Help my GPS location is inaccurate (defective phone/replace)

[novox77]

So far, my experience with the E3D's GPS has been on par with my E4G's. Sitting at my desk (indoors), it's able to get a lock in about 20 seconds, comparable to E4G. Outside, it can get a lock in about 5 seconds, once again comparable to the predecessor.

One thing that I noted was that my GPS experience on E4G was MUCH improved on CM7 than the stock ROM. On Sense, I could rarely get a lock in a moving car. Really frustrating if I'm on a highway and the GPS lock gets broken. This was a consistent problem on Sense, and when I switched to CM7, it never happened again.

Last night, I discovered that my compass was all over the place. It apparently has no idea where NORTH is, because no matter which way I face, it points to a different direction for NORTH. I tested this outside, free of stray magnetism. Don't know what's up with that...

 

[DonB]

I had something similar, my GPS works fine but yesterday when I used my Golf GPS app and the screen would go off, it would not show the proper yardage to the hole when waking the screen up, took a while to get the yardage back.

So far, my experience with the E3D's GPS has been on par with my E4G's. Sitting at my desk (indoors), it's able to get a lock in about 20 seconds, comparable to E4G. Outside, it can get a lock in about 5 seconds, once again comparable to the predecessor.

One thing that I noted was that my GPS experience on E4G was MUCH improved on CM7 than the stock ROM. On Sense, I could rarely get a lock in a moving car. Really frustrating if I'm on a highway and the GPS lock gets broken. This was a consistent problem on Sense, and when I switched to CM7, it never happened again.

Last night, I discovered that my compass was all over the place. It apparently has no idea where NORTH is, because no matter which way I face, it points to a different direction for NORTH. I tested this outside, free of stray magnetism. Don't know what's up with that...

 

[ArmageddonX]

I'm next to a window on the 8th floor of a building and I have 4 floors above me. I'm getting a reading that's off by about 300 yards. Maybe more. Tomorrow I'll try to get a clear view of the sky and try again. I sure hope I don't have a defective one.

I used Google Maps. I assume that's what we are testing our GPS position with. For a split second is identified my location correctly and then jumped back to the incorrect one. I'm gonna be bummed out if my GPS is no good

How do I calibrate it?

Edit: Just downloaded GPS Status. I only get signal from 1 satellite where I am sitting. It needs 3 to judge your true location, right? I guess that would explain it, right? Again. Will test more tomorrow. I really, really, don't want to have to return mine.

Spoiler

That's one thing my Palm Pre was always really spot on about was the GPS. I'd hate to lose that.

 

[fattank]

Inaccurate GPS and compass eh? It's good this is coming out. I hope mine won't "pull this kind of crap."

Is there a list of "common problems" yet? Wiki/thread?

 

[JinCA]

This thread made me want to test my 3vo, I'm sitting in my bedroom and it still had me within 10/15 feet of my location, my bedroom is in the back of the house and the arrow had me in the back yard so it's pretty damned close lol.

 

[Thefoodman52]

My first 3VO had a GPS that seemed lagged and inacurate. I just tested my replacement 3VO and the GPS is almost real-time and accurate to about 5 yards.

Hmm... mine never gets closer than 10 meters.... ever.

-edit-
Running GPS Test, side by side, I notice that my E4G is much MUCH faster at instantly locking 7 to 9 satellites for signal, and it's a good 10ft more accurate. The E3D is about 8 seconds behind it in locking in, and sits around 24 ft. up to 60 ft. randomly. Hmmm... something tells me the GPS isn't as good in the 3D....
Note that this is in an old renovated army barracks building made of brick and steel beams. I have 1 to 0 bars of signal in here. Not bad I'd say, honestly.

 

[EarlyMon]

Inaccurate GPS and compass eh? It's good this is coming out. I hope mine won't "pull this kind of crap."

Is there a list of "common problems" yet? Wiki/thread?

Mine was simply a bad phone - got it replaced, now there's no issues.

And common problems threads tend to turn into common complaining, often over simple things that can be fixed, but lets everyone get lazy and not read or try the fixes - just get together for beeyotch sessions until the trolls come along. I hate those threads (most mods do).

We do have an official support FAQ linked from the official forum guide sticky tho.

 

[ArmageddonX]

I'm going to do more testing when I get home. However, Mapquest seems to have my location perfectly while Google Maps consistently has been about 300 yards in the wrong direction. Granted, I am 8 floors up in a hospital and I have another 4 floor above me, but I am right next to a window. GPS Status says I'm getting at least 2/3 Satellite signals. So I'm going to try to test this more when I have a clear view of the sky directly above me. I will update this post when I know more. Thank you everyone for the suggestions here, hoping my unit is fine.

 

[novox77]

E3D doesn't appear to have a widespread issue with GPS. As Early stated, he had a one-off defective unit.

Compass issues are nothing new and definitely not limited to E3D. I shouldn't have brought it up in this thread, so if others care and use the compass, please start a new thread for that.

 

[ArmageddonX]

I'm happy to report, after coming home from the Hospital today my GPS is working perfectly. It must have been the added 8 stories of elevation throwing off my reading.

 

[thelonewizard]

Okay, so when I used the Compass app (from the market) it said that I was at a different address. However, when I went into google maps, it still gave me that address, but on the map it was pretty darn close. I'm going to use GPS Status + Toolbox to see if I can't get this more accurate.

 

[redninja]

has anyone swapped and gotten a 3d with a better radio? mine is close to unusable at my house whereas my old evo was pretty decent. almost out of time to swap, thanks.

 

[novox77]

has anyone swapped and gotten a 3d with a better radio? mine is close to unusable at my house whereas my old evo was pretty decent. almost out of time to swap, thanks.

EarlyMon (a fellow moderator) had an Evo 3D with a defective radio. He got an exchange, and all his radio woes were gone. He actually had Sprint do some RF diagnostics and conclusively proved that there was a defect.

 

[redninja]

im at 80% no signal over 8 hours, my old evo would be like 2-3%. Goint to swap and see what happens, sold my other phone already so in a spot.

 

[JSchu22]

Might as well give it a try. I swapped mine because of dust and it was surprisingly easy. I didn't even have the box with me.

 

[novox77]

Might as well give it a try. I swapped mine because of dust and it was surprisingly easy. I didn't even have the box with me.

Yeah, I didn't bring the box and original packaged stuff cause I figured they would attempt to repair first. But the guy took my phone and started to activate a new one. He did ask if I had the box with me, and I said no. He said, "no problem; now you have two chargers."

I exchanged my phone for a completely different issue. But yeah, it was quite hassle-free.

 

[ceabbott2]

Good Evening early mon and novox,

I was curious after reading your posts. My data (3g) has been horrible almost since I picked it up a couple of weeks ago. I realize that some have dust under the screen, early the radio. When i call sprint corporate store about the data issue I get the "we have had an outage that has affected our area". I have done a factory reset, data restore, the proxy fix mahes the speeds worse. Mostly market won't connect, emails won't load dolphin hd won't load webpage and speeds as well as bars are almost non existant. My question: How can Ii tell if it's the phone or thenetwork. Oddly enough a young lady in Tennessee in customer support is having very similar experiences with her 3d. I was going to take it to the tech (franchise store) corporate store doesn't have tech. What do I need to ask to be checked and how can I find out if there is a REAL network issue?


Thanks to everyone for your help.

Charles Abbott

 

[EarlyMon]

My rep said I needed a "box test" - I mentioned that, and that I had general RF concerns, including GPS (in my case).

 

[LBPHeretic]

Well, I just did a three-way comparison of GPS accuracy and lock time with a Sprint HTC Hero, a Sprint HTC EVO 4G and a Sprint HTC EVO 3D. They all locked on in around the same amount of time which was around four or five seconds and this is inside a house too. The accuracy between the Sprint HTC Hero and the Sprint HTC EVO 3D was very similar and accurate within four to six meters most of the time, again inside a house. The accuracy of the Sprint HTC EVO 4G seemed SLIGHTLY, and I do mean slightly, higher than the other two, but really we are talking about maybe a half a foot to a foot in terms of the placement of the blue arrow on Google Maps, which is negligible in my opinion. As for the compass accuracy, all three handsets were quite accurate in my testing. I did have to calibrate the Sprint HTC EVO 3D because it was the first time I had used it with Google Maps.

As a special bonus, I did a data download speed test between the Sprint HTC EVO 4G and the Sprint HTC EVO 3D and both were around the same speed at between 650 and 700 kilobits per second, which is normal here this time of night. During the day, the speeds usually creep up into the 800 to 1000 kilobits per second range periodically.

 

[AndroidSPCS]

I tested my Evo 3D GPS two days ago on a trip across town, and it worked perfectly.

 

[novox77]

i only had an issue with GPS one time. I use mine to track my runs, and one day it was pretty inaccurate; I'd say it was scattering about 10 meters from my actual location. What this does is it causes my app to think I ran farther than I actually did (it just assumes I ran in a really zigzagging pattern, caused by the error of the GPS).

Before this incident, I had successfully proven that the GPS was capable of getting my location right to within 1 meter.

I was really concerned, obviously, so after the run, I rebooted the phone, and went out for another short run to test it. After the reboot, it was perfect again.

For 2 weeks afterward, I'd reboot my phone before my run, and I never had any issues. But lately (last 2 weeks), I've stopped rebooting, and so far, I haven't seen that issue again.

 

[mattcnz]

I turned on the gps but when I launch telenav the indicator arrow never moves and in the upper left corner it was so showing a no satellite image. My families evo and evo shift work perfectly so it is not the location. Also google maps arrow bounces around because it is using the wireless network and not gps even though it is turned on.

Any help would greatly be appreciated.

 

[EarlyMon]

Try a battery pull for a full minute. If that doesn't work, suggest you have Sprint perform an RF test on your phone. It is quite possible that you need to replace your phone, as I did.

 

[some.devil]

GPS worked perfectly over the weekend when travelling from Lake Michigan to the jimmy Buffet concert.

FYI. This is my 3rd 3VO and I have not updated Google maps beta or any other HTC OTA update. I've also used GPS Status to clear and update the AGPS.

 

[jerofld]

GPS worked perfectly over the weekend when travelling from Lake Michigan to the jimmy Buffet concert.

FYI. This is my 3rd 3VO and I have not updated Google maps beta or any other HTC OTA update. I've also used GPS Status to clear and update the AGPS.

The OTA may have been pre-installed if you exchanged the phone after the OTA was released (June 28th IIRC). Check About System > Software information. If your software number ends in .7, you have the OTA. If it's earlier than that, you don't.