Samsung Fascinate - GPS issues

[Jayems]

I recently purchased a Samsung Fascinate. After reading reviews, I really liked the phone. I knew going into it there was some GPS issues with older Galaxy S models but it apparently had been fixed on the Fascinate. Anyway, I can't connect to GPS for the life of me. Not outdoors, not anywhere.

I've tried the manual fixes and nothing works.

Is there anyone out there who has this phone that has found a way to make it work?

I made it work once... can't do it again. I'm really, really, really disappointed with the Fascinate's GPS capacity.

[FlameOn]

You don't seem to be the only one that has GPS issues. It seems to be something with the the entire SGS line. Anyways the review at phone arena says they wait up to 5 minutes to get a GPS position.

I think this has something to do with them not storing previous positions and satellite ephemeris data in the software. Should have nothing to do with the hardware itself because most of these phones use identical cheapy GPS chips. I have the vibrant but I haven't used the GPS yet... will let you know what the performance is like.

EDIT: Btw... it should be impossible for you to get GPS anywhere else but outdoors. Any indoor positioning is either a stored position or something using triangulation from cell towers.

[FlameOn]

Hm... < 60s for time to first fix on my vibrant. Was using GPS status app to see available satellites and position information and not using some map and navigation application though.

[Jayems]

I'll have to try it out again when I get home and can recharge the battery... that's another thing.. I'm not even using it all that much and the battery lasts ~ 9 hrs.

[FlameOn]

For your GPS issues, I suggest getting something like the GPS status app and seeing how long it takes to get a position fix, if it doesn't take that long then its some kind of software issue with the app you're using and not the hardware or the GPS software on your phone.

All smartphone batteries don't last that long. If you are doing heavy surfing/gaming/whatever where the LCD is on for lengthy periods, expect the battery life to be quite short (~24 hrs). This applies to anything with a 3 something LCD or higher. IPhone is the same way and you expect to charge about once every 24 hours. Wifi also kills battery life really really quickly, turn that off when not needed.

Froyo is supposed to improve the battery performance, but I haven't taken it out of the house since I installed this morning so I can't tell you what the battery life is like yet

EDIT: Looks like battery life is about 8 hours for 30% so far today, thats with wifi use and a couple of messages with one or two app downloads. Huge improvement over the previous 2.1 build with was about 8 hours and 50%. The AMOLED display is quite power hungry chewing up nearly 75% of the power during those 8 hours.