Anyone else noticing it takes a solid 3-5 min to get a GPS lock on gMaps or similar? Is this normal, and are other mobile phones with GPS equally sluggish? Just curious as gMaps starts with cell tower proximity in order to start a map, but 3-5 min (plus data cost) the app finally shows better results...
What's up with that! Anyone have any tips on how to make it go faster? :-/
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This is completely normal, particularly if the phone's environment restricts satellite visibility or signal quality in any way. It takes time to lock the satellites and assess the quality of signal.
yeah i've also noticed that it takes a good few minutes to lock onto GPS.
and then when i see my friends Iphone, his one locks on almost straight away.
Depends whether the GPS has current satellite data stored or not. I've seen a marine GPS take >40 minutes for a cold start without valid cached data, usually about 5 minutes with 'warm' data after 1 hour shutdown, and about 1 minute for a hot reboot when power was only off for a few seconds. In BB terms you can probably link 'application closed' to warm start, but if you've relocated some distance, long time since last used, or gone low memory and the cache has been reclaimed it could be cold start performance with the satellite almanac having to download again (on the GPS signal from the satellites, not from the cellular network).
In other words, GPS startup performance might vary from event to event even on the same device. If the iPhone does dirty tricks like using stale cached almanacs for initial startup, that will boost apparent performance at the cost of accuracy. From what users have reported here the BB GPS seems to play fairly clean, maybe even on the cautious side with accuracy taking priority over startup time.
I have a new Bold and it takes much longer than my 8800 (side by side) to acquire a GPS signal. The 8800 is almost instant, and the Bold generally takes a couple of minutes.
If I am outside away from major signal blockers I get Gmaps to narrow me down to 400 meters in < 5 seconds. I get my actual location in about 10-20 seconds accurate within 2 or 3 meters. If I challenge the system such as when you turn the phone off, fly, and turn it on again in a cab with Skyscrapers around, it takes me around 1 minute. I think without assisted it would probably take considerably longer.
Seriously, you guys either have GPS issues or aren't running the latest OS........
It should not take longer than 15-20 seconds ever to lock GPS, unless you have zero access to the sky. Then you shouldn't be expecting a GPS lock, rather you should look for your app to use cellular triangulation/towers for an approximate location.
It takes a couple of minutes at most if I'm outside. It could actually be the GPS waiting on the maps to be pulled over a slow data connection. Go to Options>Advanced Options>GPS, refresh it and see how long that takes since it doesn't require data.
The difference with the speed or apparent speed, is aGPS (network assisted) versus Autonomous GPS (stand alone).
If you are getting aGPS, the lock is much faster, (with Verizon, and VZNav, the lock is almost instantaneous), but with Autonomous GPS, you are solely relying on the satellites above to be seen by your device and lock (again using a VZW analogy, because they love to lock down the GPS, without VZNAV, or when using GMaps, or BBMaps, it takes longer to get a lock on the satellites, because it can't use the data). I've read you need at least 7 satellites for an accurate reading.
Edit: I realize you are talking about a Bold, which is not a VZW phone, but the aGPS vs. Autonomous GPS issue will still be present, if the aGPS server is not available, or really busy, or possibly even locked out.
My Bold is running the latest .266 and obviously, I'm outside without building blockage, but the GPS pick up is still very slow compared to the iPhone.
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