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When I made the switch from the AT&T Tilt to the Fuze in December the one thing that I missed was a working GPS. I travel a lot and with the Tilt I could mount the phone in my rental car and by the time I was out of the lot everything was working. I never even thought about it.
As many of you know by now the Fuze GPS is, shall we say, challenged. Some people have worse results than others. Mine would usually get a fix but it took a while, and the lag was also an issue.
I tried various fixes that I found here and none of them did any good, they have all been removed now. I finally decided to bite the bullet and install the 1.12.25.19 radio that some people were raving about. I noticed very little, if any, improvement.
Then I tried the 1.14.25.05 radio. That was a big improvement. It could get a fix in places that even my Tilt couldn't and it got it quickly. I tried it in the car using Tomtom and was surprised that the lag was almost gone. I never looked at the Tilt this closely, it just worked, but it seems that now the Fuze is working as well as the Tilt.
I have seen reports here saying that 1.14.25.05 isn't as good as some others, but it is worth a try if you are already experimenting with radios.
For the record, I have the stock rom without bloat and started with the 1.02.25.32 radio. And I didn't change the rilphone.dll.
Now if we could just get the Tilt buttons onto the Fuze this device would be perfect.
sdbe said:
Now if we could just get the Tilt buttons onto the Fuze this device would be perfect.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ae button!
http://ae.inc.ru/aebplus.php
What part of the US are you in? I'm in Southern California, have the .19 radio and GPS fix is under 10sec when using Google Maps. However, it didn't improve my phone reception very much (my wife's iphone gets 1-2 bars more than I do). Curious to know whether it improved your phone reception at all?
sdbe said:
When I made the switch from the AT&T Tilt to the Fuze in December the one thing that I missed was a working GPS. I travel a lot and with the Tilt I could mount the phone in my rental car and by the time I was out of the lot everything was working. I never even thought about it.
As many of you know by now the Fuze GPS is, shall we say, challenged. Some people have worse results than others. Mine would usually get a fix but it took a while, and the lag was also an issue.
I tried various fixes that I found here and none of them did any good, they have all been removed now. I finally decided to bite the bullet and install the 1.12.25.19 radio that some people were raving about. I noticed very little, if any, improvement.
Then I tried the 1.14.25.05 radio. That was a big improvement. It could get a fix in places that even my Tilt couldn't and it got it quickly. I tried it in the car using Tomtom and was surprised that the lag was almost gone. I never looked at the Tilt this closely, it just worked, but it seems that now the Fuze is working as well as the Tilt.
I have seen reports here saying that 1.14.25.05 isn't as good as some others, but it is worth a try if you are already experimenting with radios.
For the record, I have the stock rom without bloat and started with the 1.02.25.32 radio. And I didn't change the rilphone.dll.
Now if we could just get the Tilt buttons onto the Fuze this device would be perfect.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am in Central Florida where we have good reception almost everywhere. I didn't notice any difference among all three radios that I tried, reception was always the same, which was good.
One thing that I noticed about the 1.12.25.19 radio was that the gps was inaccurate. When I used google maps with my Tilt I could see what room in the house I was in. With the original radio, 1.02.25.32, it was almost as good, at least I could see that I was in the house. The 1.12.25.19 radio would sometimes put me 1/4 mile away from where I actually was. This even happened when I was outdoors. Tomtom seemed to be able to compensate for the errors but with Tomtom it would get 'lost' occasionally. 1.12.25.19 was my least favorite radio. The 1.14.25.05 radio is quick and accurate at least for me.
The 1.14.25.05 doesn't require anything to get an accurate fix. I used to have to use gpstest or some other program to 'prime' the gps. Now I don't have to worry about it. I just turn it on and a few seconds later it is working.
the gps issue has been resolved and proven over here http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=496800
princeasi said:
the gps issue has been resolved and proven over here http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=496800
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Click to collapse
Sorry, I tried it and it didn't do a thing for me with either of the first two radios that I tried. So I guess you could say that I proved that it doesn't work.
The strange thing about this problem is that what works for some doesn't for others.
For me the 1.14.25.05 radio made the gps work like it should have in the beginning. None of the other fixes had any affect. Also note that I used the original rilphone whereas others tried changing theirs. That may be why I had better luck.
At this point I have to say that the Fuze has a very good gps with little or no lag. That is not something that I would have said a few weeks ago. Everything on my phone is original except the newer radio. Maybe HTC discovered this but didn't advertise it.
Im using the stock fuze rom 5.08.502.1 with radio 1.12.25.19. If your looking to speed up the gps lock and have a similar setup, I would recommend using the gps hack first, before flashing a different radio, its much safer, Duces!
Thank you!!!
I can get a fix indoors!!
it was nice of you to share, you helped me a lot.
1.14 is better for me too.
second the original commenter
Both 1.12.25.19 & 1.14.25.05 worked fine for me. However 1.14.25.05 was slightly better. I am also using the registry hack and I set the poll interval to 500.
I recommend this radio to anyone facing problems with GPS.
Thanks for sharing.
This is strange. I live in central florida too, 1/4 mile away from cell phone tower and in the house I'm getting signal strength 2-3 bars, even if phone laying next to the window. From that window I would be able see the tower if it wouldn't be for the huge oak tree in front.
The GPS gets lock in about...5-15 MINUTES! and only outdoors.
With 1.12.25.19 radio I don't get better signal strength, but GPS locks in 10-20 seconds, even indoors.
GPS is definitely better with 1.12.25.19 radio. That radio is by far the champion in overall experience - GPS, GSM signal, HSDPA signal...
As someone already mentioned, it seems results can vary by user. I tried several radios after reading the suggestions on this forum. For my .02 it's the 1.14.25.05v. It gets me a really fast gps lock with usually about ten sattellites. Also, the RF is a little better, calls are clear and whats not to like. I'm stickin' with it.
Hi all, please welcome me whom had bought the Optimus 3d just 2 days ago. I love this phone. Please do let me welcome you all to talk about a flaw, which I've found out right away with the new phone since 2 days ago! I've been with some others Android phones, so, I should say I've had good experience with Androids.
I realized that Optimus 3D has some kinda hardware Radio receiver flaw (I really don't know what should I really call it) similar to the famous iPhone 4 dilemma in the beginning. I found out that the "Radio receiver" is located somewhere at the bottom of the phone, where our hands most often holding the phone with. The hand will block out the signals and the signal bar will be reduced by a lot as much as to zero (if the signal strength itself is not strong in the 1st place!) Try find this yourself, have some experience by holding the phone at the bottom and let go and holding the phone and again let go, keep trying this you should see the signal strength that will drop and rise and drop and rise again. Or is this only my phone? But I've never experience this phenomenal with other Android phones!
Also, I don't know this has the directly link to the downloading issue or whenever browsing nets, the network data will drop very very often. I hardly got successful downloads from the market without few retries. Thank god at least at the moment I can temporarily fix it by turning off and on again with the data enabling shortcut in the pull down menu.
Please help me here and advice! Very much appreciated!
Since the famous iPhone 4 drama for a lot of phones these stories pop up once in a while. I know lots of people furiously believed the Samsung Galaxy S had the exact same problem but after a week or so nobody ever talked about it anymore.
I myself have absolutely no problem whatsoever with the signal, not even when I completely cover the entire phone with my hands leaving just a small spot to read the signal it never drops, not by one bar. I've never had a single download dropped with either 3G or wifi and I've downloaded my share of stuff from the market and other places.
I've tested this with my T-Mobile simcard (which has pretty horrible coverage here) and with my Vodafone simcard (which has great reception) and with both simcards the signal strength stays exactly the same according to the bars. Even when I go to the settings the dBm and asu values stay exactly the same, no matter how long and how bad I cover the phone.
So far you're the first and only person I've read about having these issues so I think it just could be an isolated incident, although that would be bad for you as that would mean you could have a defective phone
This problem is not something new and is not related with O3D.
All the phones have the same issue.
It is normal that if put your hand on the antenna the reception will drop.
The radio waves just work like this.
However the atenuation from your hand is most accentuated on higher frequencies like 2100Mhz.
On every phone even on the oldest phone with external antenna you will meet this phenomenon.
The difference between 4 bars and 1 bar is only around 10dBm which really isnt that massive a drop at all. Now that you've pointed this out i do see that the signal strength varies a little depending on how you hold the phone but its not enough to panic about i don't think. The iphone 4 problem was significantly greater in that the iss was that a user's hand would electeically short the mobile network antenna to the bluetooth and wifi antenna causing a total loss of signal. While 10dBm or so is a definite dip in signal strength, it's an acceptable level of attenuation and i dont see it causing any real world day to day network problems that you wouldn't experience with any other high end smartphone.
My workplace is in a giant tin hut of an industrial unit (read: faraday cage) and today while i had this phone there for the first time i saw no noticeable network coverage problems. The behaviour was as far as i can tell exactly tue same as my motorola milestone from which i upgraded.
Sent from my LG-P920 using XDA Premium App
As stated all phones can lose a bit of the reception when it's in your hand depending on how you hold it, the reason Iphone4 was such a big deal was that it was extremly sensitive when it came to left-handed people and they had a real problem with their antenna being totally blocked when holding the phone normally when speaking in it.
Later on media and uninformed people started fueling the flames as soon as they saw a bar drop when picking up the phone, radio waves are not magical rays or tachyons that can move though matter without interacting with it.
thanks for all the replies. Believe me or not, this is the 1st phone I realize this issue and it is so obvious, the bad news is, it is really bad for me that the antenna is located at the bottom, probably most others phones I've owned were at the top as a result i didn't got any problem before.
And another issue, I'm pretty stucked with the shipped rom now, really hope to see custom roms soon. I'm at the moment totally freak out with the inconsistent of data and the wifi, it keeps failing me, this really freak me off, what the hell is happening to me with this phone! I've never ever got any dropped data or wifi connections before. Arggghhhh!!!!!!!!!!!
I have no signal drop out no matter what hand positioning i use..
I'm in a very poor reception area. I do notice hand over phone a drop from 1 bar to none. Still not a red cross to indicate no signal but a drop of 1 bar all the same.
Just tested it.
Signal drops from 4 bars to 3 (1-2 in awkward positions) when hand-held. Not an real-life-usage impact though...
Thanks for all the test replies to support my findings. OK, now, I've realized that the hand holding issue has no direct impact to data drops. And the data drop is entirely due to the time issue which it does not lock down the data connection when swithcing data modes. And at the moment it can beasily over come to turn off with the data button in the pull down menu. I'm not sure though when in the situation when the signal strenght was so low, by holding with hands will give an direct effect of data drop or not. Will observe that
Since I can't find any recent posts about the wifi death grip issue which many Desire S users seem to have, I'd like to start a poll to see how bad the issue really is and what could be possible causes.
Please fill in the poll. It would also help to post your specs together with your answer to see if the phones with death grip all have something in common.
Something like:
HBoot
Rom
Kernel
Radio
Date of purchase (If you still have/know it)
Simlock yes/no -- If yes, brand
Color (Grey or black)
Also, please keep in mind that you have to be a few meters away from your modem to properly test if you really have the death grip.
Thanks!
date of purchase 3 months back
brought the device for full price
black
the rest is in my sig
i have tried all rom/kernel/radio combos ,but its still there
the latest radio makes the problem a lot less intense than before
also people say they face problems with g routers,those who use n routers don't seem to have this problem(i am unable to verify this as i only have a g router)
so can someone test with a n router & the radio im using?
kartkk said:
date of purchase 3 months back
brought the device for full price
black
the rest is in my sig
i have tried all rom/kernel/radio combos ,but its still there
the latest radio makes the problem a lot less intense than before
also people say they face problems with g routers,those who use n routers don't seem to have this problem(i am unable to verify this as i only have a g router)
so can someone test with a n router & the radio im using?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Edit:I just found out that one of my routers is an N-router. However, the wifi death grip was still there and did not decrease at all D:
Thanks for the info!
Also, how is it possible that 100+ people have viewed, but only 4 filled in the poll? Please fill in the poll if you view. It only takes 10 seconds or less.
Thanks!
have the problem on my phone.
Check signature for details
I bought my phone a month ago. It was shipped S-off so I rooted it. Stock ROM, black.
I have experimented with the deathgrip multiple times in various locations, the result is always the same.
As soon as I cover the back panel with my palm, WiFi strength drops by exactly 2 bars. As an example, the connection is excellent and I have 3 bars but as soon as I cover the back panel with my hand the signal drops down to 1 bar. If I've got a good connection with 2 bars then doing this results in a lost connection of 0 bars. It works like clockwork, doesn't matter where I am or which WiFi I use.
There definitely is a deathgrip issue, what bothers me the most is that this happens quite often when I'm using the phone in landscape mode, like texting or playing something via WiFi.
Sent from my HTC Desire S using XDA App
I didn't even know there was a wifi death grip for the Desire S, I've been using it for 2 months now and did not seem like an inconvenience for me.
When I hold the phone near the top, covering the back with my hand the wifi drops- I find this really annoying as it limits to how I can hold the phone..
i also have it. its annoying.
I never completely lose wifi and I never seem to notice a loss in speed but the signal indicator always goes right down.
Hi guys
I've tried researching this issue from time to time but have never been able to find any definitive information. A couple of threads around the traps detailing similar problems, but that's it. Anyway, what happens is this: the phone will be showing a couple of bars or whatever, but there actually isn't any signal at all. Calls can be initiated, but wont actually connect, and then can't be ended either. The only way to resolve the issue is to reboot the phone, or activate airplane mode and then deactivate it again (which tends to take considerably longer than a simple reboot). I'm calling it a radio crash because that's what it seems to be, but I could of course be wrong about what is actually going on under the hood.
This post is basically part of an effort to diagnose the problem before I decide what this phone's future will be (have a new, different model on the way now).
Thanks for reading, and any advice/information will be much appreciated
It sounds as if you have a defective phone, or it could be you carrier.
Have you tried a different phone.
Do other people have the same problem with that carrier
You could also think of it like this, carrier problem, you can connect to wifi if it doesnt have internet connection, it still can show full bars but nothing will load
Sent from my MB865 using xda app-developers app
I have an SGS3 now, with the same SIM in it (cut down to micro of course). Average signal strength (as reported by third party apps that don't pad) is about the same, but no dropouts at all (as monitored and reported by the No Signal Alert app). However the SGS3 supports both my carrier frequencies, and the Atrix 2 doesn't. Having said that, the SGS3 seems to stay on 2100MHz all the time anyway where I am.
I've also put a different SIM in my Atrix 2, from a network that is more compatible (850/2100), and although the dropouts are less frequent, they are still occurring. However, I haven't had a "radio driver crash" in over a week. The dropouts have only been momentary too, lasting no more than a few seconds, 1-3 times per day (mostly in the afternoon).
I'm also planning to charge the phone up and leave it at a couple of other locations for a day or two while continuing to monitor signal interruptions. Should be interesting.
Thanks for the reply
Just a quick update: left the phone at another location for a few days where the average signal strength is stronger, and not a single dropout was logged during that time. In certain areas this phone is obviously not as good as some others at maintaining a signal, but I don't think the dropouts themselves are indicative of a fault given this new information.
The previous instances of radio lockups/crashes are still haunting me a little, but this strange phenomenon is still yet to occur again. I also forgot to mention that I'd previously done a full restoration of the official 4.0.4 ICS release in order to return to the phone completely to stock, which might have something to do with that. Previously it was rooted, with only some minor modifications, but I guess it's not beyond the realm of possibility.
Wait i have an idea
Send me your apn data.
Motorola doesnt have the best antennas either.
Also does it crash at a certain time after it is turned on or is it random?
Sent from my SOUL
Hi guys. I've got a saga to describe for those of you who are interested, but I'll try to keep it brief. I think it really boils down to one or two simple issues.
I've had Verizon phones for a long time, in Central Illinois. Probably about 10 years now. Rarely had problems with dropped calls. My previous phone was a Droid 1 ... worked great, very rarely (as I recall) had dropped calls.
Then in January 2012, as the Droid was killing me with general Android lag and unresponsiveness (but voice was still fine), I upgraded to a Galaxy Nexus. Loved it for Android performance. For the first 3 or 4 months I had it, I don't recall it giving me any undue trouble .. dropped calls were minimal if any, I think.
Then sometime around April or May, started getting a ridiculous number of dropped calls. Mostly at my home, throughout the day, but not just there, I've also experienced them a mile or two away from my house. The neighbor hood is fairly wooded, but that's never been a problem before.
Additionally, my wife has a "feature phone" (non-smartphone) also with Verizon and very rarely if ever has dropped call problems.
The topography at my house is along a river, we're right near a high bluff overlooking the river, with line of sight (besides the trees, of which there are not a ton, really) for at least a mile or so across the river. I think we're possibly within range of several cell towers.
I notice at most points when I'm in my house, using some apps that help you track signal strength and show you the cell tower ids, that I'm mostly one just two different ones, both of which seem to be maybe about 1 mile away. Also, if I'm walking up one flight of stairs, I pretty reliably see that same app showing the phone switching among possibly as many as 4 or 5 towers, in the space of about 5 or 10 seconds!
I suspect this may be caused by the topography in my area.
I also suspect that most of my dropped calls *may* have something to do with being in range of so many towers, or with the phone switching too frequently (or unnecessarily, really) among the towers, while I'm on the call, if this is possible (I have very little technical knowledge of cell phone radio technology -- hence this post).
Now, I've done a fair amount of research and talked to Verizon customer support about this at length. They've actually been very patient and good with me, but we still haven't arrived at the solution.
I originally thought the problem my be the Galaxy Nexus, but after getting a warranty replacement on that one, and even getting to try a Droid RAZR and then finally the GS3, I'm seeing virtually the exact same behavior on all of the phones. The symptoms do *not* seem to be directly related to signal strength exactly. I get usually about 50 - 60% of the total bars (maybe 3/5 or 4/5) in most parts of the house, yet *still* get these persistent drops.
Verizon's final best solution for me, basically, was to use a Network Extender. Despite my misgivings towards this, I have acquired one and it does seem to solve the problem for me, when I'm home, and when I'm in range of the device (its range seems pretty good in my house). One big problem with it though, ridiculously, is it seems that whenever it's on, my wife's Verizon phone starts dropping calls (and it never does otherwise). So there's a Catch-22 there, added to the fact that I'd rather not have to be running a Net Extender *and* the fact that I still see other drops when taking a walk or driving at least a mile or two from my house.
So, for those of you still with me, I'm wondering if
a) my theory about excessive switching, etc., is plausible, or if you have another one based on the facts I've outlined
b) if doing something like flashing an alternate radio ROM (I barely even knew there were separate ROMs for the radio -- I've done some rooting before of Android, but not the radio) might give me some more control or better performance. It'd be great if there were a setting somewhere where I could tell the phone to be less willing to switch towers or to give a higher preference to one tower, at least while in a certain GPS area (I know, I'm sure it's a reach).
Anyway, looking for a little education into why your opinions are of what may be causing this and if I have any remedies available that are feasible and may actually help.
Thank you for your attention and expertise.