Palm Pre Plus Facing GPS & Wifi Problems

Verizon Wireless Palm Pre Plus owners might be over with an increasing number of users complaining about problems with imprecise GPS signal locking. When using Google Maps on the Pre Plus, many owners are noticing that the Pre Plus is locating them at a point that is several yards to several miles away from their actual location with the Pre Plus apparently using aGPS and not satellite GPS for location detection. For some owners, the problem can be temporarily alleviated by launching VZ Navigator and then closing it before agreeing to the monthly service fee which suggests that VZ Navigator is able to wake the GPS and obtain an accurate satellite GPS lock that is then passed on to Google Maps. This is not a Verizon Wireless only problem as Pre Plus customers on Canadian carrier Bell are also reporting a similar issue. The problem seems to be relegated to the Pre Plus only with Pixi Plus and original Sprint Pre owners reporting zero problems with their GPS. Thus far, neither Verizon Wireless, Bell nor Palm is officially acknowledging a problem with the performance of the GPS on the Pre Plus. Anyone Palm Pre Plus owners care to comment on the accuracy and precision of their GPS.

The thing about putting a phone on a new carrier - even if the hardware is virtually identical - is that there are always a handful of bugs that pop up. We have two from our forums that are looking something like confirmed. They aren't critical, deal-breaking bugs, but they are a hassle.

First up, long-time member dutchtrumpet points us to this thread about Verizon MMS and the gist is this: when WiFi is on, MMS messages aren't able to be sent. It looks as though the issue is that MMS message need to go through Verizon's EVDO network, but the Pre Plus is attempting to send them over WiFi. This isn't an issue for Sprint users thus far. The good news is that there is an easy workaround: just turn off WiFi before you attempt to send an MMS message.

The second bug is a little more worrying: it's starting to look like there is a fairly serious issue with GPS on Verizon Palm Pre Plus devices. The concern is that full, tower-assisted AGPS is only working for VZ Navigator and not other apps. The Fear, with a capital F, is that Verizon is playing their lock-down shenanigans again, but from what we can tell in this thread that's probably not the case, as Verizon Palm Pixi Plus apps are able to get quick GPS locks and also because Bell Pre phones are also having some hassles. A workaround that seems to help some comes from m0sim: open VZ Navigator (even if you haven't purchased it on your plan) before using GPS on other apps. GPS is a finicky feature, so diagnosing exactly what's happening here is going to take some time. The good news is that the massive and massively helpful PreCentral Forum community is on the case.

 

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