Well it seems the GPS on our Captivates has been improving over time due to adjusted Jupiter files, ROM updates, improvements in some leaked builds, and now a new GLGPS Daemon port, etc, but still seeing posts by lots of folks who still have trouble achieving good results. So, while the improvement quest continues, was thinking it might be helpful to have a common scoring or grading system for people to use when reporting on their gps results.
Would appreciate any comments on the usefulness of this, or agreement or disagreement with the descriptions. Just seems to me that currently it is often difficult to know what someone means when they say their GPS is good, best its ever been, or terrible.
(Note - to be most helpful to others please post your grade/results and anything you've done that has improved the gps performance.)
It would go something like this:
Captivate GpsGrade
A Common Way to Report GPS Effectiveness
Grade = A. Description – Performance is excellent at all times and very consistent. Applications such as Maps, Copilot, Google Nav, MyTracks always perform perfectly. Tracks as recorded by MyTracks consistently show the route accurately. GPS Locks are quick – under 30 seconds, and accuracy shows 5 to 10 meters or better as measured by lbstest, or GPS Test applications. When used for navigation, there is no drifting off of the road, no lag, and no overshoot of intersections. In short – its how we would want it to be.
Grade = B. Description – GPS function often works as expected, but occasionally does not. Usually no problem seeing several satellites and get locks within 30 seconds but always under a minute. Navigation apps are usable but sometimes there is a small bit of drift and sometimes will lag or show overshooting of intersections. Tracking via MyTracks is often accurate to the route taken, but sometimes off by a bit. Locks are sometimes lost but the system usually locks on again in just a few seconds. Accuracy often around 30 meters. Its not quite what we would like, but can live with it. Might call it pretty good.
Grade = C. Description – system achieves locks but often takes 60 seconds or longer. Locks are sometimes maintained while moving, sometimes not. Erratic performance. Can sometimes get Apps like Maps and Nav to work, but often have trouble with them or the system shows being on the next road or off the road. Routes recorded by MyTracks show inaccurate performance – route shown is close to the one taken but has occasional gaps with loss of lock. Accuracy is between 30 and 50 meters. In other words, performance may be good enough for location based services to be used, but not too useful for map or navigation functions. Mediocre.
Grade = D. Description – system sometimes gets a lock but cannot maintain lock. GPS Apps are not useable do to poor performance. In GPS Test or lbstest can sometimes see a couple satellites, but trouble getting a fix. Basically the GPS Icon is flashing pretty much the entire time. Awful would describe it.
Grade = F. Description – system does not work at all – cannot get locks, and cannot use any GPS Apps such as Maps or Nav, ever. Its just horrible.
good idea.
The problem with this, is most people have no idea how to properly test anything. For this to have any meaning, all tests should be conducted as follows:
Using multiple devices - not just a Captivate but another phone as well on another run
Not holding the phone in your hand - we know this can cause signal issues
Repeatable routes (testing on the same route)
Driving - walking does not allow for fast enough position change to reveal problems
No other apps running on phone - try to reduce any type of processor or storage contention issues
1. Mount device in car mount in the front windshield - other windows may have tint that interfere with signal reception
2. Launch Google mytracks - start driving after 10 seconds (fixed time for lock - equal for all)
3. Drive route with local and highway speeds and turns
4. Repeat with another device
5. Compare MyTracks recordings
Turn-by-Turn nav is a nice way to view accuracy BUT it has no way to record measurements. Comparing devices with a tool like Googles MyTracks is the only way to show that the captivate GPS sucks or not - maybe other phones suck too in certain environments.
This same methodology should be used before and after any mods as well - otherwise it is all hearsay.
alphadog00 said:
The problem with this, is most people have no idea how to properly test anything. For this to have any meaning, all tests should be conducted as follows:
Using multiple devices - not just a Captivate but another phone as well on another run
Not holding the phone in your hand - we know this can cause signal issues
Repeatable routes (testing on the same route)
Driving - walking does not allow for fast enough position change to reveal problems
No other apps running on phone - try to reduce any type of processor or storage contention issues
1. Mount device in car mount in the front windshield - other windows may have tint that interfere with signal reception
2. Launch Google mytracks - start driving after 10 seconds (fixed time for lock - equal for all)
3. Drive route with local and highway speeds and turns
4. Repeat with another device
5. Compare MyTracks recordings
Turn-by-Turn nav is a nice way to view accuracy BUT it has no way to record measurements. Comparing devices with a tool like Googles MyTracks is the only way to show that the captivate GPS sucks or not - maybe other phones suck too in certain environments.
This same methodology should be used before and after any mods as well - otherwise it is all hearsay.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are there actually people that have GPS that is consistently accurate to 10 meters or less? I can't even get a lock like that standing in one spot on a sunny day. If I don't enable wireless networks, my GPS icon will flash forever.
ChaoticKinesis said:
Are there actually people that have GPS that is consistently accurate to 10 meters or less? I can't even get a lock like that standing in one spot on a sunny day. If I don't enable wireless networks, my GPS icon will flash forever.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, many of us has GPS that works fairly well. I have had my phone since launch and running the stock GPS config.... it works OK.
My GPS is an A. I got a replacement and has worked perfectly since.
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App
ChaoticKinesis said:
Are there actually people that have GPS that is consistently accurate to 10 meters or less? I can't even get a lock like that standing in one spot on a sunny day. If I don't enable wireless networks, my GPS icon will flash forever.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Results are extremely variable. Your phone sounds like mine. By trial and error I have gotten mine to an "A", but only by doing these four things 1) flashing new ROM - Assonance (5.0), 2) installing Da_g's GPS fix, 3) Removing the rear cover and just using my Bodyglove cover, and 4) when in the car plugging into car charger.
There are other solutions and reported good results from other ROMs and methods, but these are the things that work for me. I have done extensive testing with each of the four items, including MyTracks recordings, to validate the impact they each have. Good luck with yours - it IS possible to get a working system.
Mines grade b at most.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
Where can I get this Da_G fix? I'm using Assonance 5.2 and it works fairly well - about a C+ or B I guess. I tried searching XDA for the Da_G fix and couldnt find anything
PixelPerfect3 said:
Where can I get this Da_G fix? I'm using Assonance 5.2 and it works fairly well - about a C+ or B I guess. I tried searching XDA for the Da_G fix and couldnt find anything
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can get Da_G's fix at the post below. Three options - I have been using the Google version and had good success with it.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=881941
High Level Symptoms:
- I notice battery has drained very quickly in a short time even when I have not been using phone (i.e. idle with display off)
- Phone feels noticeably warm/hot even when I have not been using phone (e.g. like it does while charging)
- Issue only seems to happen when running in 4G LTE mode
- I have gathered detailed usage statistics and do not believe there are any miss-behaving apps or system processes responsible
- I have noticed issue start most often near my office (in midtown NYC)
Note: This is where I use the phone on battery the most, so it may just be sampling bias
- I can temporarily stop the rapid power burn by switching out of 4G LTE mode (i.e. to 3G mode, or disabling radio)
- I have not found a way to stop the issue in 4G LTE mode once it starts except by restarting phone
(things I tried without success: toggling airplane mode, switching to 3G and back to 4G, radio off/on, and moving to different location/tower; rapid burn starts back up again as soon as 4G LTE mode is re-enabled)
Power Burn Rate:
- Data captured using Battery Monitor Widget which I have set to sample/log battery available % and usage every minute (this is a great app!)
- Available % dropping at a rate of about 20% / hour while phone is idle w/ screen off (my normal is about 5% / hour)
- Usage shows a very flat baseline of about 1000 mW / 250 mA (normal baseline is more like 100 mW / 40 mA)
(by baseline I mean many samples are equal to that baseline value with the rest being spikes up to greater values; no observed values are less than the baseline)
Background Info:
- My phone is unrooted and running stock firmware w/ the Verizon OTA upgrade (installed ~2011-05-19)
- I have noticed this issue many times since first getting the phone (~2011-04-12), and this issue is still present even with the newest LTE radio FW in the OTA update
- I am new to Android (~2 months in) but I am diving in deep with all the amazing tools both built-in and via add-on apps; I have collected a range of data/observations from numerous sources that are detailed in this post
My hypothesis is that the LTE radio hardware is responsible for this power burn. Most likely due to a software/firmware bug, but I'm not sure how to confirm that.
I wonder how common this issue is. I remember reading other posts on the forum that sound like the same thing. For example: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1008761
Can anyone else confirm they have seen this issue? If this issue is wide spread, I think it may be a contributing factor to the wide spread reports of 4G LTE a lot of battery.
I do not think this is the only factor that causes 4G LTE to use more power than 3G. I have read the reports, and personaly seen, higher 4G LTE power consumption when in low signal areas. However, I belive that to be independant from the burn issue I am describing here. The worst case power consumption I've seen that I think was "low LTE signal" related was only about 500 mW / 130 mA. The burn issue I'm refering too consumes power at about twice that rate and happened when I had strong signal. I had three to four of four possible bars. Also, I grabbed more detailed information:
----------
Phone info
reached using "LTE OnOff" app, "Network" app, or by dialing *#*#4636#*#* -> Phone information
Signal strength: -67 dBm to -80 dBm, 3 to 4 asu
Location: BID = 39b SID = 16 NID = 4
LAT = 7fffffff LONG = 7fffffff
Network Type: CDMA + LTE/EvDo auto
I believe this is good signal (e.g. issue not due to a low signal condition)
==================
Usage Data Capture
I briefly connected to power to reset the statistics after noticing the issue had started and and captured about an hours worth of data. My understanding of the data is that the display was off for almost all the time, and no apps or system processes are listed as using any significant amount of CPU/sensors in comparison to the hour data collection window.
-----------
Battery Use
reached using Settings -> About Phone -> Battery Use, or Battery Monitor Widget -> Usage
When last unplugged for 57m 12s
Display 30%
* Time on 1m 11s
* Auto Brightness
Cell Standby 21%
* Time on 57m 12s
Phone idle 19%
* Time on 56m 1s
Foursquare 11%
* CPU total 8s
* CPU foreground 6s
* GPS 26s
* Data sent 13.59 KB
* Data received 379.93 KB
Android System 7%
* CPU total 41s
* CPU foreground 2s
* Data sent 12.09 KB
* Data received 20.27 KB
Android OS 6%
* CPU total 39s
* Data sent 20.11 KB
* Data received 136.25 KB
Pandora 6%
* CPU total 35s
* Data sent 1.83 KB
* Data received 27.16 KB
---------------
Battery History
reached using Battery Monitor Widget -> Statistics, or by dialing *#*#4636#*#* -> Battery history
since last unplugged
CPU usage
* Android System (Total time:39s)
* Pandora (Total time:35s)
* suspend (Total time:31s)
* Foursquare (Total time:7s)
... (Note: more apps listed but with smaller total times)
Sensor usage
* Android System 29m 47s
* AccuWeather.com 28m 36s
(Note: after this capture I uninstalled AccuWeather.com app and retested. It wasn't listed anymore, but power drain behavior was unaltered)
Partial wake usage
* K-9 Mail 7m14s
* Android System 5m 4s
* Seesmic 9s
... (Note: more apps listed but with smaller times)
Other Usage
* Running (27.6%)
* Screen on (2.1%)
-------------------
CPU Spy v0.3.0 beta
Note: timers reset at begining of measurement interval
Time in state
1024 MHz 4:21 7%
768 MHz 0:54 1%
368 MHz 0:35 0%
245 MHz 12:11 20%
Deep Sleep 41:34 69%
This is a typical distribution I see when the phone is mostly idle (CPU sleeping for most of the time).
=================
Variation testing
After the data capture I systematicly tried several methods to see what it took to stop the abnormal drain in 4G LTE mode. In the end only rebooting the phone did it.
Set preferred network type: "CDMA auto (PRL)" (i.e. 3G mode) -> normal power usage (5:00pm-5:18pm)
Set preferred network type: "CDMA + LTE/EvDo auto" (i.e. 4G mode) -> abnormally high power usage (5:18pm to 5:43pm)
Set airplane mode (i.e. radio off) -> very low power usage (5:43pm to 6:54pm)
Turned off airplane mode (i.e. 4G mode) -> abnormally high power usage
Set preferred network type: "LTE mode" (i.e. ONLY 4G mode) -> abnormally high power usage
Set preferred network type: "CDMA + LTE/EvDo auto" (i.e. 4G mode) -> abnormally high power usage
Moved to a new place:
Signal strength: -65 dBm 4 asu
Location: BID = 23c SID = 16 NID = 4
LAT = 7fffffff LONG = 7fffffff
-> abnormally high power usage
Phone info "Turn off radio" button -> very low power usage
Phone info "Turn on radio" button -> abnormally high power usage
Restart phone -> normal power usage
I experience the same problem. My guess is that the radio firmware gets into a bad state when you are in an area with bad coverage.
I have been in a state where disabling data didn't stp the battery drain, only entering airplane mode would stop it.
crpalmer said:
I experience the same problem. My guess is that the radio firmware gets into a bad state when you are in an area with bad coverage.
I have been in a state where disabling data didn't stp the battery drain, only
entering airplane mode would stop it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I originally thought the same thing about the issue starting while in poor coverage, but since I have seen it occur multiple times in a good coverage area I began to doubt that was the case. The extra power consumption I usually get while in poor coverage is less in magnitude, and varies much more, and goes away when I have good coverage again. This issue feels distinctly different to me.
When you say disabling data didn't stop the drain you experienced, do you mean turning off Settings -> Wireless & networks -> Mobile networks? I haven't tried playing with that option. I'll give it a try next time I see the issue too.
You said entering airplane mode would stop it. Did you have the same experience that when you turned airplane mode off that the drain started back up again until you restarted?
Thanks
Excellent post, I would venture a guess that your background is in one the sciences.
One thing I noticed you didn't try was connecting through wifi. I believe this will render the 4g radio on but not in use. If the issue persists, it could help narrow down the cause.
As far as attempting to fix it, you can factory reset it or go to verizon for a replacement.. but that doesn't do much for others with this problem.
I have been having the same issue, both on stock and BAMF 1.6. Thanks for looking so thoroughly at this problem. It appears not everyone is affected. Can someone confirm? If so, exchanging the could be the solution.
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA App
To test your hypothesis, I'd recommend turning off LTE somehow. My suggestion for non-rooted phone:
Dial ##778#
Chose edit mode, password: 000000
You should be able to turn off LTE in Modem Settings->Preferred Mode
Please let us know your finding.
Nice work on the research!
The scenario you described happened to me yesterday.
I was in a building where I didn't get any reception at all. I noticed the phone started to warm up. By the time I got outside and the phone re-established a connection with the 4g network, it was extremely warm and the phone was at 7% life begging to be charged.
This has happened to me on two other occasions but I don't recall being in an area of zero to poor reception.
My bolt is also rooted running the BAMF Remix 1.6.
agdaniels said:
Excellent post, I would venture a guess that your background is in one the sciences.
One thing I noticed you didn't try was connecting through wifi. I believe this will render the 4g radio on but not in use. If the issue persists, it could help narrow down the cause.
As far as attempting to fix it, you can factory reset it or go to verizon for a replacement.. but that doesn't do much for others with this problem.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you. Your guess is spot on; I did my Ph. D. in computer science.
I have not tried switching to WiFi. Next time I see the issue I will put that to the test. I find I haven't been using WiFi much with this phone since I have lower standby power consumption in 3G mode when I don't need the speed. When I do want more speed, I find here in NYC 4G LTE is actually significantly faster than either my home or work Internet connection (Cable and DSL respectively) (Crazy!). Also, here in NYC the 2.4 GHz band is VERY crowded so WiFi can slow down at times even on a good wired Internet connection. I wish this phone was 5 GHz WiFi capable to help avoid this particular issue.
My intuition is that this is a radio firmware issue so I have my doubts that a factory reset or even a replacement would fix anything. Factory reset would help if there were misbehaving apps or screwed up settings on my phone, but this seems unlikely. I'll probably need to root my phone so I can back it up before I try a factory reset. A replacement would only help if there was a hardware fault. Part of the purpose of this thread is to help gauge if many other people have this problem. The more that do, the less likely it is an abnormal HW fault with only my phone, and more likely a bug or other HW errata issue that hasn't been worked around correctly.
I think it is still too early in the game to make the call that it is not fixable in FW. I was aware that this LTE network/chipset is quite new and this phone was likely to have some rough spots at the start. Verizon/HTC/Qualcomm have only made one OTA release so far, and even that release has major bugs that were not present in the original stock FW (e.g. the frequent spontaneous rebooting when in 3G mode). Forums like this seem like great places for us users to publicly characterize issues we encounter. I hope it helps the engineers involved in making fixes and that we get updates not too far down the line.
cuguy said:
To test your hypothesis, I'd recommend turning off LTE somehow. My suggestion for non-rooted phone:
Dial ##778#
Chose edit mode, password: 000000
You should be able to turn off LTE in Modem Settings->Preferred Mode
Please let us know your finding.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the suggestion.
If you look at the last part of my post under the "Variation Testing" heading, I believe I did try a number of configurations with LTE off. Each case where LTE was off I saw normal or low power consumption. This is why I grew to suspect the LTE radio in the first place.
The technique I used for switching between 3G and 4G modes was actually the "Set prefered network type" drop down on the "Phone info" menu that can be reached using "LTE OnOff" app, "Network" app, or by dialing *#*#4636#*#* and selecting "Phone Information".
I have used the dial ##778# to get the ESPT menu before, but that was to modify the "Rev. A" setting from "eHRPD" to "Enable" as a work around to re-enable 3G EVDO during the few days of nation wide 4G LTE & 3G SVDO outage we had a month or so ago. BTW, it looks like I had by phone set to the non-stock "Enable" setting rather than "eHRPD" for the original data capture. I switched this back to "eHRPD" and I'll report if I have the issue again. I was last playing with this setting to see if had any effect on the random reboots after the OTA while on 3G, but it did not.
In the ESPT -> Modem Settings -> Preferred Mode drop down I only see the options for:
- Automatic
- HDR Only
- Digital Only
- CDMA Only (selected by default)
- CDMA HDR Only
There is also a a Preferred Mode(9k) drop down that has these options:
- Automatic
- HDR Only
- LTE Only
- HDR LTE only (selected by default)
I believe that these are settings for the voice radio and the data radio respectively. See the third page of the excellent Anandtech review of the HTC Thunderbolt: <Sorry, I am a new xda-developers forum member so it won't let me post external links yet.>
Do you have suggestions on how to set these? I am unfamiliar with the HDR acronym and haven't turned up anything that seems relevant in my Google searches.
I had another instance of the 4G LTE power burn issue today. I tried a few of the above suggestions.
I enabled WiFi and logged on to an access point. This did not stop the abnormally high power burn. Instead it went up slightly; I assume this was the extra power for the WiFi radio.
I also tried turning off Settings -> Wireless & networks -> Mobile networks. That resulted in the 4G LTE icon going away but the signal bars were still showing. I couldn't use the Internet but a SMS came through in this mode. This mode did not stop the power burn either.
The burn stopped only when I rebooted.
The reboot happened when I dialed ##778# to get the ESPT menu and switched the "Rev. A" setting from "Enable" to "eHRPD" and this time remembered to commit the changes (forgot to when I posted above). Committing the changes auto-rebooted the phone, which returned me to normal power consumption. I will report if I have the problem again now that I have confirmed I am back in the stock eHRPD mode.
Most of today I was in very good signal conditions, judging by the time the drain started, I could have been out on a errand in the neighborhood. So I can't 100% guarantee that the 4G signal was high the whole time.
Does anyone know of an app that works on the Thunderbolt that can log signal strength over time and preferably graph it too (e.g. similar to Battery Monitor Widget). I have tried to download and use a few without success including: Open Signal Maps, Network Signal Info, RF Signal Tracker, and Signal Finder. Some of these apps didn't work at all (I suspect 4G signal is reported a bit differently and this confuses some of them). Some work in general but I can't seem to get the logging I'm looking for.
Thanks!
OdinGuru said:
I originally thought the same thing about the issue starting while in poor coverage, but since I have seen it occur multiple times in a good coverage area I began to doubt that was the case. The extra power consumption I usually get while in poor coverage is less in magnitude, and varies much more, and goes away when I have good coverage again. This issue feels distinctly different to me.
When you say disabling data didn't stop the drain you experienced, do you mean turning off Settings -> Wireless & networks -> Mobile networks? I haven't tried playing with that option. I'll give it a try next time I see the issue too.
You said entering airplane mode would stop it. Did you have the same experience that when you turned airplane mode off that the drain started back up again until you restarted?
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
By disabling data, I was actually using the notification tools in most rooted roms. That should be equivalent to what you said.
Toggling airplane mode toggled the battery drain problem until it failed to enter airplane mode and I had to reboot.
I see the same thing
Where I live at home we only have 3G at work I have 4G. The phone will get itself into some kind of mode at work and burn through the battery in 4-5 hours. So I keep it charging on my desk all day. If I didn't, some days it wouldn't make it till lunch.
OdinGuru said:
Thank you. Your guess is spot on; I did my Ph. D. in computer science.
I have not tried switching to WiFi. Next time I see the issue I will put that to the test. I find I haven't been using WiFi much with this phone since I have lower standby power consumption in 3G mode when I don't need the speed. When I do want more speed, I find here in NYC 4G LTE is actually significantly faster than either my home or work Internet connection (Cable and DSL respectively) (Crazy!). Also, here in NYC the 2.4 GHz band is VERY crowded so WiFi can slow down at times even on a good wired Internet connection. I wish this phone was 5 GHz WiFi capable to help avoid this particular issue.
My intuition is that this is a radio firmware issue so I have my doubts that a factory reset or even a replacement would fix anything. Factory reset would help if there were misbehaving apps or screwed up settings on my phone, but this seems unlikely. I'll probably need to root my phone so I can back it up before I try a factory reset. A replacement would only help if there was a hardware fault. Part of the purpose of this thread is to help gauge if many other people have this problem. The more that do, the less likely it is an abnormal HW fault with only my phone, and more likely a bug or other HW errata issue that hasn't been worked around correctly.
I think it is still too early in the game to make the call that it is not fixable in FW. I was aware that this LTE network/chipset is quite new and this phone was likely to have some rough spots at the start. Verizon/HTC/Qualcomm have only made one OTA release so far, and even that release has major bugs that were not present in the original stock FW (e.g. the frequent spontaneous rebooting when in 3G mode). Forums like this seem like great places for us users to publicly characterize issues we encounter. I hope it helps the engineers involved in making fixes and that we get updates not too far down the line.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You are absolutely correct on all three points, my main focus with the two suggestions were background data for the factory reset and faulty hardware for the replacement.
If you have the ability to disable all background data syncing while on 4g- on the application side, sense ui side, and the android side you could completely rule out software being the cause. My thoughts with this are some background service is keeping the radio active, causing the burn.
The replacement device would help to narrow down whether the issue lies on the device side, or if its more related to the towers/the way lte functions. The latter is bad news for you. My thoughts on this are that some people report no issues running lte, while others are having similar problems as you have reported; I doubt that it is faulty phone hardware, but its possible.
I share your conclusion that this is a firmware(baseband) issue. Actually going in and manipulating it would require root, a considerable understanding of how the interaction between hardware and software works, and the abilty to make tweaks and test them. I will also contact some people more knowledgable then myself and see if they want to chime in on the matter.
crpalmer said:
By disabling data, I was actually using the notification tools in most rooted roms. That should be equivalent to what you said.
Toggling airplane mode toggled the battery drain problem until it failed to enter airplane mode and I had to reboot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Excellent idea. I then I was able to execute the test you suggested yesterday when I re-encountered the issue. I saw the exact same behavior you reported: even though I disable applications data over LTE, the drain did not stop. This is strong supporting evidence that it is not an issue with some kind of rouge app / sync settings.
Drain toggling with airplane mode is the exactly consistent with my observations as well. Sounds like we have confirmed you having the exact same burn issue.
Thank you for the feedback and confirmation.
mcargil05 said:
Where I live at home we only have 3G at work I have 4G. The phone will get itself into some kind of mode at work and burn through the battery in 4-5 hours. So I keep it charging on my desk all day. If I didn't, some days it wouldn't make it till lunch.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is consistent with my observations of the burn issue. The baseline power consumption I observed is about 20% of the battery per hour while phone is idle with screen off. That would correspond to the phone burning through a full charge in 5 hours even if you didn't use it at all. Add any extra actual usage on top of that and 4-5 hours of life sounds very plausible. That assumes you have the problem right away though (the worst case).
I typically see a variable amount of time of normal consumption before the issue starts. For instance, let's say I've been running normally for 3 hours and am at 80% before the issue starts. Then I'd quickly burn through the last 80% in 4 hours or less. In that case I'd get less than 7 hours of total battery life (e.g. not making it through the day). If my normal usage had continued, it should be more like 15 hours (e.g. more than enough for a long day and needs charging every night).
There is still the question if this issue is related or not to 4G signal levels. What do you normally see in the office? Number of bars is useful, and also the more detailed dBm number can be found in Settings -> About Phone -> Network.
Thank you for your report.
agdaniels said:
You are absolutely correct on all three points, my main focus with the two suggestions were background data for the factory reset and faulty hardware for the replacement.
If you have the ability to disable all background data syncing while on 4g- on the application side, sense ui side, and the android side you could completely rule out software being the cause. My thoughts with this are some background service is keeping the radio active, causing the burn.
The replacement device would help to narrow down whether the issue lies on the device side, or if its more related to the towers/the way lte functions. The latter is bad news for you. My thoughts on this are that some people report no issues running lte, while others are having similar problems as you have reported; I doubt that it is faulty phone hardware, but its possible.
I share your conclusion that this is a firmware(baseband) issue. Actually going in and manipulating it would require root, a considerable understanding of how the interaction between hardware and software works, and the abilty to make tweaks and test them. I will also contact some people more knowledgable then myself and see if they want to chime in on the matter.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
In the most recent test I disabled "Mobile Networks" which effectively shutdown data service. I also tested switching to WiFi which should have redirected all data away from the 4G LTE radio. Neither one of these stopped the power burn. Do you agree this is sufficient enough to rule out apps/services?
I noticed on the Phone info screen there are some counters for number of bytes sent over the radio. Next time I have the issue perhaps I'll keep track of how those change when I'm having the issue vs not.
I agree that trying replacement HW would be a useful data point to help identify if the issue is inherent or tower related. I'm not quite ready to jump through all the hoops with Verizon to do it myself yet. I'd want to root first to create a backup of my current setup first to reduce the pain of the procedure. And I'll probably give them the benefit of the doubt and wait for the next OTA to give them another shot at fixing the issue with FW.
Part of our questions would be answered if there was indeed a user out there that runs 4G LTE and can document that they do not have this issue. Does anyone out there run Battery Monitor Widget or similar and can say they have never seen the tell-tail pattern of power burn I am talking about?
I really wish Android had a built in screen capture feature. I need to get adb installed and setup on my computer so I can post examples of what the graphs look like; I think that would help other users to identify the issue as it happens so they know when to re-boot to save what is left of their battery.
I agree there is very little we as users can do to fix the issue if it is in the radio FW. As you say, it would indeed take very detailed knowledge of the HW. Also, I think it would be impossible without the radio FW source code. Although I haven't looked through the HTC released code, I would be very surprised if this was included. It wouldn't be covered under the Android or Linux open source licenses as it likely originally came from Qualcomm and is considered proprietary. Without that, we can only hope that Qualcomm/HTC/Verizon work together to get it figured out. The good news is that they all have a good business case to do so. This LTE chipset is likely to be used in several phones so they need these issues resolved before it affects their whole lineup.
Anyone know if the new Samsung Droid Charge has this issue too?
After experiencing all the same issues myself, I have noticed that this seems to have been addressed in the leaked Gingerbread radio. Might be worthwhile to repeat testing using that radio and then somehow compare code.
Sent from my ADR6400L using XDA Premium App
I would have to agree you've sufficiently ruled out software, the point about the gingerbread build not having issues is worth noting though. Can someone confirm the 2.3 release has new radio firmware? It wouldn't be difficult at all to pull it out and flash it if it does
My thunderbolt will be in hand Monday, I don't have the phd you have in c.s (mines just a bs) but I've been in the business long enough to throw some graphs together. We'll compare notes then if we don't find resolution sooner.
I experience the same problem in North Phoenix when running 4GLTE in a weak 4g signal area. It doesn't happen too often if I'm in a heavily blanketed 4g area.
EDIT. I'm running rooted. OC to usually 1400 mhz. I'm constantly being synced with the Exchange Server. My phone gets super hot when running navigation plus 4GLTE. Temperature gets up to around 110 degrees Fahrenheit.
When I notice my phone heating up, I'll switch to CDMA prl and immediately my battery temperature starts dropping to normal levels, ie. 86 degrees Fahrenheit.
At the time I was running on different radio combinations. Such as, CDMA. 6 and lte. 7 radio combo. I have recently switched to Gingerbread so more testing is needed.
Had a spare minute to look up the radio, looks like its bricking certain devices after flashing. Not completely ruling it out, maybe you can flash it, test it, then flash it back, but there is some risk involved.
Whatever the case, its reassuring to know updates are coming eventually.
Here is a link for reference:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1098363&page=70
I recently received an OTA firmware update for my Samsung Galaxy A5 2016 [SM-A510F].
The new firmware version is A510FXXU4CQDJ / A510FOXA4CQDJ / A510FXXU4CQDH.
The new Android version is 7.0.
After the update I started to experience a GPS issue which I try to explain:
it's like at a certain point (can't figure out the trigger cause) my GPS location remains stuck while tracking it.
I noticed this while using a sport tracking app (the workout distance sometimes had been stuck to zero while sometimes had started increasing but suddenly had stopped).
I first thought about a bug of the sport tracking app, but this morning I made a test workout while monitoring the GPS sensor with the GPS Test app.
When the issue occurred in the sport tracking app (the workout distance stopped increasing), I switched back to the GPS Test app to see what was happening: the GNSS Status was still on 3D Fix and there were about 20 satellites in use, but the accuracy was a s****y 32 meters (while it is usually about 4/6 meters).
It took a couple minutes to have the accuracy around 8 meters again. At that point my location in the sport tracking app was updated and the distance started increasing again when moving.
I had never experienced any GPS issue since I bought the phone. I never monitored the GPS sensor but there had never been any issue when tracking my location with the sport tracking app that I use.
I tried to toggle off and then on again the location functionality on the phone, to restart the phone, to clear and update the AGPS but the issue still persists.
Has anyone any idea on how to solve it?
Exact same problem!
Hi, i have the exact same problem!! I can't seem to figure out what is wrong....
Have you found the answer yet???
elbro84 said:
I recently received an OTA firmware update for my Samsung Galaxy A5 2016 [SM-A510F].
The new firmware version is A510FXXU4CQDJ / A510FOXA4CQDJ / A510FXXU4CQDH.
The new Android version is 7.0.
After the update I started to experience a GPS issue which I try to explain:
it's like at a certain point (can't figure out the trigger cause) my GPS location remains stuck while tracking it.
I noticed this while using a sport tracking app (the workout distance sometimes had been stuck to zero while sometimes had started increasing but suddenly had stopped).
I first thought about a bug of the sport tracking app, but this morning I made a test workout while monitoring the GPS sensor with the GPS Test app.
When the issue occurred in the sport tracking app (the workout distance stopped increasing), I switched back to the GPS Test app to see what was happening: the GNSS Status was still on 3D Fix and there were about 20 satellites in use, but the accuracy was a s****y 32 meters (while it is usually about 4/6 meters).
It took a couple minutes to have the accuracy around 8 meters again. At that point my location in the sport tracking app was updated and the distance started increasing again when moving.
I had never experienced any GPS issue since I bought the phone. I never monitored the GPS sensor but there had never been any issue when tracking my location with the sport tracking app that I use.
I tried to toggle off and then on again the location functionality on the phone, to restart the phone, to clear and update the AGPS but the issue still persists.
Has anyone any idea on how to solve it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am also stuck with this issue
Yvon85 said:
Hi, i have the exact same problem!! I can't seem to figure out what is wrong....
Have you found the answer yet???
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try disabling battery optimizations maybe it's causing the problem
Yvon85 said:
Hi, i have the exact same problem!! I can't seem to figure out what is wrong....
Have you found the answer yet???
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you have social media apps installed(Facebook, Messenger, Whatsapp, Snapchat, etc...), then your issue could be caused by one or more of these apps overloading the CPU and/or consuming all of your bandwidth(not allowing GPS to send or recieve any data to update exact location).
These social media apps are processor and data hogs. They interfere with other things functioning while they are scanning, sending and receiving information packets. They also dramatically impact how long your battery lasts per charge and they can also cause the device to get hot when using these apps heavily, it's even worse if you're charging the device while using these apps heavily.
I DO NOT PROVIDE HELP IN PM, KEEP IT IN THE THREADS WHERE EVERYONE CAN SHARE
I recently had an intermittent GPS problem which finally got so bad that the device (unrooted Samsung A3 (2016) , Lollipop) was not picking up any satellites and thus not getting a fix. After trying all sorts of things, such as deleting files in the phone memory, installing various GPS fixer apps I came across TopNTP in the playstore, installed and ran it. The GPS immediately started working properly again. Don't be put off by the age of the app or the requirement stated in the playstore that the phone be rooted. Mine wasn't and it still worked. Also the install and automatic reboot option in the app does not work. You have to restart your phone manually, but it still fixes the GPS problem.
Hello. I recently started to ride a bike with Strava and track monitoring via watch. I have noticed poor GPS accuracy that makes strava recorded data unusable (max speed >100 kmph, twice more distance due to lost fix...).
Does anyone else observed same issues?
LEO-DLXX (LTE with no sim inserted)
WearOS 1.0
OREO
Hi,
I did not observed this issue on my watch (LTE version). I would event say it is much more acccruate than my phone. But I notice that is not the same in every zone: in some cities, it is OK ans data are usuable, and in others, the GPS is more efficient and I can see which side of the road I was.
Here are some examples of my HWatch2 GPS:
https://ibb.co/iBmcDc
https://ibb.co/fpNHDc
Although I have only used GMaps for navigation, I will say it does give very accurate notifications which has helped me a lot in turning the right turns around 99% of the time compared to relying on only voice navigation on my phone.
Same happens here!
Hi dreamnewbie, Exactly the same thing happens to me, first I thought it was because of the coat, maybe a problem of low signal or the fact of running in the city, some interference by the constructions. after several tests I get to run with short sleeves in open spaces and it's exactly the same, I record the session with the phone and it always measures better, HW2 makes like "peaks" in the route indicating that I got to run at about 40 km/h? !! I do not know if the GPS antenna is very weak or a fault after the upgrade to Wear OS. I love the Huawei propieraty app to run but it is impossible to export workouts to cloud-based services. Regards!
LEO-BX9 (no LTE)
WearOS 1.1
Nexus 6P OREO 8.1.0
Do you guys have a third party watch band? I recently changed the original watch band with a metal one. I noticed the metal interfere with the watches sensors like the compass. Also bluetooth range decreased... i guess i could influence gps reception as well. Now i have the original band installed and no problems. I have the watch for almost a year now and used it a lot for running. Never had any accuracy problems, distance and track was spot on....
I also encountered the same problem. .
What is the version of Strava you are using? Is there any solution?
If there is no way, is there any other application that can be used on the watch and synced to Strava?
ud4x said:
I also encountered the same problem. .
What is the version of Strava you are using? Is there any solution?
If there is no way, is there any other application that can be used on the watch and synced to Strava?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I found out that the issue was interference with wireless bike counter - Kross KRC 319WC. After dismounting counter HW2 track recording is OK.