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Cases and Full Body Skins May Significantly Affect GPS Signal

Guys, so I found out what's wrong with my Captivate. I took the Phantom Skinz Carbon Fiber (it's really vinyl) skin off cause it was peeling a little anyways. My GPS became amazing that's with wireless support off and on stock GPS settings. I also have the Body Glove, and I put the case on. The GPS immediately became the way it was with the Phantom Skinz on cannot lock GPS to save my life. I took the Body Glove off, and the GPS locks like a champ. I left the google maps app on for at least 5 min and copilot on for at least 5 min. Both apps held GPS lock throughout and was accurate within 10 meters.
The above findings were subjective, and I also verified objectively using the phone's GPS test app which demonstrated faster satellite detection time and lock time.
I am pretty confident to say that the GPS should be fine on the phone just the case really affects the GPS much more than wireless signal. I hope this solves some of the GPS issues for others.
I started a new thread so that maybe this could benefit others instead of putting it in the huge GPS Improvement thread.

With all due respect if a vinyl skin could atenuate the signal that radically the GPS would be worthless in a car or indoors.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App

I already returned both Body Gloves because of this. With them on, the GPS signals hovered around 38dBHz max, and up in the mid-40's without the gloves.
I recently ordered some Amzer Luxes. Hopefully they don't cut the signal in the same manner.

more placebo effect...
ive never had case on my captivate and the gps is still ass.

GPS Improvement Something Different!

I greatly improved my GPS performance by doing this: First, a brief background: I was always curious about the two electrical contacts mating to the aluminum battery cover; if they were a ground plane or part of the antenna. For the heck of it I tried improving the connections by cleaning the small square contacts on the inside of the cover with a pencil eraser (they looked like they had a thin coating on them) and then gently, slightly prying up the contact on the right with a small screwdriver (the left is spring-loaded) and thats it. I was surprised to see an immediate improvement in signal strength resulting in locks within a minute and spot-on navigation. As a side note I noticed a better signal if I held the phone by it's sides vs cradled in my hand. It may be my imagination but I also seem to get a better signal (more bars) on the phone itself. This was probably an issue with my specific unit but I thought I would share.
Edit: Wow! Looks like many have had a similar experience. Still seems too good to be true, would like to know if you see sustained results. I'm curious if oxidation may eventually occur on the bare metal contacts in the cover, might be beneficial to re-clean with an eraser periodically. Be careful, as there has been a report of a broken contact, pry gently! Keep posting your results and thanks to those who gave me a thanks!

Could be - everyone tried to see if the contacts effected cell signal - But i don't remember anyone checking GPS signal with them.

Interesting. I will check this out tomorrow and see.
The thing is though, there are times when GPS would work great and some when it won't. It's usually in different areas though. For instance, around NYC area and where I live, it always works. When I went to Mass over Thanksgiving, I could barely get anything. This is without touching the casing and having a hard plastic case on.

can you post pics of what you did?

Interesting. Scratched some of that top layer off the contacts on the door and used a screwdriver to pry up the contact on the phone a bit. We'll see how it goes tomorrow. Got a much higher mobile speed test result than I usually do, but that can vary wildly so it could just be coincidence.

I am very much interested, please do provide more test results and pictures, please. Ever since reverting back to eclair (with the minor update that "fixed" tethering... I mean GPS signal, it was horrible. I needed it badly today and lucked out when I just had barely caught enough to get me to my destination. Thank you.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App

jz3 said:
I greatly improved my GPS performance by doing this: First, a brief background: I was always curious about the two electrical contacts mating to the aluminum battery cover; if they were a ground plane or part of the antenna. For the heck of it I tried improving the connections by cleaning the small square contacts on the inside of the cover with a pencil eraser (they looked like they had a thin coating on them) and then gently, slightly prying up the contact on the right with a small screwdriver (the left is spring-loaded) and thats it. I was surprised to see an immediate improvement in signal strength resulting in locks within a minute and spot-on navigation. As a side note I noticed a better signal if I held the phone by it's sides vs cradled in my hand. It may be my imagination but I also seem to get a better signal (more bars) on the phone itself. This was probably an issue with my specific unit but I thought I would share.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
how much did you pry up the contact on the right? A small paper clip works well as your can actually slide it into the rounded up portion and use leverage from the side to lift up. I lifted it a little bit but i mostly settled back down into original position..maybe slightly lifted from original position. I can tell they have been making connection because there are worn spots on the corresponding contact points on the door.
The coating on the contact spots looks possibly to be some kind of spray coating similar to a thermal paste only dry? Wonder if the connection would be better without it or if it was removed and replaced with a very conservative amount of quality thermal paste. (Also when you cleaned them with eraser was the white film removed or still present?). Mine is still present although there are small worn spots where you can see the metal from where the contacts were touching.

bames said:
how much did you pry up the contact on the right? A small paper clip works well as your can actually slide it into the rounded up portion and use leverage from the side to lift up. I lifted it a little bit but i mostly settled back down into original position..maybe slightly lifted from original position. I can tell they have been making connection because there are worn spots on the corresponding contact points on the door.
The coating on the contact spots looks possibly to be some kind of spray coating similar to a thermal paste only dry? Wonder if the connection would be better without it or if it was removed and replaced with a very conservative amount of quality thermal paste. (Also when you cleaned them with eraser was the white film removed or still present?). Mine is still present although there are small worn spots where you can see the metal from where the contacts were touching.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I pried it up just a hair worrying that it might break off. Mine looked like it was not making good contact as there was no wear marks. I first removed the film by scraping it with a knife then using an eraser. Underneath the film it is just the bare aluminum.

You could just move to Axura if you want great GPS without messing with the contacts.

adamholden85 said:
You could just move to Axura if you want great GPS without messing with the contacts.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That assumes there is no hardware issue. Due to the huge variations in GPS success with people on the same software, there is probably more involved. One possibility is antenna, another likely culprit is "disk" IO blocking GPS functions.
If the contacts and antenna are an issue on a phone, changing OS or tweaking softrware will not make things better.

I think you stubbled on something here, I'm picking up sat. in my home, have not tried it on the road yet, but I am excited to test it out. I've been fighting this
GPS problem since day one. It is the only problem I have with the phone. Thanks for posting your discovery. Man, I think everyone should at least try this and post your results, because I am getting extraodinary results.

alphadog00 said:
That assumes there is no hardware issue. Due to the huge variations in GPS success with people on the same software, there is probably more involved. One possibility is antenna, another likely culprit is "disk" IO blocking GPS functions.
If the contacts and antenna are an issue on a phone, changing OS or tweaking softrware will not make things better.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am not saying Axura will help everyone but boy has it helped quite a few. Check the poll I put on the OP.

If you're gonna do this, use an INK (white) eraser. They work much better at cleaning electrical contacts.

adamholden85 said:
You could just move to Axura if you want great GPS without messing with the contacts.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
nm... I can't count.

I cleaned off the 2 contact points on the lid using my pocket knife. There seemed to be some white coating on it. My gps is working real well now.

1 sat in an office building (no lock but actually see's it) .. 5x5 bars 3g download 1889kbps/ up 517kbps (was lucky to get 900kbps before..) so yah it is both the Cell ant which is the spring loaded one and the other is the GPS. The coating isn't actually a coating just the oxidation at assmb. emery paper prob works the best just don't try to make it too shiny or remove to much metal.

Wow!! You may have really got something here. I just spent 2 minutes cleaning off and prying up the contacts and the results were instant! As soon as I booted the device back up my 3G signal strength increased by two bars! Not only that but I got a GPS lock in record time - only a few seconds. YMMV
Thank you for posting this!!

Long time browser here. Just made a forum account to post my results of doing this.
Let me first say that you might really be onto something here. I powered my phone down then scraped the white coating on the cover contacts to bare metal using a pocket knife. Then pyred the right contact up to about a 45-50 degree angle. About putting it all back together and powering the phone up and killing all the apps afterward I launched gps test ap. I got 7 sats and a lock under 10 seconds sitting here at my desk. Beforehand I would've been lucky to ever see 1 sat sitting here and even more luckier to get 5+ or a lock holding it against the window to my right.
Haven t tried this outside but I will on my trip to the phili airport this even.
Thanks a bunch!
+Getting 7-10 locks with 32-49feet accuracy here at my desk. Never ever got a lock here before!
+5:30 est. Just did a speed test on 3g. Usually getting around 600-700kbs here at my desk. Getting 1.5-1.7k+ Now...
Also should I be concerned about scratching up the back tabs while removing the coating. Looks like I took sandpaper to them. I mean the its aluminum so rust isn't a problem. And nothing will be touching or getting on them to cause any type of corrosion.

Wow, I normally have 5 bars where I'm at so I couldn't see any change in that obviously, but GPS is perfect sitting here in my house, can't wait to try it out on the road! By the way, I gotta say this again, when I say GPS is perfect, when I zoom in all the arrow is sitting exactly on the portion of the house that I'm in. I'm amazed.
Edit - Just did a speed test and WOW immediate speed increase, ping was 100 below normal, did 1mb/s up AND down! This is definitely a nice little trick you've found.

First time posting. I just tried this, and am getting a lock inside the house for literally the first time.
However, I also got a lock while driving this afternoon for the first time (my GPS experience has been exceedingly poor), before I cleaned the contacts. Maybe it's just a good.day for GPS signal in my neck of the woods today.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App

Wifi Death Grip

I just tried the death grip at the Bell store and the wifi indicator quickly dropped one bar. I was quite disappointed, until in a whim I tried on my N1. Lo and behold, it dropped TWO bars, not to mention it's in a quality Deodorant case. So I guess the issue has been blown out of proportion. But I do find the horrible viewing angle annoying, compared to my N1 and IS. So I'm still deciding...
Sent from my Nexus One using XDA App

Walk away from the router and try again. Not blown out of proportion at all ...

You'll notice the death grip only if u wanna see it... You'll never be disconnected untill u'r holding the phone normally, both in portrait and landscape...
But if you hold it intentionally at top right corner around camera, u'll notice death grip..

pnyppon said:
You'll notice the death grip only if u wanna see it... You'll never be disconnected untill u'r holding the phone normally, both in portrait and landscape...
But if you hold it intentionally at top right corner around camera, u'll notice death grip..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not so fast. Simply placing the phone down on a flat surface (screen side up) is enough to cause a significant loss in wifi signal. This signal loss is not an issue if you are very close to your router, however this is not always possible. I have noticed that this signal loss is often enough to cause unreliable wifi communication, but not enough to disconnect wifi entirely and fall back to mobile data. This results in no connectivity and missed notifications which can be quite frustrating.
The solution is to observe one or more of the following:
1) Stay close to the router.
2) Turn wifi off unless actively using it.
3) Place the phone face down instead of face up.
4) When holding the phone, keep your greasy paws away from the antenna.

Buy a rubber case with some rubber backing like the case-mate. That should solve whatever issues you have.

m918v said:
Buy a rubber case with some rubber backing like the case-mate. That should solve whatever issues you have.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
And how exactly do you propose that a rubber case will solve this issue? This isn't an iPhone 4 external antenna issue.. A case on this phone will likely cause an additional small reduction in wifi signal.

smacman said:
Not so fast. Simply placing the phone down on a flat surface (screen side up) is enough to cause a significant loss in wifi signal.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just tried this and it caused zero loss in wifi signal. Tried it with and without the case, no difference. So, your observation would appear to only be true for some phones or some routers.
I do see about a 20-25dB signal loss if I wrap my hand around the top of the phone, but that's easily avoided, so for me it's not a serious problem.

*something witty about this being the nine millionth thread about the death grip and how this is redundant*
Thread closed.

[Q] Looking for good case w/ low signal interference

After a lot of testing, the four different types of cases I bought (cheapos on Amazon) have horrible degradation of signal.
GPS signal is almost entirely wiped out by all cases. Tower signal has a small, yet identifiable, loss as well. I tested both signals with Marketplace apps: "GPS Stats" and with "OpenSignal".
Any cases out there that don't have interference or are very minimalist in doing so?
Two cases that I've tried and have GPS signal loss to the maximum are:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004PNAXXW/ref=wms_ohs_product_T2
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004PN7DRG/ref=wms_ohs_product_T2

How exactly do you quantify signal strength for GPS?
Sent from my Inspire 4G using the power of the dark side

Well, that's a fair point. I've based it on how many satellites I lock onto both indoors and outdoors. I let it "lock" and then wait a couple of minutes to see the number that actually stayed locked.
For example, without the case I can lock onto 7 sat's indoors, but with the case I'm currently only getting 1 sat. Outdoors, I can get 5-6 with the case and 9 constant without.

With my Otterbox Defender I see no difference in GPS or cell signal. I lock 9 says inside on or off as well as get the same signal strength for cell.
The first two shots are naked. The last two are in the Defender. That's actually the first time I ever saw double digit sats.
Sent from my Inspire 4G using the power of the dark side

The Otterbox Commuter is another good case. It might have a small amount of attenuation - a couple of months ago I did some testing and I got a lock on 8 satellites with the case on, and 9 satellites with the case off. Not enough difference to worry about, and my results may have been within the margin of error.

Thanks for the input. There are a lot of factors for GPS issues....

The Seidio innocase II works well for me...
I tried the casemate tough and it def degraded my gps signal..

Seidio case I'm in love with. My sis ran over my phone and it's fine! I've haven't had problem with the signal.
It's always good to have a good radio flashed in too.

Yeah, this ****ty case has definite issues with GPS. With the patch I provide in the Android Development, I can only get 4 sats with it maximum and it takes forever to get past 1. But, I get instant 7 with it off and gain a few more seconds later.
Now, there are two cases that look to be the same
http://www.amazon.com/Seidio-Innoca...PTB0/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1316740449&sr=8-4
http://www.amazon.com/Seidio-SURFAC...RWU2/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&qid=1316740449&sr=8-9
It's as if they are calling them two separate things even though they appear to be the same?
In looking at those cases, the design may be why some say it's fine with GPS. The GPS spring-connected antenna is on the backplate that holds the LED. If it's opened nicely, you get a clear shot. If it's covered with crap (as mine only has a hole for the led), it sucks. Just an assumption until I figure out which to buy.

I personally have the S-wave black case. If I need the navigation on my phone, I just take the case off. Problem solved

popupstoppa said:
I personally have the S-wave black case. If I need the navigation on my phone, I just take the case off. Problem solved
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, I'm tired of taking this case off every time I need to test my patch!

tell me about this device

singforpain said:
tell me about this device
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What about it?
FYI: The innocase is awesome!

I use the Speck Candy and have zero issue w/ either GPS or Cellular signals. My only complaint is the thin piece(specifically the plastic portion, the rubber stays in tact) at the bottom below the front bezel tends to crack, but the case is warranted for a yr. I've replaced mine for this piece breaking w/out issue at the ATT store.
The piece I'm referring to is the thin section that's against my leg in the photo.
Here's with the case on.

concerning the bt and wifi death grip

forgive me if it has been posted over and over again, but after some time now, has any1 actually found a real fix? from last year's thread till now, some say it's software some say hardware, some say hard case solves it but some says aluminium foil does it. some even say by simply turning on best wifi performance, it will solve it.
some others say flashing a custom rom fixes it. so what is the actual fix? tomoro im going to buy aluminium foils and run it all over the antennaes behind my back cover and see if it helps..
i've tested my sensation, yes death grip is there, but not as terrible as people had it before.
here's my test results :
ROUTER : ASUS N53SV (use connectify)
OS : WIN7 HP
distance from router, 2metres, but blocked with a wooden door (those thick and hard type).
normal holding position : full bar
cover the antennae : 4 bars (- 1 bar)
cover the antennae with 2 hands : 3~4 bar
scenario 2 : distance : 10 metres (blocked by walls and doors) (went to different room on the same floor
normal holding position : 4 bar
cover with 1 hand : 2 bar
cover with 2 hand : 1 bar
considering the fact that im using my laptop to emit wireless signal, this is not bad at all. but im still trying the aluminium foil fix tomoro. will report back
do post your methods of fixing here if you have it thx

Every smartphone has a deathgrip issue and to be honest, it doesnt affect me so much. When i cover with my hand the antenna positions, signal drops 1 line, maximum 2, but like i said, that's normal. Had this problem with 3 different phones, and i think its a general smartphone issue. In many cases people like overreacting.
But hey, thats my opinion!

i've tried my damndest to find this death grip and i just cannot...i run a speedtest and completely cover every single part of the phone with both hands and i still manage to get a 10Mb throughput...so i just don't get it

Have you got a dual band router, if so that's probably why you cant find it.

Death grip affect all of the Sensation phones whether people admit it or not. The back cover is part of the antenna, so covering it with your hand WILL drop the signal. I find it is worse with wifi. No software will fix it, no tinfoil will fix it, no ROM will fix it. Just don't clasp your hands fully around the back cover and its not a big problem.

the_scotsman said:
Death grip affect all of the Sensation phones whether people admit it or not. The back cover is part of the antenna, so covering it with your hand WILL drop the signal. I find it is worse with wifi. No software will fix it, no tinfoil will fix it, no ROM will fix it. Just don't clasp your hands fully around the back cover and its not a big problem.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
that said, some people dont experience it at all. there's a couple of youtube videos proving that. they cover the entire backside of their phone and there's no signal loss..