I just received my Sprint Nexus S 4G from Sprint on Wednesday (moving from an EVO) and, of course, I've been playing with it non-stop. On the whole, it's amazingly fast and responsive - more so than I ever experienced with my EVO and a number of ROMs on it.
However, the one thing I have seen repeatedly since day 1 is that the GPS lock is abysmal. I wanted to say "weak", but no, it's much worse. I know the original Galaxy line was plagued with such issues but doing a general Google search for Nexus S GPS issues mainly revealed people wondering if the NS4G would have the same problem - not many reports of actual experience.
I can tell you that my EVO got GPS locks with nary a problem. If I was driving and had to whip out the phone at a red light to fire up the navigation, it was ready to go in moments. I did that a few times this week with the NS4G and was just annoyed. This morning was especially bad so I have been spending some time just opening up Google maps and hitting the location button to see how long it took to get a lock on me. It's truly something awful. The radius it shows is based on the cell tower estimate (I know from seeing where tower location usage without GPS pegs me when I'm at work on both my Hero and EVO) sits for MINUTES before it might get a lock on where I actually am. Even at that point, the accuracy radius is still huge compared to just being pegged where I am with the other phones I have/had. Then, with maps open, the phone goes to sleep (screen off) and I turn it back on a few minutes later and this starts all over again...
I'm actually surprised to find no real reports like this yet so I thought I'd prompt people to really take a look at their new NS4Gs and welcome a report from them. Is my unit bonk or is this more widespread? If you've got one, try it a few times throughout the day. Just open GMaps up and hit the location button on top right to get a fix on your position and take note of how long it takes to lock in to you.
(Before anyone asks, yes, in SETTINGS>LOCATION&SECURITY I have both "use wireless networks" and "use GPS satellites" checked off).
I've experienced this somewhat, although for some strange reason it seems to have tamed itself. The very first time I fired up Maps it locked on to me with a 20m window after about a half a minute, which I've found to be "normal" for AOSP. My Evo would get me within 2m and would do it in around 5 seconds.
The second time I wanted to use it, I used the voice control to ask for directions, at which point my stock Ns4G rebooted itself leaving me on the side of the road for a few extra moments before I was on my way.
The last couple days though, it's been decent. It still only locks within a 20m window, though, but it's been pretty accurate so far.
Actually, I think I am suffering from the same issue. From time to time, depending on the location I would lose service (yet wifi works) and the only way I would regain service back would be to reboot my phone. It's the strangest thing ever, I believe its a problem between the Sprint network and the Nexus S. My old phone would get full bars but on my Nexus, its been only 1 or 2 bars in 3G. Sprint better be resolving this issue soon.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using XDA App
fraspas said:
Actually, I think I am suffering from the same issue. From time to time, depending on the location I would lose service (yet wifi works) and the only way I would regain service back would be to reboot my phone. It's the strangest thing ever, I believe its a problem between the Sprint network and the Nexus S. My old phone would get full bars but on my Nexus, its been only 1 or 2 bars in 3G. Sprint better be resolving this issue soon.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using XDA App
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Now that you mention it, using this phone the past 2 days... it's the first time in god knows how long that I've seen signal issues. The first one being low bar readings - but I attributed this possibly being a difference in display of the bars on this phone vs my EVO. On the Nexus S there are four bars total, gray and green. I'm usually at one - two green bars with this phone. On my EVO I had a lot more bars (maybe 6-7?)... so maybe my actual signal strength was comparable but "seemed" like it was better because I saw more filled bars. Again, a display issue? I'll leave that open for further investigation...
However, the thing that is really strange is that I've seen the 3G go to 1X numerous times. I don't know if I ever saw this on my EVO.
All related or no? Color me perplexed...
edit: During my Google searching earlier I came across a search result posted in the Sprint forums titled:"Signal Issues with Nexus S" - however none of the links worked because the site was under maintenance. It's come back online... from reading through it, this appears to be a widespread issue (general signal issues, not GPS).
http://community.sprint.com/baw/message/286393
So, do we have TWO signal problems with this phone? Ugh!
20 meters accuracy is the norm for me. not the best, but thats all i need it to do.
Tried it inside of my house, got 30m lock, pressed again after few seconds got 8m.
Radio problems have been reported on other forums too,
Signal strength is the same as my Epic, but nexus can't pick up 4G signal in the same spot where my Epic does.
And I get signed out of gtalk randomly, I guess its when it loses signal, 3G or WiFi.
DiNoise said:
...Signal strength is the same as my Epic, but nexus can't pick up 4G signal in the same spot where my Epic does...
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Funny that you say that. When I had the EVO, coverage and download speeds over 3g werent a problem. now that i have my ns4g, same coverage but super slow 3g speeds in my area. not sure if its my phone, cuz where i work i get legit 3g speeds here and there. i'll give sprint a couple weeks to sort this out before my buyers remorse period ends.
DiNoise said:
Tried it inside of my house, got 30m lock, pressed again after few seconds got 8m.
Radio problems have been reported on other forums too,
Signal strength is the same as my Epic, but nexus can't pick up 4G signal in the same spot where my Epic does.
And I get signed out of gtalk randomly, I guess its when it loses signal, 3G or WiFi.
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From what I can tell, there's actually a difference between the white-ish signal bars and the green ones (it's probably in the manual but this would be the FIRST manual for any tech device that I didn't read front to back right when I opened the thing). Green bars mean you're connected to Google directly or something like that. White is just to the network. I tried to see the difference myself by going into mobile networks and disabling data - the green bars immediately turn white. When I turn the data back on they're still white for a little bit but I can get them green again immediately by logging into Google Talk.
Of course, the gray bars are still "no signal" bars as far as I know. White or green, I'm still only getting 1-2 bars of the four and going from 1X to 3G a lot. I thought I'd share that bit about the Green/Google connection because it might help you look up more info on that problem, too. I've already seen reports of people's connections to Google (lots of white, little green) being spotty, too.
It's too bad - this phone is really growing on me. It feels good in hand, perfect weight, looks gorgeous on or off... but the connection and GPS problems are a deal breaker. We need to see something happen. Really, REALLY disappointed in Samsung now.
Just got the nexus s 4g about two hours ago now and the gps has been great for me compared to the epic I traded it in for. Sitting at my desk on the second floor of my house and getting instant 2 meter locks. So far so good on my first pure google phone.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using Tapatalk
I came from the Moment and it had 6 bars for signal strength....the Nexus has only 4 and from what I've noticed, reception has been the same or better than what I had. I haven't had any problems with 3G switching to 1x except when I was in our storage basement at work, in a heavily populated downtown. I haven't been able to try out 4G yet because it isn't offered in my area yet but assume it'll be the same or worse downtown. I have had issues with the GPS taking forever to get a lock, but I only use the GPS chip with NO help from the cell network. Most of the time, since it reboots in about 45 secs, I just reboot and it works fine for a while.
I did something slightly different. Before I used the GPS for the first time I completely removed google maps and didn't have any map program. I did have the evo shift sprint telenav map apk already on this phone. I installed it and started up the gps. After a few minutes of downloading files, the map screen came up and showed my correct position. I've found in the past if I fire up sprint maps for the first time I use the gps, it doesn't have problems locking afterwards. If I use google maps first, if it locks it takes a long time.
mrhinkle83 said:
I came from the Moment
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God bless you.. I had that paper weight for awhile and ditched it for the Epic. Worst phone I've ever used. The Nexus S must be like heaven compared to that thing.
So I was driving to one place today and needed gmaps to show me shortest route from my location, turned on GPS, could not get any sats to lock, I probably waited 20-30 secs and then remembered one old trick with GPS Status app.
Downloaded the app, went to tools, reset, redownloaded data, got 9 out of 9 sats locked on in 1 second, 2m accuracy. I can live with that.
But still not happy with 3G/4G performance, and at the same time I dont wanna go back to my Epic.
Mine locks instantly but up to 20m which doesn't bother me as long as it gets me where I need to go
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using XDA Premium App
p00kienrayray said:
Funny that you say that. When I had the EVO, coverage and download speeds over 3g werent a problem. now that i have my ns4g, same coverage but super slow 3g speeds in my area. not sure if its my phone, cuz where i work i get legit 3g speeds here and there. i'll give sprint a couple weeks to sort this out before my buyers remorse period ends.
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Well, what I meant was that signal strength in "dBm's" was the same, or at least that's what both phones' status showed. But with speed test app 3G speeds on NS4G were MUCH slower than Epic's, and of course I couldn't even test 4G...
I'm also thinking if I should return it before 30days or just keep it and hope there will be fixes to make NS4G's radio better and better, to be prepared for ice cream desert, and then just jump to next Nexus
styckx said:
God bless you.. I had that paper weight for awhile and ditched it for the Epic. Worst phone I've ever used. The Nexus S must be like heaven compared to that thing.
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Yes, the difference is like night and day! I'm just amazed at the battery life...I can actually go a full day without nursing it with a charge here and there, the moment wouldn't go longer than 6hrs before crapping out...and that was with light useage! I've had the nexus for over a week and I'm hooked....and the GPS issues seem to have settled down, it locks within 30-40 seconds now and is pretty accurate.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using XDA App
GPS reception issues, but only while biking
OK I've searched around and haven't found much on this particular problem:
I use the MayMyRide app to track and log my bicycle rides. It consistently shorts my ride by at least 1.5 miles and several minutes, as compared to my computer on the bike.
This only started happening after I switched to the NS4G on Sprint from the Moto Defy on T-Mobile. I used the same app on t-mobile and it was generally pretty accurate.
Also, I seem to have decent GPS reception in general, the GPS lock times seem reasonable, and I can use google maps navigation with no problems.
Also, I've had this problem regardless of what ROM I'm running. I've flashed several, but I've mostly run Gummy, burnsra's CM9, and the latest Bugless Beast.
I've just started the process of flashing different radios, so I don't have enough info yet to see if that fixes the problem.
My hypotheses so far:
1) Poor reception in the rural areas that I ride, although since it's GPS I don't see why having poor network signal would affect it. But maybe it does.
2) Weak GPS antenna in the NS4G (?) (This doesn't make sense because GPS works fine in other settings.)
3) General sprint crappiness.
4) I don't think it's the app because it worked fine on T-MO.
5) I don't think it's the ROM because it's happened on several ROMs.
6) I don't have enough data yet to know if it's as simple as flashing a new radio. I flashed LC1 this morning so we'll see.
Any ideas?
I am currently running Ninja-0706, radio 26.06.06.30_M.
Intermittantly, my phone will drop out of H and start cycling through all the connections, edge, gsm, 3G etc. After cycling through, it will go to no connection at all where you see "no service" on the screen. And it will stay like that for several minutes, no matter where I am standing in my apartment, or even if i walk outside. Then all of a sudden, it will pick up H, full bars and it will stay like that.
So far, this issue has only happened a couple of times, within the past couple of weeks, and at my apartment. I have full wiped and flashed different roms, and reflashed the radio after the first time this happened, so this issue cannot be blamed on current said rom. This has led me to suspect that maybe there is an issue with the tower in my area. Twice I have called AT&T now about this issue. Both times they claim there have been no outages or issues with the towers in my area. They also claim that the closest tower to me is about 1 mile away, so there shouldn't be issues as such with a tower so close. I don't know anyone in my complex who is on AT&T to see if they are experiencing the same issue. So AT&T seems to think there might be an issue with the phone and i might need to do a warranty exchange. Any ideas before I flash back to stock and exchange it out?
While mine doesn't go that far, it'll cycle between H and 3G for no apparent reason.
Mine does weird **** sometimes, too, on Tue 04_11_M2 radio.
Just today I was sitting around browsing via WiFi, and bam, no signal. Most if the time it'll kick back in after a sec or two, but it stays like that until I intervene by toggling airplane mode, then, it'll be back to 3-4 bars or whatever.
Second time its happened over the last month, so no biggy.
In my house I get lots of signal variations overall, which I guess should be expected.
Well, my phone has done it twice since OP. I just flashed back to stock and downgraded to s-on. I'm going to see about an insurance claim.
Update: Just got off the phone with AT&T. They said that this issue would need to be handled by the warranty dept. So got back on the phone with tech support and they suggested that I go into an AT&T store and have the sim card replaced before they replace the phone, as the sim card itself might be causing this issue. It seems plausible because the sim card is needed for a connection to the network.
My phone has dropped data randomly two times this morning. I could only get it back by doing a switch to airplane mode. Anyone else with this problem? Is this a phone issue that I need to get a new one?
Sent from my HTC One X
Mine has dropped several times. when coming to and from work. It seems to always happen when it connects to wifi. when i leave work and its wifi, i lose all signal entirely.
I don't use wifi though that's the thing. I called ATT and they said it may need a new simcard......which this was. So I swung by and got one and the lady at the store said that my phone may be going bad! LOL wow I love how they train their people.
YES. Most definitely, this is the same problem I'm experiencing. I had another thread posted about how the 4G icon was lit but there was no signal. The icon now seems to be a little more accurate...But still.
At home I switch on WiFi so I don't run up my data but if I look at the settings for mobile network the status underneath in gray text keeps showing that it connects and disconnects. Endlessly. The phone isn't moving. My wife has signal on her iPad and iPhone (I know those are 3G).
I have to turn on airplane mode and then off...Then mobile network on and it seems to help a little. However it's still super spotty.
This is pretty much only indoors but I don't know. I'm going to go around town and try it out. On their coverage map I'm in a big zone of LTE coverage. Outside I have seen 30Mbps on LTE using speedtest.net app. So I don't know. I thought it was very odd given the houses here in CA don't exactly have super thick insulation and every other cell phone (Sprint, my wife's on AT&T, etc.) seem to be AOK. It's just this new One X that just can't stay connected to the 4G.
Going under settings > about > network ...
I see my signal strength....some readings are...
-109 dBm 4 asu
-101 dBm 6 asu
-107 dBm 2 asu
I have no idea what values I should be seeing - what is considered good?
Mobile network type says HSPA. Service state says in service. Icon up top is 4G with one bar. If I turn off WiFi I could not load a web page or anything. That's what annoys me. I usually see like 2 bars and that's fine...But if I see the damn bars and the 4G icon....I sure as hell expect the data to work, even if a little slower.
It's just SUPER flaky. Again outside seems to help but to be honest I haven't sat and watched it. For all I know it could be connecting and disconnecting over and over outside as well but just have a stronger connection when it is actually "on."
I'm annoyed and speechless. I'm not in the boonies. I've never experienced anything like this before. I'm actually at my desk in front of a window. Uh...WTF?
Just picked up lunch and watched the data while on the trip.
This phone is unusable. It's gotta go back. Well, I guess it's welcome back Sprint. Sooooo disappointed.
All I got was HSPA. The only time I get LTE and those fast 30Mbps down is at night time. AT&T is such a joke and their network is NOT ready for this phone.
I'm in Palo Alto, CA. It's not the middle of no where. This is embarrassing. Either that or somehow I have a defective phone or SIM card or something I have no clue here...It's really really bad and I'm obviously not the only one.
3 days and it's been horrible, the only reason why I didn't notice sooner is because I've been using the phone on WiFi most the time.
tom_m said:
Just picked up lunch and watched the data while on the trip.
This phone is unusable. It's gotta go back. Well, I guess it's welcome back Sprint. Sooooo disappointed.
All I got was HSPA. The only time I get LTE and those fast 30Mbps down is at night time. AT&T is such a joke and their network is NOT ready for this phone.
I'm in Palo Alto, CA. It's not the middle of no where. This is embarrassing. Either that or somehow I have a defective phone or SIM card or something I have no clue here...It's really really bad and I'm obviously not the only one.
3 days and it's been horrible, the only reason why I didn't notice sooner is because I've been using the phone on WiFi most the time.
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how fast is the HSPA you're getting?
1-3.56Mbps down and 0.04-1.03Mbps up.
Out on the street downtown.
Best I've ever had was at night on LTE 30Mbps down and like 17Mbps up.
All to the same test server. Trying servers several states away it varied, sometimes I'd even see 20Mbps down to a far away server.
Again this is all WHEN I'm actually connected to the data network.
The thing just can't hold a connection. Constantly dropped.
edit-- ok so right now same time of day, servers, etc. Sprint's 3G is a little slower, but at least I'm not getting dropped.
and on a side note, i got a REALLY helpful lvl1 tech support lady on the phone. much better experience than i thought. there was an issue in the area before. but basically i'm going to give it another shot. if no good tomorrow, swap for a new phone. they'll call me back friday and we'll see... crossing my fingers.
Any update on this? I've got a new One X and work night shifts twice a week. I've notived tonight that the data drops when the phone is idle and obviously nothing pushes.
There's got to be a way of turning this off. I can see why HTC would call it a feature, but there has to be a flag or a switch somewhere....
Today I went from Houston, TX to Waco, TX and had a strong 3g signal in most places and the occasional lte. However, when I got to Waco, my signal dropped to absolutely no data whatsoever when I would normally have lte. I can call and text just fine, but data is gone. I've done countless reboots, airplane mode toggles, network mode switches, profile/prl updates, but nothing gets data back.
Has this happened to anyone before, or has anyone happened to be around Waco today and have the same thing happen?
Sent from my GT-N8013 using Tapatalk 2
I'm experiencing a similar issue in NYC with my data connections dropping constantly. Even though I know my issue is the phone itself as even my wifi will not stay connected. All of my connections may stay on for a few minutes, maybe even a half hour, but then the icon disappears and the connection is gone. Then it will come back, usually within 5 minutes, only to disappear again shortly after.
No clue what's going on, I'm running stock, haven't rooted. I did install the new update recently, but I'm fairly sure it was happening before that, I just assumed it was poor service from the hurricane damage tho.
If it wasn't for your wifi, I'd say it would have been from the hurricane.
The problem for me is that my wifi is fine, and I usually have a great signal is most places in Waco. I usually drop down to 3g in buildings or roam when I go below ground (for a class, etc), but I've never had an entire loss of signal like this. It could be possible Sprint is working on a tower here, but you'd think they'd have more than one tower to govern the data for the entire city.
I think if my data isn't back by tomorrow, I'm visiting a Sprint store to see what's up. Until then, I'm just glad I live on campus and my university has wifi all over the place.
Sent from my XT897 using Tapatalk 2
This is not entirely related, but I wanted to throw it in somewhere: yesterday I was in a different city, in a part of town that apparently has a very poor Sprint signal. I put my phone down, and when I picked it up 10 minutes later, it was SUPER hot, hotter than a phone of mine has ever been. It also drained around 15% battery in those 10 minutes! I guess it was from constantly trying to connect to the network, and I don't think it was even 3g.... But I've been in poor service areas and have never seen a phone get that hot before.
Well, I feel stupid. Apparently, when I was turning my GPS off with my toggles, I hit toggle mobile data on accident. Silly me.
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