[axelj]

yes, had the same problem while my fm-sender was activated.

of course listening to music via my car radio and having the gps activated at

the same time is not really good. nokia just reminds me that im not capable of

multitasking. the n97 isnt capable of multitasking too, because if interfering

signals and of course the limited ram...

thank you nokia.

but then again they just switched of the fm-sender with their latest firmware update to v11

because its not legal to activate an fm-sender in some countries of the world.

at least not in north america. seems like there will be some more iphone users in that

part of the world soon.

i just hope that they fire the guy who is responsible for the worst gps device ever, and the one

who had the idea that this little ram is good enough to save 55 cent while producing this device,

err, flagship, errr cellphone...

the nokia papers are going down at the wallstreet, and there is a reason for this. now let wait

us a few more weeks without updating our stuff, without fixing the flagships *cough* and nokia

can start firing the first *good-idea*workers. deserved i would say. its not that there are other

phones out there and nokia really doesnt get the clue that they are 2 years late with this phone

(if it would work like expected).

hello nokia employees, do you really think that your jobs are safe for the next few month?

still sitting on your desk proud about your work?

lets see in a while

[bitflung]

perhaps i'm biased - my old N95-1 had VERY POOR gps reception compared to the N97-NAM.  with the N97 i get a solid lock while my phone is sitting in my cup-holder, beneath the dashboard and with no clear view of the sky.  

i have, however, noticed that the maps 3.0 beta 'chugged' a bit, similar to how you described, where my position icon lagged a ways behind my real location.  for me it even bounced a bit, so when i came to a stop the position icon would catch up to my real position, then bounce back 100 yards, then catchup again, and repeat.

three points to make from this:

1.  this issue went away for me with the upgrade to maps 3.0 final, and remained gone with the update to maps 3.1

2.  the issue, when i had it, seemed worse when the device was under load - if i was playing music for example

3.  plugging in the charger seems to launch a software component to handle intelligent control over the charging mechanism (note the firmware update to v11 included a fix specifically for this software component).  on my phone it seems being plugged into the charger has an effect similar to running lots of background programs: it puts load on the CPU

so - perhaps the car charger is not interfering with gps signal?  perhaps you are experiencing this cpu load based lag that i have witnessed in the past?

try verifying your assumption:

Menu -> Location -> GPS data -> Options -> Satellite status

watch the bars wiggle for a few minutes, try to plug the charger in without moving the phone, then watch them for a few minutes again.  does the charger REALLY affect your gps reception?

-bit 

[axelj]

its not the first s60 im fiddeling around with since my old n95.

im very aware what happens within the phone when i turn on gps.

but there is a difference, i dont use a-gps or the net based one.

reasons and thread here:

/discussions/board/message?board.id=navigation&thread.id=12223

turn off a-gps (since you dont want to pay the extra for your provider) and check again.

vodafone today admitted that they had faulty devices and sent the shipment back to nokia.

the first production seems to have some bug with the gps. it can see the satellites, but never

locks on to them. 

[bitflung]

FM radio interferes with GPS reception:

yes, this is called the near-field effect and, well, it's an issue for ALL rf receivers in the phone during and rf transmission.  you get symptoms in the gps receiver more so than the others because the gps receiver is high-gain and amplifies the **bleep** out of what it can pick up - ie: gps satellites are weak transmitters so it's easier to disrupt the reception of those signals.  the effect is inversely proportional to the square of the distance between the antennas.  nokia would have had to make a design decision: which antennas would you put near each other?  make it so that a phone call disrupts the gps?  that sounds bad to me.  how about bluetooth?  hrm, that would be ok unless you use a bluetooth headset to make a call while using maps....  FM?  ahh, that's the one - it's a seldom used feature anyways.

 

N97 not capable of multitasking....there will be more iphone users soon:

That is freaking great.  a) my N97 multitasks like a champ.  b) iPhone still can't multitask, by design.  sure, now with os 3.0 they get background notifications... but not real multitasking.  how many years late is the iphone with mms and video and mutlitasking... and... and... let's just say this part of your post was really funny to read.

 

N97 doesn't have enough RAM:

Sure, good point.  Well, kinda.  I haven't had any real issues with RAM myself, but I'm biased - my N95-1 was constantly killing apps on me due to ram issues.  N97?  I haven't noticed it happen, but I tend to run only 2 or 3 apps at a time.  Still 2 to 3 times more apps than iPhone users can run at once... just to continue pointing out the irony of your suggestion that people will flock to iphones because the N97 can't multitask...

 

FM Transmitter Disabled in North America with firmware v11:

umm... nope.  I've got an N97-NAM, using here in North America, with v11 firmware... and my FM transmitter hasn't been disabled.  Not sure where you got that misinformation from, but if you really want your FM transmitter to work, I can assure you it hasn't been disabled.

 

 Nokia papers.....:

Umm, I could sorta follow the rest of this, but it didn't make too much sense to me.  Just throwing mud perhaps? 

 

-bit 

[bitflung]

@axelj

huh - i'll try with the a-gps turned off - i admit i haven't tried that.  

does vodaphone really charge that much for data?  i pay a flat fee, USD15/mo for unlimited here on AT&T (shhh - im supposed to pay $30 for that but they think i've got an old feature phone...).

 curiously, does the gps signal strength actually diminish when you plug in the charger, or does the phone simply lose gps 'lock'?  the fundamental difference would be:

1.  signal diminishes: you have RF interference

2.  signal stays but lock lost: the computational effort of translating time info from satelites to an actual position is not successfully being performed.

if it's the second of these, the symptoms would be the same but the solution would be a firmware bugfix.  if it's the first, then software bugfix wouldn't be possible (at least, not likely - unless the gps receiver uses a programmable dsp for rf carrier detection and signal extraction... then the algorithm for isolating gps signals could be updated but i doubt that is the case). 

[bb2daywalker]

I have up to almost a 40 percent difference i signal strength with or without the charger connected!.. Anyone else having noticed the same symptoms? Then again this is not the biggest issue with this phone right now. besides all the other "little" bugs i recently discovered that my phone every night at midnight decides to connect to someone or thing. And has done so since day one!?  When asking nokiasupport about this they asked to call me back.. This should be interresting.. However thats a different thread. Not even my old series 1 N95 was this much of a pain in the a**. 

[blackbagz]

Hi all,

I seem to have encountered a problem with my ovi maps.  Whenever i start it up now i get a "General Error" and it closes.  I see in here that people are able to uninstall it.  How do you uninstall if the program is not in application manager of SW Update???  how can i reinstall it if it's not in SW update or the nokia maps updater program doesn't have any new updates?  does anyone have a link to the sis/x file that i can reload it?

Any speculation why i'm getting a general error now? 

Thanks in advance

[blackbagz]

Slight error in my last statement above.  the error is "system error" not "general error" .

Message Edited by blackbagz on 24-Jul-2009 01:41 PM

[axelj]

@bitflung:

i dont really care about the money. i just expect a device as its advertised.

im sitting in a sailplane. above 6000 feet (or less) there purely IS NO network

i could conenct to with a-gps. it worked fine on my n95 and on my e71.

so i expect it to work with the n97.

i want my device logging the flight and giving me exact coordinates and routes with

altitude and speed over sportstracker (which worked perfect on my other phones!).

but i cant use the n97 for this.

i cant make my winch-start depening on the time my n97 gets its first sat fix, i would

wait for hours down on the ground! and then in the air, i dont want it to loose its fix constantly.

and to be honest, i dont want to start fiddeling around with this device up in the air, i have to

concentrate on other things which could be dangerous for me  (and others!)

cheers

[blackbagz]

is there no one out there that knows how to reinstall ovi maps 3.1?

is it just me that gets this 'system error' when firing up Ovi maps 3.1?

i just tried reinstalling the most recent firmware (11.0.021.213.02 v22.06.2009 rm-505) but that didn't fix it.  so i think it's someting to do with ovi maps itself.

any ideas?

thanks in advance

[andyjb]

Maybe it's not the gps reception which the charger is disturbing? Maybe the calculations are thrown off by voltage wobble? I'm gonna try smoothing the voltage output using a capacitor and see what happens.

[axelj]

 hi blackbagz,

i managed to install an older maps2 sis files (although there was a warning that its not caompatible with my phone!)

and then updated with the maps updater app from nokia again.

be careful, i wouldnt install a sis file from the internet, there are some that you still can download from nokia servers!

[blackbagz]

Axelj Thanks for the reply. Do you know what the link is to this previous version?  I cannot even install version 3.1 anymore.  when i use the NMU program it now says "Cannot update the maps application. Unspecified error (1)" and closes. 

Does anyone know where to get a hold of the ovi maps v3.1 sis/x file?

[axelj]

hi blackbagz,

i downloaded this version from nokia:

http://nds1.nokia.com/files/support/global/phones/software/Nokia_Maps_2.0_4503_3.1_u.sis

i know its for another symbian version, but still works.

it will tell you that its not compatible with your phone, but you dont need to run it anyways.

just install and then update with maps updater.

that worked on my n97 without glitches. not perfect, but a quite good workaround.

if it still fails to install i would try to delete the "cities" folder and additionally the qf files on your handset.

if this still fails, i would try to uninstall "nokia maps" from the app manager and try an update again.

and if this fails i would reset the phone to its initial stat.

also make sure to get the latest maps updater v1.0.10 i think and as cbidlake advised me,

make sure to uninstall the versino 1.0.08 before

good luck!

[blackbagz]

Axelj

Thanks for the link.  unfortunately no such luck here.  i downloaded the sis file but i get the error unable to install.  I've also (already) reset this phone 3 times yesterday (*#7370#) and also attempted to reinstall the firmware but even after all that, the ovi software doesn't work.  even with the latest NMU.  Not having much luck with this second handset.

Can only hope the UK version of the latest firmware comes soon.

[markpos]

Last night I installed v3.03 beta from the Nokia Beta Labs:

http://betalabs.nokia.com/ovi-maps

It doesn't fix the GPS accuracy issue (I'm still using an external bluetooth GPS receiver) but the software is much faster and map position updating during navigation is very smooth, much more like it was on my N95.  Also some nice new menus and useful things like a "drive me home" button.

Seems to work well so far.

[blackbagz]

Markpos,

I gave you kudos because i wiped my phone (again but this time i also reformatted my mass storage too).  I appeared to install v3.01 ovi maps OK but when i fired it up, i got that "system error" message that i had previously.  At that point i nearly threw the phone into orbit.  However, with nothing to lose i reformatted the phone again but this time installed the version 3.03.  It worked.  had not error messages either and, as you said, the UI looks quite impressive.  i liked the feel of the new ovi maps which was why i wanted it - v2 is so dated. 

My advise is to install the newer version posted by markpos.