Mobile's recently activated (just last week) 4G LTE network here in Las Vegas without a hitch too.
But while I wouldn't mind rooting it (have a few apps that need root) I'll wait, or I'll end up selling it with the first good offer from the craigslist ad. At this point it doesn't matter I suppose, it just seems like a decent device that's getting ignored, but there could be a reason for it (some screwy new protection mechanism from Samsung, who knows, I did read that the recovery partition isn't where it should be or it's hidden, something to that effect).
Bleh... my advice for the present time: leave it alone, with ICS, unrooted, until someone potentially comes up with a breakthrough that gets things rolling.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Too late for ICS. I already let it update to Jellybean 4.1.2 and I really like it. It is much more responsive and accurate even with the voice-to-text feature in messaging. But, you sound very wise as far as the rooting subject goes, so I will wait for a while to see what happens. But as far as the unlocking, can you give me a link to how to do this? Or can you be more specific, please? I am such a noobie that I don't even know how to get to this "hidden" menu that you are talking about. Can you help me with more specific instructions please? I have a much better chance to sell it if it is unlocked than if it is tied to AT&T. Thank you.

Same one for all the Galaxy S3 models:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2023709
My suggestion: change the timer on the backlight to 5 minutes when you're doing this so it doesn't keep dropping back to sleep mode, and then get started.
Pretty simple stuff, just pay attention to the 3rd step (as soon as you choose that option, wait for at least 30-40 seconds before continuing - don't do anything, just sit there holding the phone in your hand or whatever for 30-40 seconds, then go to the next step.
When you get to the last step, definitely wait at least 60 seconds before you do a reboot of the phone (JB now offers the restart option, so restart directly from there - don't back out of any of the menus, just wait the 60+ seconds, hold Power for the menu, choose Restart and when it reboots you should be unlocked.
Just to ask, did you do any testing of the GPS in ICS? I did, and as I noted in another post in another thread, I was pulling in 22 satellites from inside my apartment in under 10 seconds and a fix in 3-5, now with JB I can't get more than 6-8 satellites in the same exact spot and it takes nearly 4 or 5 minutes to get a solid fix so I'm positive there's something going on with Jelly Bean on this device but, alas, I can't roll back to ICS now.

GPS and thank you...
br0adband said:
Same one for all the Galaxy S3 models:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2023709
My suggestion: change the timer on the backlight to 5 minutes when you're doing this so it doesn't keep dropping back to sleep mode, and then get started.
Pretty simple stuff, just pay attention to the 3rd step (as soon as you choose that option, wait for at least 30-40 seconds before continuing - don't do anything, just sit there holding the phone in your hand or whatever for 30-40 seconds, then go to the next step.
When you get to the last step, definitely wait at least 60 seconds before you do a reboot of the phone (JB now offers the restart option, so restart directly from there - don't back out of any of the menus, just wait the 60+ seconds, hold Power for the menu, choose Restart and when it reboots you should be unlocked.
Just to ask, did you do any testing of the GPS in ICS? I did, and as I noted in another post in another thread, I was pulling in 22 satellites from inside my apartment in under 10 seconds and a fix in 3-5, now with JB I can't get more than 6-8 satellites in the same exact spot and it takes nearly 4 or 5 minutes to get a solid fix so I'm positive there's something going on with Jelly Bean on this device but, alas, I can't roll back to ICS now.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Both on ICS and on Jellybean it can't seem to get a good lock on any satellite, it has to go through the wifi for its location services. It even took forever to get a lock outside when I was on ICS. I will try it now on Jellybean and report back. BTW, how do you note the number of satellites that you are pulling from and how do you get the GPS to manually start. It just seems to do it randomly on my phone. I've got a navigation device (TomTom) that pulls about 16 satellites here at home but it reports it right on the screen. So, how do I force the Express to do a GPS locating and how do I find out how many satellites it is pulling from? Do I need a special app? You have really made me curious and I am learning a lot from you, so thank you. If you can just be bothered one more time to answer these questions, I will immediately test it inside and outside the house. Thank you again for all your help so far.
---------- Post added at 04:19 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:28 PM ----------
caine0001 said:
Both on ICS and on Jellybean it can't seem to get a good lock on any satellite, it has to go through the wifi for its location services. It even took forever to get a lock outside when I was on ICS. I will try it now on Jellybean and report back. BTW, how do you note the number of satellites that you are pulling from and how do you get the GPS to manually start. It just seems to do it randomly on my phone. I've got a navigation device (TomTom) that pulls about 16 satellites here at home but it reports it right on the screen. So, how do I force the Express to do a GPS locating and how do I find out how many satellites it is pulling from? Do I need a special app? You have really made me curious and I am learning a lot from you, so thank you. If you can just be bothered one more time to answer these questions, I will immediately test it inside and outside the house. Thank you again for all your help so far.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I tested its ability to use GPS on Jellybean by turning off location by wifi. I used the yp app and it pulled an address within 30 feet of my house... When I used the AT&T Navigator Diagnostic tool I got 10 satellites outside with accuracy of 26 ft. Inside I get 5 satellites. So it works pretty good (not as good as my TomTom). Now I need to cancel that Navigator before they charge me. Hope this information helps you. Jellybean seems to give me an almost instant GPS lock, so I have to say, that's pretty good. Again, I hope this helps you in diagnosing your problems somehow. If I had more money I would upgrade to a better phone, but for the $49 I paid, this thing is pretty darned good. I understand how someone who is used to high-end phones might be disappointed, but if you want a good bang for the buck, I think the Express is a pretty good choice:good: (certainly better than my wife's IPhone 4S).

I use GPS Status & Toolbox from Google Play more than anything else for basic GPS duties, I don't own a car anymore (gave that up years ago) so the only real purpose I have for GPS is using it with Wigle for Wi-Fi access point mapping. Having said that, I still expect GPS to work as designed so whenever I have issues it's one of the first things I notice.
I just rebooted the phone since it's been running JB for about 2 days now and should be "settled in" as Android has a tendency to do. Remarkably I just pulled in 21 satellites from inside my apartment - something it wasn't doing on Saturday night right after I did the upgrade to JB but now it is, and got a fix in a matter of seconds so, I suppose the settling in helped (?!?!?!)
Mind you, that's pure GPS in the screenshot below: no Wi-Fi assistance, no location awareness, and no carrier assistance either, everything is disabled except the GPS itself so, yeah, I'm somewhat satisfied now since it seems to be working pretty much as well as it did on ICS the other day before the JB upgrade.
Anyway, when I enabled the Power Saving mode, the CPU finally started clocking itself up and down as expected so I suppose that too is also now working as designed, we'll see what happens. So far so good is all I can say at the moment.

Here is a copy of the stock recovery. Have fun =)
This is not a flashable zip. It only a copy of the mmcblk0p18 (Recovery) partition from ICS 4.0.4 of the Samsung Galaxy Express I437

BlindArtisan said:
Here is a copy of the stock recovery. Have fun =)
This is not a flashable zip. It only a copy of the mmcblk0p18 (Recovery) partition from ICS 4.0.4 of the Samsung Galaxy Express I437
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Awesome thank you...now...
I'm a newb at stock recoveries, unless Theyve already been Made, so pay no attention If my next question seems dumb but what do I do with it now? How do I create a flashable recovery from that?

br0adband said:
Join the crowd of Galaxy Express owners hoping that someone is able to delve into this somewhat decent device and make some magic with it (recovery, stock ROMs, custom ROMs, whatever). So far it just doesn't seem to have much interest sadly, but there are quite a few searches I've noted (right now the advanced search showed 40, yesterday when I checked there were over 70, the day before over 115, etc).
It'll either get some support or it won't - I'm considering selling mine already and I've only had it for 2+ days. My worry is that if I do decide to sell the thing that 5 minutes later someone will announce they're going to develop for it or already have some custom ROM ready, I don't know but I've had that happen in the past: get a device, nobody cared about it, sold it, then literally the same day someone starts working on it and it turns out to be a fantastically capable device for experimentation and development.
Oh well, such is the flux of Android devices and development I guess. :silly:
As for your issue(s), I upgraded mine to Jelly Bean on Saturday night and I've had issues with GPS and the CPU not downclocking as it should (sticks at about 1.1 GHz and won't go lower) so if you're still on ICS, stick with it - that's my suggestion.
(and hope someone takes an interest in the Galaxy Express, soon)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have managed to get root on this device well at least with 4.0.4 ICS, that part was relatively easy with unlock root and It let you unlock root without paying for It lol and I agree I hope someone takes interest in this device soon when you compare it to the s3 the specs arent that far apart lol

ChronicScribe said:
Awesome thank you...now...
I'm a newb at stock recoveries, unless Theyve already been Made, so pay no attention If my next question seems dumb but what do I do with it now? How do I create a flashable recovery from that?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you are on 4.0.4 and rooted read this post of mine.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=39626678#post39626678
ChronicScribe said:
compare it to the s3 the specs arent that far apart
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The partition layouts are identical, but the kernels and images are different.

Hopefully, we can get somebody with stock ics to do a factory reset then a system dump. I tried flashing my system dump with odin and it seemedto be trying to flash something to boot thus invoking our cursed locked bootloader. I don't know why it would try flashing to boot as it should have been only the /system partition. Maybe something to do with initramfs
? I'm hoping a system dump performed after factory reset might have different results
Now, since we cant flash a zimage that means we're stuck with jb kernel. Would that be an issue, I wonder? If we had jb kernel (and initramfs) with ics /system?
Another thing would be for a rooted ics to use ota rootkeeper for update, then system dump.
Factory reset, root, ota rootkeeper, update, system dump.
If not, then cwm and an insecure kernel would be our best bet. Although we would need the initramfs from the jb zimage. Which we can't get without root...
Sigh.
As to the recovery image. You'll need to use odin 3.07. I don't have a link handy. Also, the file must be prepared in a certain way. I have one at hone. Can upload later.

ChronicScribe said:
Awesome thank you...now...
I'm a newb at stock recoveries, unless Theyve already been Made, so pay no attention If my next question seems dumb but what do I do with it now? How do I create a flashable recovery from that?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Of course, you can make your own odin img as follows:
Either in linux or in an android terminal emulator:
First of all, cd to the directory the recovery image is stored.
E.g.
cd /mnt/extSdCard
Then:
tar -c recovery.img > recovery.tar
md5sum -t recovery.tar >> recovery.tar
mv recovery.tar recovery.tar.md5
Note: rename original recovery image to recovery.img. Not sure exactly how odin determines what goes whereand suspect it might be the name.
Easy.
Same procedure for kernel and system, by the way. zimage and factoryfs.rfs respectively.

+1

Alright thanks to BlindArtisan and invert_nexus i was able to create and successfully flash the stock recovery back onto the express. I'll post it here for anyone who might need it :victory: this does not have CWM on it but i'm currently trying to figure that out also I also have a copy of the update to JB that i'm going to attempt to use to get the phone to allow me to update and I'm going to use OTA RootKeeper to see root access will stay.
Once again thanks to everyone here for their expertise and knowledge hopefully we can get the attention of some people to get the galaxy express ball rolling lol
Now my counter is up to 3 and I have triangle away put i'm afraid to use it at the moment because I don't won't to completely screw the phone up, is anyone aware as to whether or not it will work on the express without bricking it?

Well I ended up getting an offer on my Galaxy Express so I offloaded it earlier tonight for a somewhat decent profit, guess I'll move on to the next device and edit the signature yet again.
Good luck to those that pursue development on this device, it sure could use some love.

So apparently i've done something horrible lol my express no longer allows me to install apps, i can't open the play store at all, i can't install apps from the web, unlock root says i have root access but i can't push any files to the system folder because i'm not rooted, nothing opens on the phone, except settings, did a factory reset and still have the same issue...any advice?

ChronicScribe said:
Alright thanks to BlindArtisan and invert_nexus i was able to create and successfully flash the stock recovery back onto the express. I'll post it here for anyone who might need it :victory: this does not have CWM on it but i'm currently trying to figure that out also I also have a copy of the update to JB that i'm going to attempt to use to get the phone to allow me to update and I'm going to use OTA RootKeeper to see root access will stay.
Once again thanks to everyone here for their expertise and knowledge hopefully we can get the attention of some people to get the galaxy express ball rolling lol
Now my counter is up to 3 and I have triangle away put i'm afraid to use it at the moment because I don't won't to completely screw the phone up, is anyone aware as to whether or not it will work on the express without bricking it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i use this recovery image but is like i mess up everything now is not even been recognize by kies software anymore pls i need some help if i can recover this phone at all to original or New firmware

ICS vs JB GPS
br0adband said:
Just to ask, did you do any testing of the GPS in ICS? I did, and as I noted in another post in another thread, I was pulling in 22 satellites from inside my apartment in under 10 seconds and a fix in 3-5, now with JB I can't get more than 6-8 satellites in the same exact spot and it takes nearly 4 or 5 minutes to get a solid fix so I'm positive there's something going on with Jelly Bean on this device but, alas, I can't roll back to ICS now.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was able to do side by side testing of ICS vs JB since mine got upgraded & my wife's didn't and your GPS observation seems spot on. Neither of us had ever used GPS so 1st thing I noticed was mine with JB it took about 10 minutes to get a lock where hers took about 30 seconds. Keep in mind these phones were side by side. Granted indoors but near a window but either way they were next to each other so should get the same signal/sats. I left them both searching for sats for about 1/2 hr then swapped spots & let them go another 1/2 hr. Even after leaving them for awhile the JB one definitely finds less sats & takes longer to lock. A very strange thing to note is for some reason the compasses show completely different direction but not sure why. Funny thing is neither is right but ICS is closer & JB is WAYY off.
I attached pic of them side by side after same amount of time searching and also a video showing them sync. Granted time difference is negligible now, the # of sats is definitely lower for JB. (JB on left & ICS on right. Can see the upgrade nag at the top as it was postponed.)
Hopefully poor GPS doesn't plague this phone if JB is being forced on us.
Bill
EDIT: Apologies to OP, this thread came up searching to compare ICS vs JB & I didn't pay attention I was OT replying. While already OT I'll add a few more observations about JB vs ICS. JB seems to be using 171MB more memory than ICS comparing mine to my wife's with mine @ 494MB used & my wife's @ 323MB. (Some apps are the same, just larger, but there are a few new ones like Simple Alarm Clock 3.5MB, PageBuddyNotiSvc 3.0MB & Stock Daemon(EUR 4.2MB to name a few but many other crapware's I'd love to kill. (I can kill some of them temporarily but they come back) ATT Software Update is using 10MB, Media Hub 4.6MB, S Suggest 3.9MB, AT&T Hot Spots 3.0MB and a few i'm not sure on like Synchonize 5.0MB S Voice 6.3MB com.sec.phone 2.7MB.) They took away the Mobile Data button on the drop-down menu! The new dialer is FUGLY! (Granted I hate the stock dialer because it's so hard to dial & find people so I use Dialer One but still WOW what is up with the white dialer.) On both rom's I miss the Power widget. Really need to get this this ROOTED ASAP to kill some of that crap.