yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Desire HD General] Ansib:
I opened the plastic cover last night after i got irritated with the GPS not finding any sats for 2 minutes. Tried many apps and all reported nothing. Also updated my Radio version to latest and still nothing. Looks like a dead GPS to me. So i opened the cover and saw the contacts on the motherboard were slanted to the right enough to not make contact (it's a guess) so i tried to straighten them up but one of them snapped off. Such a flimsy PoS....Soldering is my last option to fix this.

One question though, does it matter what the length of the cable is to get the best possible service from the GPS? :fingers-crossed:
[Desire HD General] RogerL:
I found that using cables results in a weaker signal, but if you do, make them as short as possible. I replaced both of those crappy brass connectors with better quality ones taken from a blackberry battery connector bought on eBay. Soldered on ok, but go carefully. Found that the antenna's great provided there's a decent connection to the PCB.
[Desire HD General] Ansib:
Well today i tried. Unfortunatly still nothing, did i dun goofed and messed it up or something?

i.imgur.com/lFzJMbUl.jpg (copy and paste into browser, i cant post images due to have low post count)
[Desire HD General] RogerL:
Think I misunderstood your post, thought you were soldering the cover antenna to the contacts using wires, so sorry about that. You could try a longer loop of wire, or even a single wire sticking out of the cover soldered to the contact nearest the camera. Apparently steel wire e.g. food sealer tie does better than copper or aluminium. Some examples earlier in the thread.
[Desire HD General] Ansib:
Thanks for the reply. It was my intention to do it this way. Not sure why it wasn't working :silly:

I've got a twisty sealer thing. Let's see if that works! At this point i don't really care if i have a cable sticking out from the back of the phone lol
[Desire HD General] Ansib:
Just a quick follow up from yesterday. I took Swell6's advice and used a bread tie which can also be found on toys that are attached to cardboard and such. Soldered one end to the joint next to the camera and left the other one as is AND IT WORKS!

I got 11 sats indoors with an accuracy of 10 metres. Not bad at all

And you can see the crappy DIY yourself here

Doesn't look pretty but after owning the phone since launch, i couldn't care less tbh. Finally happy i got the GPS working.

Just a little question for anyone that knows. Will snipping a bit of the wire affect the signal strength in any way? I wouldn't mind haven't it a bit shorter. It's just begging to prick me in my leg.
[Desire HD General] RogerL:
You could always try folding it in half. Interesting to see the effect.
[Desire HD General] RogerL:
Also be interesting to see how it works if the wire is stashed under the cover......

My daughter has a Samsung Tab 2 7" and GPS reception is amazing with SNRs over 30 indoors! Never got close to that with the DHD. Samsung has a plastic case and I wonder if that's a major factor. I gather that aluminum interferes with the GPS signal, which is maybe why we struggle so much with the DHD, and explains why an antenna outside the case works so well. That said, I still get a reasonable reception from the standard antenna - not as good as with a twisty tie, but still not bad. Helped by the cover being plastic of course with the actual antenna right on the outside. Just need a good connection to the PCB, which is the challenge!
[Desire HD General] Arikuzo:
Thank you, after struggling to get my DHDs GPS working for six months I came along this. I did the soldering and now it is as good as new. I got my DHD on launch.
[Desire HD General] Ansib:
The bread tie didn't last long, the pressure from closing the case was too much for the wire after having to adjust it every now and then to get a good signal :rolleyes:

Looks like i'm going to have to find something a bit more flexible that works with the cover snapped firmly in place.
[Desire HD General] RogerL:
At one point I had a tie though a hole in the cover looped around the outside of the cover with tape holding it in place. Signal strength not as good as with the wire sticking out but it was a stable setup.
[Desire HD General] Lugke:
really nice results with all this modding, i added a copper wire to the inside contacts and i slightly have a better reception outdoor and indoor.

But these long 5 cm steel wires look so awesome!

my plan is to mill a small gap into the housing on the backside and lay the wire into the gap. Perhaps some epoxy resin over it to fix the constuction... i´ll send some pictures when i find some time for it :D

hopefully it helps with reception
[Desire HD General] frostark:
My DHD's GPS is crappy, worse than N1.

Your ideal is brilliant. Can't wait to try is. :D
[Desire HD General] karanx:
it works.

1 second connecting outside.

Rom the difference there. 2.3.5 roms the same. I think problem 2.3.5 sense roms :(

but very nice connect this sci rom

very good now :)
[Desire HD General] jasperduijn:
It doesn't work for me at the first try, going to try it again with another wire!
[Desire HD General] dazultra2000:
Question for those that have done this already...

Did you leave the original spring things in place or did you remove them?

Did you make it so that the solder still had contact with the flash cover or is that antenna completely redundant after the mod?

Only reason I ask is because one of my spring things has snapped and I need to know if I'm stuffed or not!
[Desire HD General] TylerDurben:
It works with or without having contact to the flash cover my friend :-D
[Desire HD General] futur1sm:
A question about this, I have a DHD with a broken internal contact for GPS meaning it currently doesn't work. Would I be able to solder onto this with a wire to do this mod and get the GPS working again? :)
[Desire HD General] TylerDurben:
Could you explain what broken internal contact means ???

The biggest problem is that corosions spots onto that "antenna folio" that can't be polished because of the thin of it.

Thats why I solder a cable to it to fix that problem for ever.

I need my gps working every day for geocaching and navigation without gps status drop.

After few week's of testing it I can say it works great and extremly fast for me !
[Desire HD General] Eshi:
Very nice! I'm gonna try this :D
[Desire HD General] futur1sm:
One of the connectors has fallen off the board after it had a fall. :(

That's why I was wondering if I could solder directly to where the connector was?
[Desire HD General] TylerDurben:
hmm . im not realy sure .... i need to see a macro picture of it

maybe that could fix your problem but its an bit risk because u can overheat something on the circuit board

maybe you can make a picture of it and show us your problem ;)

but i think this could fix your problem if u dont overheat other parts on the board
[Desire HD General] TylerDurben:
hey jasper did u tryed to delete and load new agps data with the gps status apk ?

that maybe fix your problem after soldering the wire to the device :)
[Desire HD General] futur1sm:
Here is best I can take right now as I only have a Desire HD to take this on. :) if no good I will grab a better picture soon cheers.
[Desire HD General] TylerDurben:
looks possible to me

but hey you do it on your own risk ;)

be carefull and good luck
[Desire HD General] manolito1998:
Thank you very much for the trick.

It works perfect. Now I can see 11 sats and it has an error of 10 meters. I haven't seen this before.
[Desire HD General] dazultra2000:
Just tried and it's made no difference for me. Am gonna try another ROM and see how that goes just in case that's the problem. Humph!
[Desire HD General] dazultra2000:
Nope.

Think my GPS is fried. Even with a brand new flash cover I get 0 satellites. Tried new ROM, New radio, nothing works :(
[Desire HD General] TylerDurben:
Did u tryed the gps status apk?

Otherwise you can try the faster fix apk :-D
[Desire HD General] Weasel-cz:
Hey..would like to try this guide but cannot see the picture for step 2..did I miss something?

My gps is just piece of ****. I tried and changed flash cover but it is not working again. Really need to do something with it :)

Thank you..
[Desire HD General] dazultra2000:
Yeah I tried GPS status and test. I have tried the faster fix apk too. I honestly think my GPS is fried :(
[Desire HD General] TylerDurben:
Try this one ;)
[Desire HD General] jasperduijn:
After trying 3 different wires it finnaly works perfect!

Thanks alot for the tip :)
[Desire HD General] daedric:
Offtopic but related.

Anyone has severe gps signal loss, to the point of no signal, with unbranded covers ?

I tried a generic tpu, a plastic one that only covered the back and sides, and nothing.

Either no signal, or close to no signal.
[Desire HD General] dazultra2000:
What sort of wire should we be using? Multistrand? Single core? What gauge?
[Desire HD General] Pepppito:
+1
[Desire HD General] christeohlg:
what type of wire can use ???
[Desire HD General] TylerDurben:
After fixing some devices i am using a single core wire 0,8 mm witch works verry good
[Desire HD General] pooganes:
I enyo that all of you like this work but this was Copy and Paste from a other forum. NeXT times, it would be nice if you could call my name and the forum where you found it, because it is MY PICTURE MY IDEA...made in Germany!... still nice that you like it, but thanks goes to me :-)
[Desire HD General] skystealth:
Can i use the HTC earpiece wire?
[Desire HD General] craze96:
your name and forum is listed under his banner

"Big THX goes to pooganes for sharing his idea on Andropit"
[Desire HD General] TylerDurben:
I think its better to take a single core wire:-D
[Desire HD General] captaineos:
I have NO hardware hacks and get literally perfect GPS performance here in Australia. These screenshots show 1m accuracy in both GPS Status and Maps.

Only thing I did was use fasterfix from the market and set it to my region (Australia).

Tonight the sky was perfect, no pollution here (ever) and no clouds so may be that helps with getting the GPS accuracy so tight.

1st post so be kind.
[Desire HD General] kgpp2293:
That is insane, best iv ever gotten without hardware hack is 10 satellites indoors accurate to 10m and I'm under a tin roof, never rreally tested outside on a clear night / day lol
[Desire HD General] Kellicros:
my GPS is dodgy, sometimes i got a fix in a minute or so and sometime it gets no fix at all on my 30km drive home even with mobile data on. It is weird, tried tons of software related methods but no help at all.

A question tho, can we just use some solders to thicken/improve the contacts? or that the original antenna is completely hopeless? I hadn't got time to go out looking for suitable cable, and it is easier this way too, just wondering.
[Desire HD General] JurieDHD:
My GPS signal was great when I got the phone, but recently it refused to lock on. After googling it like crazy I found a post that suggested opening the flash cover(I used a guitar pic, worked like a charm) and cleaning the contacts and springs.

This didnt really work for me, so I soldered a small 2 wire plug I got out of a old handset to the springs, and the other end of the plug to the contacts on the flash cover. I was very careful not to melt the pathetic excuse of what HTC calls a contact clear off the plastic flash cover, with a little patience and a lot of time I managed to solder the wires onto the contacts.

Now I can disconnect the plug and reconnect whenever I need to, and I get a lock within a minute with only 5m error.
[Desire HD General] BenRoark:
I clicked on this thread thinking that it contained a hardware fix for GPS that would take 2 seconds to implement... as per the thread title.

Bummer. ;-)
[Desire HD General] reg.smith:
I tried soldering a 4.6cm length of wire to the internal contacts and it has worked wonders..the 4.6cm came from a forum article I read last week and is actually a good length to fit inside/under the flash cover.

I have gone from very flakey gps reception (it took an hour last week to get a lock) to taking literally a few seconds - the snr figures are typically now in the high 20's to mid 30's, and even the odd 40 for the occasional satellite. It has totally transformed the gps for the better (my wife has a wildfire s and my desire HD gps is almost as good as that now..perhaps it just tracks a couple of satellites less)
[Desire HD General] Kellicros:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/45881470@N06/5743864674/in/set-72157626706509210/

lol, i found this link from the youtube video in the first post, for those who do not want to mess with the board you may try this, just put some solder on the contacts attached to the flash cap, i got 9 fix almost instantly in my room near a window, before this I can hardly get 1 locked sat in the same spot. Will do some testing outdoor tomorrow.
[Desire HD General] CodeJACK:
So this works then? great, ill give it a shot.

Could the OP please add a poll to this thread that lists the number of people that had success against those that it did not work with?
[Desire HD General] paccin:
GPS on DHD

For me the problem with the GPS on my DHD is that it NEVER shows me the location where I am,but in a distance between 800-1000m and even more...can`t trust this phone to locate me!

It is also interesting,why it pushes me to use a wifi for a better location?(on wifi normally we know where we are)

Is it not the GPS antenna the one witch have to do the job???
[Desire HD General] tpmonteiro:
Worked Perfectly! Thank you very much! :)))

Biggest trouble was really opening/closing the cover, but eventually worked :)
[Desire HD General] CodeJACK:
Ok, so I did this another way to try limit the potential damage I could have done to the phone by soldering directly to it.

This worked for me...

Thanks for the tip!

Will test this while moving too. Without this mod, it was impossible to get a sat while in motion.
[Desire HD General] exodbalzac:
hy. im from Spain . i used a copper single core wire ( from an internet cable modem ).

getting 8 satellites from 8 ( rainy sky ) with a accuracy of only 3 meters in only 10 seconds . use faster fix too (to change the server for europe ). thanks TylerDurben
[Desire HD General] waits:
Thanks! (also to pooganes for sharing his idea on Andropit)

Combining all replies I decided to put some solder on the two contacts of the cover (not on the HD board: the cover can be replaced easily and cheap). Just for a better contact. I did not attach an antenna wire.

A bad contact might be the only reason for GPS reception problems. Soldering an antenna wire solves this, but only because of the solder, not because of the wire?

This solved my GPS reception problem. I will do some tests in the next days, and post my findings.

[Edit, 2 days later, after some testing] GPS reception is fine now. GPS fix after less than 10 seconds (when restarting a GPS app on the same location) ; 10-40 seconds (when restarting at a different location, 20-60 km away from the last use). Accuracy is better than 10 meter. Time wil tell if this solution is long-lasting. I think so, the solder is much softer, which makes the contact area larger, and the distance between the springs on the mobo and the contacts on the cover is reduced with about 1 mm.

So, problem solved, at last. No nostalgic feelings for my old Nokia 5800 (perfect GPS reception with the nice free Nokia maps app) anymore!
[Desire HD General] bryanlim05:
Well I did the same as you. I figured soldering onto a part that can be replaced was better than onto the mobo. So I put a solder blob on the connectors on the antenna and this seems to have fixed my gps problems =D

Thank you for this thread and all the info in it
[Desire HD General] rosswaa:
Basically the dhd has a really badly designed antenna, the main reason it fails is the flash cover which has the antenna build into it and connects through 2 prongs which sit on the little gold springs on the mainboard

after a while the connection slightly fails which leads to really bad gps signal

applying a blob of solder to the flash cover works but not for very long as the problem will happen again

whilst soldering a wire from point to point on the mainboard helps but as soon as you put the cover back on the original antenna seems to block the signal quite alot to the new wire thats been soldered into place, most will not notice this because when they solder to the mainboard it makes the connection to the flash cover alot more solid and both antennas work together to get a really good signal

i soldered a wire only to the right side on the mainboard, drilled a little hole and when i want to use gps just pull the little antenna out and it works a treat

i dont recommend this though as its ugly as hell

i guess ill have to find a way to remove the flash cover antenna so it doesnt block the signal to the one inside and resolder it
[Desire HD General] Leozaors:
gsm and wifi

wow! nice mod!

gps its ok now!

but, we cam do the same think on the others anntenas? to give bether wifi and gsm signal?

im refer to a back dor anntena ( closer to a SIM / micro sd card) and the side door (closer to de volume up and volume down butons)

the wireless signal is too bad as a gps signal,.

sorry for the english!

thankx form Brazilian DHD user!
[Desire HD General] dicko1975:
Anyone tried recoating the DHD's antenna connections (on the removable flash cover) using some conductive silver paint?
[Desire HD General] waits:
The way to recoat is to put a little blob of solder -using a soldering iron- on the contacts. Be careful not to overheat the contacts. The underlying plastic might melt.
[Desire HD General] dicko1975:
That's why I ask about using conductive silver paint. It dries in about 20mins, meaning you could quickly build up a few layers without damaging the antenna.
[Desire HD General] Nasobem:
Interesting question, Leozaors. I'd be interested in that too. wifi and gsm is too weak i think. Does anybody have a solution for this?

greetings
[Desire HD General] TylerDurben:
could be intresting, any information about that for now?

atm im have no time to have a look to it.

found a new intresting toy to play *smiles

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1387105
[Desire HD General] robrauy:
Works brilliantly. Was about to replace my Desire HD as the gps thing was really annoying. After the mod I get a lock in less than 10 seconds and 10 satellites as well.

Rob
[Desire HD General] eryk4381:
What about just dropping a few large dots of solder on the contact points on the actual antenna? Then when the case is put back on it will have more of a base for the pins to touch.
[Desire HD General] shad0wboss:
i'm not good at chemistry since it's not even my subject studied but doesn't soldering uses a different metal than the one in the wire? I mean, conductivity can be different if they are two different metals..

Again i can be wrong here.
[Desire HD General] eryk4381:
Yes you are correct. It does have different metal. But using it to affix the extra wire would be using the same flow of electricity through that since you'd be using that solder to attach it. These "gold" supposed contact points are very fragile at best and out of all that I think they are the biggest weakness in that link.
[Desire HD General] AlgoJerViA:
I first tried to only apply solder on the contacts of the antenna part but if anything it made it worse so then I put a wire in and it's a great success. :)
[Desire HD General] Akida:
Soldering the contacts

Hey guys, I thought I'd share my experience.

Of late I was getting poor to no signal/lock on my gps so after looking around I found the gps.conf fix to get AU gps servers which significantly improved my signal and lock times. I calibrated my battery immediately after using this fix. To drain my battery I left the gps on with screen locked on. After about 30 mins I realised that I had lost signal. I tried to reconfigure the gps.conf to no avail. I then removed and reseated the flash housing. This gave me a signal but it was still poor and intermitant. I went through with all the other apps resetting my AGPS and Syncing my time with time servers but this didn't help much. Finally I found this thread. Not having spare wire, I soldered the surface of the contacts on the flash housing. I actually melted one of the contacts off (oops). After soldering the contact back on (real dodge) I put the housing back on my phone and tried my gps.

Before soldering the contacts I couldn't get a single sat with >=30 signal, afterwards I managed to get 1-4 >30 signals whilst indoors. The accuracy improved from 20meters to 5meters while indoors and down to 3m while outdoors. Signal locks lightning fast compared to before. Looking outside it is overcast and patchy and I was standing under a big tree while getting my readings.

Guys, either replace your flash housing, reinforce your contacts (more carefully than I did) or get some 0.8 solid wire in there.

P.S. To the people who are complaining about how difficult it is to remove the flash housing: My phone has taken a beating so I wasnt worried about the light cosmetic damage that the following method causes.

Stick a stanley blade into the edge of the flash housing by the camera and gently pry it up, then do the same on the bottom edge and it will come out easily.

To get it back in put in the bottom tab and the left bottom corner first, then seat the rest of the left hand side. After that you just have to gently apply pressure to the flash housing whilst carfully pushing the clips on the top side and camera side one at a time and it clicks into place. Give it a squeeze to make sure it has fully seated and you're done.

I give this Mod an A+ considering I couldn't find anything else like it. Next I'd like to find out if that round thing on the board next to the gps tabs is some sort of antenna connection and if we can hook up a proper gps antenna to it.

Many thanks to all involved including pooganes, TylerDurben and the authors of the other applications and methods mentioned above
[Desire HD General] samotronta05:
Did this hack to my DHD last night.

I used 0.8mm magnet wire and made it a bit longer and also a bit more angular than shown in the original pictures.

Now i can lock on to ten satellites form inside my house within 15 seconds.

Thanks for this awesome idea.
[Desire HD General] ashboe:
This seems like a really good fix to such a common problem, are there any 'bits and pieces' near to the contacts which could be damaged by solder?
[Desire HD General] samotronta05:
Well there some parts you could damage while soldering, however if you don't try to do this using a blowtorch it is really easy to accomplish.

The worst part is the dis-/assembly of the phone.
[Desire HD General] ashboe:
Thanks - I will give this a go tonight, then co-pilot can finally work as it is supposed to!
[Desire HD General] Flacid Monkey:
I did mine, took 20 seconds and then instant GPS!

Good guide, even if it is just 1 wire point to point. A very useful and needed mod for quite a few DHD users!
[Desire HD General] Hunt3r.j2:
The ideal length of the wire should be about 4.76 cm.
[Desire HD General] huggy2008:
Hello,

I cleaned and polished my contacs a half year ago and it was runing better. During this I was als thinking about soldering. Th ideal length shoul be depend on the wave length of the of the signal (frequency). I will test it with isolated copperwire (for transformer or coiles) and maybe some more rounds of the wire to get a higher signal. Is the correct length realy 4,76cm ?

best regards huggy
[Desire HD General] samotronta05:
The L1 frequency is 1575,42MHz.

Lambda is 1575,42MHz / c=190,29mm, 1/4 Lambda is then 47,5725mm, so it's correct.

However since you don't know the rest of the RF-circuit, ~47,6mm needn't to be the optimal length.
[Desire HD General] Hunt3r.j2:
So apparently this person provides evidence confirming that about 4.6cm wire will solve it.

Anyone else willing to confirm?
[Desire HD General] hurrycane90:
i tried it this morning, and i can say only wonderful! less than 10 sec outside to lock 7 sat.. :O
[Desire HD General] Flacid Monkey:
Any length will do, only needs a loop small enough to fit under the cover.

Your not controlling a goldeneye satellite