GPS innaccurate

jaytek13 · Apr 6, 2011

I know there are many threads about this already, but coming from an iPhone w/ AT&T, I'm a bit disconcerted by this situation. Having to download this or that app to fix it, wave my phone in magic circles, enable or not enable certain options... This all seems a bit ridiculous to me. My iPhone -never- had GPS problems. Indoors or outdoors, upstairs or downstairs, it always knew where I was. Unfortunately I recently had my iPhone stolen so I bought a Thunderbolt. With hindsight now acquired, I thought I would take advantage of one of the "find my phone" features for my new phone, but it never knows where I am. It's accurate within maybe 100 yards on a good day, a mile radius on a bad day, and I just don't understand why. This is more of a commentary as it seems there is nothing I can do at this point.. I've tried downloading the apps, different configurations, different options selected for "the most accuracy", calibrated many times over, and yet still I cannot obtain a GPS signal which I would even consider decent, much less accurate. Most often the "accuracy" is off as well, putting me outside the circle with Latitude and a mile away.

Having read the other threads about the issue, I am now convinced there is nothing I can do, and GPS inaccuracy seems to be an acceptable norm among the Android community. Or maybe it's Verizon? I really don't know...

Of course this causes problems with GPS apps as well. Can I find the nearest chinese take out with Yelp? Nope. Not unless I go outside my apartment, wait 5 minutes for it to grab my actual location, and then search.

I'm mostly just disappointed because of the whole "find my phone" thing. I am now convinced that were my Android phone to ever be stolen, I would never be able to find it, no matter what precautions I took. Whereas with my iPhone, had I had the foresight to enable the feature, it wouldn't have been an issue.

I don't mean this to be an iPhone vs. Android debate but... really, myself/we as Android users should not accept these issues GPS issues as the norm. Unless I'm missing something, and maybe I am... maybe AT&T uses a better or larger network of satellites to grab the location? I really don't know but I'm frustrated and a bit angry about it.

TLDR - iPhone always knew where I was, through storm, underground, on a cloudy or sunny day. My Thunderbolt seems confused about my location no matter what.

HTCThunderbolt · Apr 6, 2011

If you are rooted there is a mod that made my TB pick up my location accurate within 7 meters..

Try gps fix in the market though

RobG5589 · Apr 6, 2011

I used mine last night at work. It updated every few seconds with the icon a fraction behind my actual location. It listed all the streets and various businesses along my route. I had all the gps services turned on to get an accurate location. I think I am the only one here with a TB that does not have any issues. Lucky me

nkd · Apr 6, 2011

my gps is perfect. I have no issues. Every time I use it I get less then 5 meter accuracy. Most of the time I get around 3 or 4 or even 2 sometimes. I even get that inside my house.

Evulution · Apr 7, 2011

Okay, if the military GPS munitions don't always hit 100% of their targets, what makes you think a cell phone is going to be 100% accurate? I have flown on 16 million dollar planes where we couldn't get a GPS lock while on the ground. Lots of factors play into cell phone GPS technology and those same issues impact aircraft.

If your phone is trying to acquire your GPS location it will use your GPS chip in conjunction with triangulation from cell phone towers. If you were lost in the woods and your phone is 100 meters off, rescue forces would still find you. So.....

ANDЯOID · Apr 7, 2011

i also had gps issues ... "accurate to 1000 ft". i returned the phone, they gave me a new one. seems to be better, but i havent really given it a good go around this time. i did have some issues inside my apartment when it was GPS only, but when i enabled wifi - it instantly put me in the right spot. i assume that's because the google cars cataloged my wifi name though....

jaydroid88 · Apr 7, 2011

What is the GPS fix for rooted phones? Can you link me to it? Thanks!

HTCThunderbolt · Apr 7, 2011

Just look over at xda thunderbolt Dev forums. The thread is by ziggy

Stevessvt · Apr 7, 2011

I tried everything suggested on XDA to fix my GPS. It would eventually lock, but only after about a minute, not acceptable to me. Not one of the fixes worked for me. I was on bamf 1.3.2. This was also how it was on Virus rom, and perfect storm. Curious, I did a full fecovery, back to unrooted factory .6. I now lock gps with in 5-10 seconds. I can always root again, but for now Im going stock.

HTCThunderbolt · Apr 7, 2011

Stevessvt said:
I tried everything suggested on XDA to fix my GPS. It would eventually lock, but only after about a minute, not acceptable to me. Not one of the fixes worked for me. I was on bamf 1.3.2. This was also how it was on Virus rom, and perfect storm. Curious, I did a full fecovery, back to unrooted factory .6. I now lock gps with in 5-10 seconds. I can always root again, but for now Im going stock.

Dang.. Thats not good. It works great with me and bamf 1.3.2 with the newest kernel

Stevessvt · Apr 7, 2011

HTCThunderbolt said:
Dang.. Thats not good. It works great with me and bamf 1.3.2 with the newest kernel

I tried all kinds of kernals, and rom combo's. But its ok,...mine would only clock to 1.2 stable, so Im not getting a huge OC to make me want to keep it rooted. And Im using Juice Defender Beta, and it seems to be starting to work for the TB, still lots of errors, but its toggling wifi and 4G correctly now...so my battery performance should improve. Also setting it to only LTE I think is helping, too. So no real reason to keep it rooted, for me, right now.

ska.t73 · Apr 7, 2011

Evulution said:
Okay, if the military GPS munitions don't always hit 100% of their targets, what makes you think a cell phone is going to be 100% accurate? I have flown on 16 million dollar planes where we couldn't get a GPS lock while on the ground. Lots of factors play into cell phone GPS technology and those same issues impact aircraft.

If your phone is trying to acquire your GPS location it will use your GPS chip in conjunction with triangulation from cell phone towers. If you were lost in the woods and your phone is 100 meters off, rescue forces would still find you. So.....

^^^^ This, no one using a cell phone needs 100% accurate GPS, you simply aren't going to get it. Now if the GPS isn't locking on at all then that would be an issue, but again there are many factors that could cause that (cloudy day being one).

Prim8 · Apr 8, 2011

jaytek13 said:
I know there are many threads about this already, but coming from an iPhone w/ AT&T, I'm a bit disconcerted by this situation. Having to download this or that app to fix it, wave my phone in magic circles, enable or not enable certain options... This all seems a bit ridiculous to me. My iPhone -never- had GPS problems. Indoors or outdoors, upstairs or downstairs, it always knew where I was. Unfortunately I recently had my iPhone stolen so I bought a Thunderbolt. With hindsight now acquired, I thought I would take advantage of one of the "find my phone" features for my new phone, but it never knows where I am. It's accurate within maybe 100 yards on a good day, a mile radius on a bad day, and I just don't understand why. This is more of a commentary as it seems there is nothing I can do at this point.. I've tried downloading the apps, different configurations, different options selected for "the most accuracy", calibrated many times over, and yet still I cannot obtain a GPS signal which I would even consider decent, much less accurate. Most often the "accuracy" is off as well, putting me outside the circle with Latitude and a mile away.

Having read the other threads about the issue, I am now convinced there is nothing I can do, and GPS inaccuracy seems to be an acceptable norm among the Android community. Or maybe it's Verizon? I really don't know...

Of course this causes problems with GPS apps as well. Can I find the nearest chinese take out with Yelp? Nope. Not unless I go outside my apartment, wait 5 minutes for it to grab my actual location, and then search.

I'm mostly just disappointed because of the whole "find my phone" thing. I am now convinced that were my Android phone to ever be stolen, I would never be able to find it, no matter what precautions I took. Whereas with my iPhone, had I had the foresight to enable the feature, it wouldn't have been an issue.

I don't mean this to be an iPhone vs. Android debate but... really, myself/we as Android users should not accept these issues GPS issues as the norm. Unless I'm missing something, and maybe I am... maybe AT&T uses a better or larger network of satellites to grab the location? I really don't know but I'm frustrated and a bit angry about it.

TLDR - iPhone always knew where I was, through storm, underground, on a cloudy or sunny day. My Thunderbolt seems confused about my location no matter what.

Is there a chance it is defective?
Mine sometimes takes a couple minutes to lock but usually it's within seconds and never anywhere near as inaccurate as 100 yards.
On google nav there's usually no circle at all. My Tracks are pretty accurate as well with the occasional inaccuracy when under trees and such.
Overall it's nowhere near as bad as my Captivate was and a definite upgrade over my 3GS.

Evulution · Apr 9, 2011

How many of you know your GPS tends to be off when indoors? Well, that's typical for GPS technology folks when you are indoors. Going outside and it being clear outside should help. Just remember GPS works off of satellites and if you have to wait awhile for it to find you its probably due to no satellite overhead, another entity using the satellite, or interference.

GPS innaccurate

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