yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Vibrant General] Timpaa:
Hey Guys, Im on the SGS, and I have a problem. I did the fix where I bent the connector up, but now my GPS isn't working at all. When I turn on GPS in the drop down menu/in settings then Ill get the small icon blinking twice, then it disappears. It still says that the GPS is turned on, but I get no positioning at all, and in GPS Test it shows nothing at all, as if there are no satellites. I didnt break anything, bend the contact and snap it or any other noticeable "trauma"... Im on Darkys 9.1 Rom, GPS Status shows nothing at all. Ive wiped the GPS data with SGS tools. Im at a loss and any help would be appreciated, no matter how insignificant you might think it is! I did a factory reset from Darkys, still no luck. Its completely dead. How the hell is that possible?! I was poking around where i shouldn't have, no doubt.

Cheers from Sweden, Tim
[Vibrant General] makulais:
additional for fix

might want to try this on top of your contact also. expensive, but if a group banded together...

wwwdotgoldplatingdotcom go to pcb section.

sorry about the subterfuge, don't have enough posts on here yet for them to allow me to post outside this forum.
[Vibrant General] RPGbig:
So if I take my phone to tmo and its made before that date and the gps doesnt work, they are obiligated to replace it? I also have the $5.99 a month warrenty.
[Vibrant General] nacron:
I think I may have done something bad when I lifted all the pins. I will sometimes loose 3g connectivity and wifi will error out sometimes and I have to restart the phone to get it working again.
[Vibrant General] xpcomputers:
It is showing your speed in km/h rather than miles/h (mph). Not sure how to change it though

However, you can be reassured by the accuracy as 57 km/h x 0.62 = about 35mph (so spot on!)

Hope someone knows how to switch it for you.

Mike
[Vibrant General] Pig Vomit:
So I see all these posts about GPS, including this one, which I read with interest. Everyone is frustrated and trying to help. GPS continues to be a problem to this day.

But, no matter what, for me it always comes down to this: I can run Google maps, and sometimes GPS won't lock. In these situations, I run Samsung GPS Restore, and sometimes this works, sometimes it doesn't. However, running GPS Restore, and then rebooting the phone, GPS works and locks quickly EVERY SINGLE TIME. As such, I strongly feel that this is a software issue alone. Samsung just hasn't put the proper effort into fixing this.

Perhaps a new poll would help....polling only those who did the GPS hardware fix and have lived with it for 30 days or more....asking whether there was any long-term difference.

Never again Samsung. By the time my contract runs out, HTC will have released phones with displays at least as good as Vibrant. I'm going with a company that is much more responsive to customer feedback, updates software in a timely manner, and generally releases phones without major glitches. LG? Moto? Seems like pretty much everyone is better than Sammy overall.

BTW....isn't it about time you unlock Kies to work with Vibrant and sync with Outlook?
[Vibrant General] theratdude64:
That's a good idea lol... ya know you may be right lol. Tis my wife's phone so next time I see it I'll check into that.

I used to have a truck with oversized tires, and it seemed to be of by a percentage just like my speedometer was so I was thinking more in those terms lol

I sucessfully used it yesterday to navigate to somewhere I knew just to test and it seemed to be off by about half a block.
[Vibrant General] theratdude64:
Agreed. This vibrant is pretty awesome, but my main selling point is the screen. Overall I like my G2 more, and this GPS thing kinda tips the scales for me. We just got my wife the vibrant *From a friend that upgraded to MT4G* and my main reason for wanting to upgrade for her is to give her good GPS... fail, lol.
[Vibrant General] the3dman:
Holy S@*! It works!!!

My Vibrant Specs:

Manufacture Date: 07-09-2010

Rom: Stock OTKies KA7 with Root

Last time I was able to connect to 10 satellites - Never

Last time I was able to connect to any satellites - 1 month ago (I tried every Rom out there and all GPS settings for the last month but still have not been able to connect to even one satellite) My GPS had gotten progressively worse over the last 6 months until it did not work at all.

I then followed this guide and decided to go with the permanent method because I did not feel like ever breaking open this phone again, and I am pretty experienced at soldering. So I added a little solder to the contact put the phone back together, cleared the GPS settings, ran the GPS test and almost instantly 10 satellites connected with a 6 meter accuracy. I think I re-found the love for my vibrant! I did not even connect to satellites that fast when I first received the phone. I will test over the next few weeks and update you guys and gals, but so far everything is working great!!! Thanks to the OP and everyone who helped to make this guide and mod possible. Oh and thanks to Samsung for........ well maybe not them. Actually I really do like the phone but they could have done some more field testing before rushing to the market.
[Vibrant General] Mannymal:
Glad the solder fix worked well for you. I've been using it for a while now, and as far as hardware goes the GPS is working perfectly. Now hoping the software side will catch up. With Bionix V 1.2 I get a cold start lock in less than 10 seconds on GPS Test. But its still not good enough that I can simply open Google Maps and get a quick, accurate lock like on the iPhone. I have to use GPS Test first before Maps, but it works flawlessly then. Sometimes it shows me outside a road, but after a bit it'll be fine.
[Vibrant General] theratdude64:
I actually got mine working pretty decently last night, and used the app GPS HUD just fine... but when in maps it keeps showing the inaccuracy halo around the icon while riding around in a car, and would show me driving across yards, or really delayed from passing by streets ect. So its decent but still garbage for me
[Vibrant General] igorgomez:
Hello everybody!

I tried install GpsRestore via web AndroidMarket and failed. The Market says that: "this item is not avaliable on your carrier". I have a SGS Captivate, I live in Brazil and my carrier is TIM. I tried to install via SD card but Cappy is locked to installations outside the Android Market.

Any tips for this problem?
[Vibrant General] theratdude64:
Goto Settings -> Applications and Check "Unknown Sources" to install from the SD card as well as market. It took several attempts with the GPS Restore app, because it immediately wants to lock on to where you're at, and it refused to in my house. But I went and sat in my car last night and it seems to have done a decent job :)
[Vibrant General] igorgomez:
There is no such option in the settings menu. There are only four options: manage applications, services running, development and USB settings.
[Vibrant General] theratdude64:
hm, weird. maybe someone else can help heh, I've never not seen it there. My stock 1.6 Donut MyTouch 3G even had it :confused:
[Vibrant General] T313C0mun1s7:
You don't see it because:

Being in Brazil you are not in the US

Your carrier is not T-Mobile

These same two reasons is why you should not use the app. It would restore you to US/T-Mobile setting, which I am fairly sure may not work well for you.
[Vibrant General] tecjunkie:
I finally got the nerve to crack mine open. I just bent the contact up and buttoned it back together. So far I noticed a difference. I won't know the full effect until I get to work, that's where I get no reception with

this

phone.
[Vibrant General] theratdude64:
the OP says that you shouldn't have to if it's made in October, mines made in 10.06 but the GPS was totally useless. I've gotten good results after this mod and the Samsung GPS Restore utility.
[Vibrant General] T313C0mun1s7:
That was based on supposition on my part. Mine and my wife's vibrants (both made in September) have usable but questionable GPS. Reports coming in from others seemed to show that if it was made in September you had hit and miss chances of the GPS being decent, everyone reporting in with manufacturing dates prior to that had a large instance of issues, and people reporting in with units made in October or later (either because they purchased them later or got them as a replacement unit) were having very few instances of problems.

Based on that I made the assertion that they must have started making changes in September, and made a fix in late September early October. As reports continued to come in the pattern held, and it became a de-facto rule that if it was Manufactured in October or later you should be good.

Sorry if this did not hold true for you and I hope this fix brings you joy.
[Vibrant General] theratdude64:
I almost didn't do it because I figured hrm, October should be fine... but it's early October and the GPS was garbage so I gave it a shot. I swear the person in that video you posted has taken it apart already, because mine needed a LOT more convincing to open than that one :p But overall was not very scary. I've never opened an android device before but I've worked inside a lot of other stuff like this before.
[Vibrant General] KWKSLVR:
Oh no doubt. I've had mine apart a few times. It gets easier for sure.
[Vibrant General] theratdude64:
I dig the fact there's no warranty sticker to be broken lol. Though if they look into it, there's some nicks from prying it open. But, I bought mine used from a friend, no warranty to be had Haha
[Vibrant General] T313C0mun1s7:
Those stickers don't mean as much as you might think. When e-machines first came out and they were the only sub $1000 PCs to be had, I bought a half a dozen for a computer lab. Since they needed larger hard drives I planned to upgrade them when I received the lot. They all had a warranty void sticker on the back, so I called support and reamed them for locking the owner of a desktop PC out of simple upgrades like adding a hard drive, especially since they advertised the number of drive controllers in the stats. They assured me if I broke the sticker, and the thing that broke was normally covered by the warranty, the broken seal would be overlooked.

Since then I have found this policy to be more the norm than the exception. I believe that is also why those sticker are on the decline. I used to see them on everything in the late 1990's and early 2000's, but now they are quite rare.
[Vibrant General] alvinz:
Hey guys, hope to get some help/advices .... i tried to do the hardware fix and things went bad due to my stupidity, the whole chrome antenna pop out ... i mean the whole thing pops out from the board, its not broken .. so i used a super glue and stick it back in its position perfectly, but things went really bad, previously i was able to get a lock on 2 to 3 out of 6 satellites around my area but now it couldnt even detect, much less get a lock! ... please help and thanks in advance

note: i am using sgs which i got back in my home country, but i am now studying abroad, it would be a hassle to send half the globe back for warranty :(
[Vibrant General] DocMarc73:
Ehh.. but you didn't accidently isolate metal contact due to glueing, did you?
[Vibrant General] alvinz:
err ... i just glued it back without doing anything else, and the super glue i used was 'watery' based not those sticky type ... :confused:

should i take it out again and re-glue it? ... should i sand paper it?
[Vibrant General] T313C0mun1s7:
Ummm . . . I am not gonna touch this one, my head is gonna pop just looking at it. As soon as I start to think about how to reply I hear a very high pitch tone drilling into my soul.

Could somebody else please take this.
[Vibrant General] alvinz:
its ok .. i am hoping that someone which had similar problem and able to solve it would be able to give me some guides.. i am very very noob in electronics
[Vibrant General] Mannymal:
It's just too much, I dont think I'll open this thread again until a few pages have been added
[Vibrant General] T313C0mun1s7:
Ok, first of all please understand that I am not trying to be cruel, but the level of understanding you are displaying leads me to believe that you should not have been taking the battery cover off by yourself.

In electricity some materials are what we call conductors, others are insulators. The concept is similar to how some materials carry heat well and others don't, this is why your fry pan had a wooden handle. Try grabbing the metal part when it is hot and you will see what I mean.

If you picture a electrical wire the center has some kind of metal, usually copper, that is a good conductor. It is covered in some plastic material that is a good insulator, which is why you don't get shocked touching it and why it does not short out.

The super glue is much more like the plastic on the outside of the wire, or the wood on the handle than it is like the wire. It is a insulator.

Add to that the fact that the situation you describe is not possible. There is no way that those thin weak contacts would pop off at the solder joint and leave the contact unbroken. So you must be talking about something other than the GPS antenna connection, although I don't know what. Possibly the cable connection going to the bottom of the phone. However, then you would be complaining about not being able to make or receive calls rather than decreased GPS performance.

So either:

You are lying.

You are describing the situation in a tragically incorrect way.

You have so little understanding of what you are looking at that you are incapable if describing it.

In any case you should not have touched it to begin with because of your level of understanding of physics at a level so basic that I can not even conceive how you make it though the day on your own.

If you want help you are going to need to take several good pictures and annotate them pointing out what you think everything is and exactly what you did. Even at that I might suggest you find somebody that knows the difference between a conductor and a insulator and has the ability to look at the pictures in the OP and actually identify the same components in the phone to actually perform a fix for you.
[Vibrant General] alvinz:
the easiest description i can think of it by refering to the 4th picture/attachment in TS's post. The zoomed pic of the chrome antenna, the whole thing came off, thats it. Believe it or not, it is as simple as that. If u r curious to know how it came off, though embarrassed, i stupidly tried to bend the bottom part rather than just wat was instructed as this fix was so easy and i was like "wth, is this all?" then the next moment it came flying off.

I am noob in electronics as in handling it psychically, but theories and logical facts i think i quite know them well. Yes, super glue acts an insulator but it might depends on which type of super glue. I have encounter those thick sticky super glue and some which is just like water & dries up almost instantly without leaving much of the middle layer. But this is just my theory of the super glue, there r more things i might not know too. Anyway, thanks
[Vibrant General] YetisAreReal:
It is obvious you don't understand electricity or basic chemicals so if you want to fix your phone you need to listen to precise directions and learn basic soldering or better yet find an electronics repair shop to fix your phone for you. The voltages most electronic devices operate at are so low that even a thin layer of insulation (glue residue) will block voltage and thus break operation. That 'watery' super glue uses chemical bonding the same as that 'sticky' super glue and will break contact between conductors.

BEST BET: take it to a shop the level of skill needed to solder such a small piece is too much for most including people that can solder fairly well.
[Vibrant General] T313C0mun1s7:
Yes, this is about the best advise you can expect.

The contact is very tiny and you would need to practice soldering for a rather long time to gain the skill required to repair this correctly. Also, in order to remove the super glue you will need to use a solvent such as acetone, and it WILL eat away any plastic or soluble substances it touches. So you will want someone with a lot of experience to take care and get the glue removed correctly also.

All glue of the Superglue type is cyanoacrylate. This is true regardless of how watery or sticky it might be.

This problem is a poster child example of know what you are doing before you start, and it is why it is necessary for every dev to post a disclaimer for everything they do.
[Vibrant General] theratdude64:
I finally got my GPS is accurate with speedometer and elevation and stuff, but on maps its stuck about a block south :'( When driving east it's stuck half a block to the right, going south it's half a block forward.

Is there anything to do about that?
[Vibrant General] T313C0mun1s7:
Yes. You could try a different navigation app. Google Maps is notorious for being off and giving poor directions. They have added a HEL-UV-A lot of data in a very short period of time and it is impossible to human check all of that data. Companies that do maps/navigation as a primary product are naturally going to be better at it than ones that have it as one of there MANY products. Remember, Maps started out as just a good way to show off this new technology called AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML) that Google was working on.
[Vibrant General] theratdude64:
Any free ones?

I have played with ORUXMaps which has a way to use PC to rip maps off google,yahoo, or whatever source and make them local to SD. I can't for the life of me get that to work out right.
[Vibrant General] chuimk:
Sharing my first Samsung warranty experience

I was tempted to try this fix because GPS performance totally and completely sucks on my two Vibrants (I got them from that T-Mobile offer last year). Running the "GPS Test" app (by Chartcross Limited) side-by-side with a MyTouch 4G, one can see that the difference in time to lock, number of connected satellites and error radius is astonishing!

But I decided first to send both to Samsung support. After some 3-4 long calls stating that I did already followed all of their steps to fix it myself (yeah, right!) they finally conceded me the RMAs.

I sent them, waited almost 2 weeks and just got them back today. The only thing they did were software changes: wiped the phone and ROMed it back to stock (2.1-update1)! I'm feeling like a stupid clown! :mad:

I really don't wanna mess with my phone hardware and I'm willing to bug them further until they fix this problem which is theirs (not mine) to fix! But if they give me no choice, I'll have to give in at some point, I guess... :(

Now I really wished that other thread about the guy suing Samsung was real...
[Vibrant General] BruceElliott:
SNR in

"Average SNR: 22-35. Obviously you'll always have one or two that are lower and one or two higher. My max I've observed was 42."

SNRs for GPS signals are negative. (I.e., the signal is buried in the noise and is extracted by complex signal processing algorithms.) 42 was your "min," not your "max." LOL
[Vibrant General] T313C0mun1s7:
Sorry Bruce, but you are wrong here.

The number may be represented as a negative number if you are talking about a signal level, because it is in dB. However, as a ratio of signal to noise it is a positive, and 42 is a more positive signal to noise number that 22. It also represents a better SNR making it easier to see the signal through the noise. The noise is assumed here to be 1 so a SNR where the receivable signal is the same as the noise floor (either received noise or thermal noise from the processing electronics themselves) would be 1 or 1:1. 22 is 22:1 and 42 is 42:1. Since both are measured in dB as a negative number and every 3 dB is doubling or halving the signal the numerical values rise rather quick. Also, since you are dividing two negatives your answer is positive. -42/-1 = 42

Also, if the signal level is lower than the noise floor you would not be able to determine the signal out of the noise (see the forest for the trees so to speak) the signal MUST be above the noise to use it. So you have that wrong also. This is where receiver sensitivity comes into play. The higher the receiver sensitivity the better chance you have of picking out a weak signal and the better you are at processing a signal derived from a poor SNR.

I have years of RADAR, IFF, and Wireless ISP design experience behind me. So I have this one covered fairly well.
[Vibrant General] hmpohjola:
Try MapDroyd from the Market. You can pre-load a map in your phone. But it's just a map app, not real navigation.
[Vibrant General] suni123:
Samsung Vibrant GPS hardware fix - worked

Hey guys. This fix and the whiskey rom makes my samsung rock.

I just wanted to thank you for your continued awesomeness.
[Vibrant General] Dallasalien:
Worked great for me, 50m lock indoors now.

Edit: Left it running a couple of mins, it's down to 12m
[Vibrant General] kgbros:
Did the GPS and Antenna (3G) fix. The difference is night and day.

The process was totally easy (even without the toolkit) and the results are very rewarding. I finally feel like my phone is worth the price I initially paid. Sat locks in less than two mins instead of 45min -1 hr.

Thanks Guys.
[Vibrant General] bigjoe87865:
Hey guys, I have a vibrant from 10.07 ( July 2010 ) my GPS as of now with axura 2.2xxx isn't unbearable at all.. I'm always getting locks but it takes a couple minutes. and it is accurate, but its really sensitive and not that strong feeling.

if im driving, with google nav running with the phone on my dashboard, everything is great. as soon as I move it to my lap, my location isn't accurate, and the location radius gets bigger. Im assuming, the gps isn't strong enough to get multiple locks from my lap. it probably drops a few sats on my lap.

Am I a good candidate for the hardware fix? ... will it solve my irritations with the gps?...

I just dont want to get into this unless its worth my time/effort/ risk. as my gps isn't unbearable as of now.

let me know guys

thanks.
[Vibrant General] T313C0mun1s7:
You are blocking a lot of signal when you move it to your lap for a number of reasons.

You placed the antenna very close to a large body of water, you (98% water in fact) and this is a big barrier to good reception.

You moved the antenna away from a clear veiw of the sky (glass would not affect it) to a shielded area (down within the metal body of your car)

You probably burried the antenna below the device, it is on the back. If you laid it on your lap then the antenna is under the device. On the dash, set so you can see it, the back is exposed.

IMO, if it works for you when you are not other wise blocking the antenna's clear view if the sky, then you may not gain much from this fix. Of course the only way to know for sure would be to perform the fix and see. I personally would not be very confident it would help terribly. Of course, if you don't break the contacts, it is highly likely that it would not hurt anything either.
[Vibrant General] ceycey72:
I tried many roms, modem files, many gps test and fix issues but I never solve gps weak signal problem. I tried also many changes in setup. The first explaination solved my gps problem. Now a days I could not fix gps and get position even in a clear ouside, and now I have valuable gps signals indoor ! Now I fixed it. Once I remember I dropped my galaxy. I thik at that time this connection loosen between gps antenna on the back side . I just get the gps antenna spring higher according to pictures in thread.

Many many thanks to KWKSLVR .

GREAT JOB..
[Vibrant General] bigjoe87865:
I agree with you to a point, I had multiple other phones that had no issue getting a GPS signal pretty much anywhere in my car. So I know it isnt impossible. I really feel like mine is weak as in, its really sensitive when I move it around.

I will think about it some more I guess... whether or not I want to try this fix.

btw... human body isnt anywhere near 98% water.. more around 60-70