yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Kilack:
Yeah... Clove have outstanding customer service but they are caught in the middle on this one. Samsung seem to be just spouting out "a fix is coming" in every direction now but no real dates or anything.

At least it is looking like it should be something they can solve rather than a hardware fault. The question is just when they decide to do it. I imagine Froyo is taking a bit of their attention right now, one would think they would try and roll out the fixes etc at the same time though but who knows..

ps but jg6??? are they serious???, seems a bit scary if samsung think that fixes things...
[Galaxy S I9000 General] pepitodequetequejas:
Korean SGS GPS hardware is diferent (qualcomm), but european (USA) BCM4751 is also a good GPS unit.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Beards:
When I last spoke with Chris Love at Clove he was clearly 'frustrated' with Samsung.

Trouble is, you are at the mercy of Samsung, a company I find utterly appalling in their customer satisfaction.... but that is another story.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] sjdean:
Ok, I've compared the NMEA reports and the MyTracks results. Not good. Looks like the underlying NMEA information is flying off the handle too.

Not good.

Looks like the NMEA information is wrong too:

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=U...77579,-1.794891&spn=0.005594,0.01929&t=h&z=16

(Blue Squares indicate NMEA positioning, Blue Track is MyTrack)

Somewhat good news in other regards however, there are times NMEA reports show 10 satellite fixes, but the SGS still only reports on 8.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] sjdean:
It's also a bit alarming when we see references in Experts Exchange asking programming questions with relation to the 4751 chip:

http://www.experts-exchange.com/Programming/Languages/Scripting/Perl/Q_26274794.html
[Galaxy S I9000 General] nicoloco:
Just a quick question ... for the samsung galaxy does it worth ot read the following thread ?

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=732030

I just changd the settings to what is proposed in the first page and I did the same run of 7k I did last week.

Last week the mytrack was hideous but at least I had a fix. With the new settings I realized at the end that the gps was still at the initial position ...40 minute later !!

So if I wonder if it worth to read all the thread and see if they are different settings proposed ... or if it won't change anything

Thanks
[Galaxy S I9000 General] sjdean:
Looks like the 4751 isn't the only chip having problems. Meet the two previous chips used in the iPhone 4 and 3G - both Broadcom models.

Fast fix, but useless tracking. suggested the problem is the antenna.

http://www.gpspassion.com/forumsen/topic.asp?topic_id=135768
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Beowulf_pt:
That's some nasty tracking too. The worse on Android in these cases is that you can't use external bluetooth GPS devices so we're stuck with it. Antenna design probably can't be improved in any way so lets hope some firmware work might improve things a bit.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] larryccf:
someone identified that socket next to the sim card / above the battery as a GPS MMCX socket for an optional antenna - wonder if someone at sammy anticipated this and added the feature in this event GPS problems became an issue

i followed the link sometime back the poster provided and t he damn things aren't $6 with a 3 metre cable

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=718233&page=2

in case your's is covered, on my vibrant there's a round rubber plug that can be popped out with a small jeweler's screwdriver (with a 2MM blade)

the rubber plug is on the far left just under the beveled corner on the sim car - those arrows are from my asking if that pc of black tape on my vibrant was a covering over the GPS antenna, given the socket near it's left end was identified as a GPS socket
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Beowulf_pt:
Not as good as a dedicated external BT device but I guess $6 for a 1.5 GHz antenna wouldn't hurt when you need really better tracking. In fact you can get them on ebay for around 4€ now.

The question is, would it help the Samsung much without firmware/driver work? Probably not :cool:
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Beards:
Maybe we can start asking what version we are running the Galaxy S on.

I'm running mine on a stock ROM, no changes whatsoever and I have the GPS problems.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] hmj2k3:
I have not tested with the stock firmware but today I used the samsung navigation application and worked fine with firmware JF5.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Tachikoma_kun:
I'm on JF3

Just ran the satellite checker app and I can get 5 satellites in my living room, whereas my HTC Touch HD couldn't find one. Outside I get another 2, and it gives me 13.6ft accuracy overall. Averages 3-5 used out of 7-odd, but it does randomly spazz out and say accuracy = 600ft for a fraction of a second.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] TravUK:
Been running tests all evening, and its a mess. The Galaxy just wont hold a stable signal on any satellite, so position bounces between 30 to 500ft. The HTC HD and HD2 have consistent stable signals. Even fired up my old Dell Axim, and even that works properly.

*sigh*

I'm on firmware version XXJF3, which as I understand it is the only firmware released on UK phones.

I can see what the problem is clear as day. The phone will only lock on a satellite if its signal strength holds above 22 or so and since they all bounce between 12 to 28, it never maintains a consistent signal.

I'm not sure if we make the GPS chip inside the Galaxy S, we make a lot of them but I'll see if I can get someone on the phone on monday and get their take on it all.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Pika007:
Really?

When i checked before i got a lock on 3 sattelites with signal between 17-19

I think it's a software problem rather than a hardware one.

The device does see enough sattelites, with strong enough signal, just usually doesn't even try to lock on them.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] TravUK:
Can you post a pic from GPS Test, with the phone locking on satellites below 20.

Thanks.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Seifer1975:
Same problem here. GPS will not lock on to satellites with signal strength less than 22.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] bakalamaka:
I have flashed the JF5 firmware on my phone and the GPS quality improved drastically. The GSP sensor is still kind of picky at times, but at least the accuracy jumps are history.

P.S. The firmware was never officially released — I got mine from samsung firmwares website, these guys have some connections to samsung employees and thus get their hands on unreleased firmware.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] ilbulgaro89:
4 me GPS is Great! It finds me also when i was in my room at home...xD
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Beards:
This will be interesting....

Hope you manage to get through Mark.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] TravUK:
To be sure is working you need to use something like GPS Test. If you just run maps it will use cell towers and wifi too. So may look like its working better than it really is.

Although for every one of us with a problem, there seems to be another with GPS working fine.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Beards:
Agree.... The GPSTest app is great in what it does...... just a shame the Galaxy S performs nowhere near as good as my HD2 and the older HD.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] pinoypower:
mine is working great. It finds me in no time. The navigation is a lot smoother than my Tomtom XL Live, I don't like the voice though. Can this be changed at all? Can't find an option to do this....
[Galaxy S I9000 General] TravUK:
Actually, from the spec's it does look like one of ours, namely the InCrystal 20751, with GPS/BT3/FM support. So anything I did learn I wouldnt be able to share anyway.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Pika007:
Will do as soon as i manage to get such a lock again.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] sjdean:
It's not 22, the Samsung Galaxy S won't lock onto anything of 20 SnR or below unlike HTC Desire/G1 etc.

If you see a grey bar in "GPS Test", that is not a lock on, that is just "I can see this satellite".

The current XXJF3 software seems intent on only using upto 8 satellites, even though you may see 11 all with a good signal, you will only ever use 8.

I wonder if this is half of the problem, it cannot use all the satellites it sees, so when there's a bad signal from a couple in one direction, you lose your lock and it has to try to work frantically to establish a lock elsewhere.

Does XXJF5 allow a lock to more than 8 satellites? Does it open up use to Signal Strength of 20 or below?
[Galaxy S I9000 General] peterlan:
Not on my phone. The GPS is still useless.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] sjdean:
For those whose GPS is working fine, we need to know I think what your baseband version is, and whether you rebooted your phone prior?

I seem to get a better signal after a reboot. Better, but not perfect.

I must admit as well, you need to walk around the block and see what happens.

Although I think those of us with GPS problems will see problems when stationery, sometimes, you do get a strong lock on. But walk around a bit, and the thing gets confused. If you take a look at the Sky Map or Satellite Position maps in GPS Test et al, you will the direction "North" bounce around all over the place.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] TravUK:
Hmm, this is interesting. Have just tried it again, and now it can see 8 and locks to 8, but the weather has changed in the past couple of hours as the temperature has dropped and its clouded over, so from I have just seen, I wonder if atmospherics have something to do with it.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] SgtJoe86:
I too am facing some problem with getting a proper GPS lockon. Even after finding an open spot and spending couple of minutes searching for my destination, the phone still encounters problem getting a proper lockon. Sometimes it took a restart of the navigation app and turning off and on of the GPS receiver before it can finally get proper lock on the satellites.

Does it got anything to do with the phone design or firmware issue?
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Beowulf_pt:
I see you added the photo now. I do have such an antenna (used with my Holux BT GPS) but unfortunately I do not have the Samsung to see how well it improves things. The location of the socket doesn't seem very practical if you need to use the antenna often but at least it has one (my Nokia E72 doesn't).
[Galaxy S I9000 General] appelflap:
I only see blue squares on google maps.

Concerning the accuracy of the blue squares: is it really that bad? Most of the time it is tracking you on the road. Sometimes you seem to drive through some houses and the forest :) but isn't that an acceptable error (I measured an error average of 22 m. there) . Ok, I see 2 very extreme jumps (did you loose you're fix there), but overall it is surely good enough for a vector based navigation program with some good prediction algorithms.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] larryccf:
i originally thought it was a radio antenna for use similiar to a sony ericsson phone i had - it had a plug in the rear case cover that you could remove, and the sony ericsson car holder had the male prong built in so that when you dropped the phone in, it would automtically connect the phone to the option antenna

wouldn't be difficult to do the same here but for GPS, but i didn't realize the antenna needed it's own driver

but still, maybe samsung had this in mind, ie a modified backplate, and a car holder with similiar setup
[Galaxy S I9000 General] boomerbubba:
I see only blue squares, too. I do agree with sjdean that the tracking there is not good. Not only are there areas where it wanders away grossly, the track along the road is pretty far off-road in too many places. My trusty old G1 does much better, showing me not only on the road, but in the right lane.

BTW, I have corresponded with the developor of GPS NMEA Monitor (and of GPS Test) who was very helpful. He is investigating my problem running the NMEA utility on my Vibrant. Interesting that it runs for you. I assume on a Galaxy I9000?

Interestingly, he tutored me a bit on what is happening under the covers. In the Android programming interface there are indeed different programming hooks for the NMEA output and for the other GPS sensor data outputs:

I wonder if these different Android listeners are being affected differently (or the same) by the Broadcom driver, which I assume is running at a lower level.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] appelflap:
I agree it is far from perfect, but at least the data are useable for a decent navigation program. I think that with this kind of data it passes with ease a navigation test. But it isn't useable for "offroad" tracking, far from that.

Yes, a Galaxy I900 S... I'm very curious about the cause of your problem.

Aha, I thought so, but now I know for sure, I'm very interested to see what the difference is between what the NMEA listener generates and the jupiter log file.

I'm going to write a program to do some testing with the different listeners. One thing I want to check is if the moments the GPS Status listener and the Location listener recieve their data are in sync with the nmea output (raw and from the NMEA listener). With other words if the events that triggers the listeners are correct. Also, I want to check what the best time and distance is between different GPS measurements.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] larryccf:
suspect this is going to affect samplings taken over the next couple days

http://www.engadget.com/2010/08/03/violent-sun-throws-fit-massive-blast-of-plasma-to-hit-earth-tom/
[Galaxy S I9000 General] appelflap:
lol

Maybe the Galaxy has a GPS designed to travel through the Galaxy and will it be very accurate in these kind of circumstances. We'll see, if we still exist after tomorrow that is.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Beowulf_pt:
Well the Samsung's GPS has already been proven to be quite effective during high-speed navigation. especially in a fairly straight line.

Problems start only when you eventually land your ship or even beam yourself down to surface and try to do some more interplanetary geocaching. That's when your cheap ass 3.99€ GPS antenna bought at Earth's Ebay might come in handy - either that or your copilot's HTC Desire.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] ghosty_uk:
yes but it was only at the start, i checked the whole route (bare in mind i have never used my tracks before), and althought the start was a mess (just outside my house, then for about 750 yrds round the side roads), when i hit a main road it got considerbly more accurate, in fact it did not glich once, it even tracked round a mini roundabout, if someone can tell me how to post the data ill be more than happy to.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] sjdean:
Let me clarify.

Firstly we see in the NMEA logs than sometimes it does achieve ten satellite fixes, but when reported in Android in programs like GPS Test, the accuracy only ever reaches at minimum 16.4ft and never fixes onto more then eight satellites.

This gave us some hope that maybe something else was going on so that whatever was reported to Android in terms of positioning was different to raw data and we only had to rely on Samsung to get everything sorted out.

But unfortunately, the NMEA info is out too.

For those curious, I have links to both the NMEA data track, and the MyTracks log:

NMEA

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=U...=52.474338,-1.799355&spn=0.0149,0.045319&z=15

MyTracks

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=U...2.476011,-1.793132&spn=0.014899,0.045319&z=15
[Galaxy S I9000 General] ghosty_uk:
ok i have no idea how to post my my-tracks file, but from the basic under standing of maps and roads, the nmea data seems pretty spot on, aside the odd jump here or there.

what im now thinking is althought i dont know andriod tooo well (came from windows mobile), looking at it from mearly a person interested in programming (doing a degree in it atm) that it is an interface issue not a hardware issue.

i sumise it is more how the software interacts with the hardware that is af fault, as looking over this topic, and all the raw log files ect, the hardware is seeing the satalites ok, it just the software dont seem to be able to read the data the hardware is outputting correctly.

i have just put a silicone case on my SGS (dont want it to get scratched) and even with that on i get a good clear gps fix in lnb test and gps test (i paid for the plus version as i like the HUD functionality).
[Galaxy S I9000 General] sjdean:
The huge problem I see is that it is intermittent. Fine one day, bad the next three weeks. Plus the map of the NMEA data was as off as the track in MyTracks, so I don't think either are particularly great. I've seen tracks that have been absolutely spot on, and HTC Desires are perfect.

In terms of uploading your map though from MyTracks...

1) Press the menu button and go to "Tracks" to show your saved tracks.

2) Select the track you want to upload

3) When the track is loaded, press the down arrow button in the bottom right corner, and you'll see a "Send to Google" option

4) Select to upload to Google My Maps, and choose Create a New map (I recommend).

5) Once uploaded, log into maps.google.com with your google name and password.

6) Click on "My Maps" top left, and you should see the list of tracks you've uploaded. Select your track...

7) Then there is an option top right to "Link", where it gives you a link you can paste here.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Kilack:
Hi,

I was all hopeful yesterday that we were onto something with the NMEA data and that it was accurate and so we were just looking at a software issue. Now you burst my bubble.

Interesting seeing the tracks from the iphone that you posted, very similar tracking there. I was reading an article the other day that was saying tomtom are selling a lot of GPS car kits for the iphone, almost one to one with the software they are selling , I can see why now hehe.

They then go on to say that the chipset is a good one and the bad data is probably caused by lack of antenna and rf interference from other parts of the phone etc as if that is all one can expect from a gps in a phone.

So why do the HTC phones do so well? do they have an antenna? (and also curious what chipset htc used?)

We are back at square one then really, could be hardware again and now likely looking at the results of the iphone using a very similar GPS chipset.

Road navigation seems mostly useable to me, sometimes it might jump a street etc, i mean its pretty shocking but still useable...
[Galaxy S I9000 General] boomerbubba:
Yes, I see that. :-(

The same sort of interpolation algorithms seem to be in play in your examples. Do I presume correctly that the places with the gross errors -- the intersections of Queens Rd & Meadway, and of E Meadway & Tile Cross -- were places where traffic was stopped? That would fit the pattern of my own experience on the U.S. Vibrant using My Track. Rapid driving seems to enable some buffering, interpolating, etc., and that post-processing creates a smoothed track along straight or gently curving roads decently while in motion. But standing still or walking, the coordinates go haywire easily.

Is this sort of post-processing of raw data going on within the Broadcom chip or its driver? Or is it something Samsung is doing in its own firmware? Both would seem to be operating at a level below the Android programming interface.

The fact the the NMEA output reflects these interpolation artifacts is fishy. Might that not be a property of the Broadcom chip itself?
[Galaxy S I9000 General] sjdean:
I think HTC Desire has Qualcomm MSM7201A gpsOne
[Galaxy S I9000 General] jmreed97:
Do you have a link for that article?
[Galaxy S I9000 General] Kilack:
Why yes I do!, I was actually googling "android tomtom" when I found it, was checking if there was any news on tomtom coming over to android but they are still refusing to comment on that issue...

http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/31768/tomtom-android-ipad-versions-question

""We can't answer that question," was the reply from senior VP of marketing for TomTom America when Pocket-lint asked him whether an Android app was on the cards in the future."

"Furthermore the company also confirmed that it has seen a massive uptake in the car kit that not only cradles the iPhone in the car but also boosts the GPS signal.

"Damn near one to one sales" was the quote from Tom Murray."

Ahh maybe you were meaning the other part where I was talking about the antenna issues with the galaxy, I just read that from the link that simon posted. I think I managed to combine the two sites in my head :). I have read so many GPS articles these days, it is hard to keep track of them all.

http://www.gpspassion.com/forumsen/topic.asp?topic_id=135768
[Galaxy S I9000 General] sjdean:
I was stationary about 30 seconds at Queens Road and Meadway. Im just reviewing the map again and I can see it was fine until just after the roundabout at Shirley Road and Olton Blvd when it appears to lose signal. Then up Yardley Road, it just starts making things up and has me driving in a cemetary.

Those points were both normal driving at around 30mph. The bit at East Meadway was also 30mph... But still good thinking there.

I can live with a few glitches. I can live with the slight divot at Tile Cross Road/East Meadway. What I don't enjoy seeing is where it thinks Im driving 10 metres to the side of the road along the entire road or cutting through a cemetery. I don't like those funny loops it puts in. Quite bizarre.

For me I think I get the most issues usually when I turn a corner.

Ironically, this is probably one of the most accurate maps I've had.

Clearly I think Samsung is doing something in the interpretion of accuracy and satellite fixes. But I think Broadcom are responsible for the location information as indicated in the raw NMEA data.
[Galaxy S I9000 General] boomerbubba:
I had not read that link myself. Disheartening, because of the implication that the innacuracies are inherent in the hardward design and form factor of the phone. The standard of "GPS performance about as good as the famously weak iPhone 3 but not as good as iPhone 4" was not what I was aiming for as a customer.

It would be interesting to see such benchmark track comparisons of the Samsung Galaxy S models head-to-head with the Apple products.

My own benchmark standard has been the performance of my old G1, the very first Android phone ever sold. It has excellent GPS performance, and outperformed my Samsung Vibrant over both driving and walking courses -- especially walking.

Driving Test.

Walking Test.

(Edited to fix links)

Is this as good as it gets for this Samsung design?
[Galaxy S I9000 General] sjdean:
Is this as good as it gets? We still don't know. It's kooky. It works half the time, doesn't work the rest.

Whether this means that there's a faulty chip that's burning out (probably due to the heat from the screen or when recharging), or a bad aerial, or just a programming bug in driver whether Broadcom or Samsung, we don't fully know.

Every day I investigate I come up with a bit of new information suggesting something else.

Certainly the GPS receiver can see and fix 10 satellites, so that probably isn't the problem.

Im going to try another update tomorrow. I've been noticing people move /data/data or something elsewhere.

Thing is, there's a load of files under /data/gps including control pipes and sockets which will be used for something. Im gonna move those to either the /dbdata or /system and create a symlink for /data/gps and see if it works better.

Maybe it is just a speed issue with the file system under /data.

Cya

Simon
[Galaxy S I9000 General] larryccf:
don't know if this will have any bearing but i'll throw it out there as earlier you guys were commenting about other nav programs interfering

on the tmobile forum, someone posted that telenav gps is running in the background, even though it doesn't show to be, he pulled up another management app that indicated it was

he suggested an app called "startup auditor" to dis-able it

if you guys are rooted, i assume you've eliminated that program, but in case