Just to re-iterate. The issue with XA2 is not MLS or the lack of it. The gps is unable to lock on weak-ish signals.
In the exact same position old windows phones and android phones get lock within a minute of cold start, with no data connection, and no cellular signals present at all.
2 Likes
The inability to lock onto weak signals may be part of the problem, but in my experience it’s more than that. Even with a good signal there’s still no GPS lock on for a significant time after the a GPS app is launched.
1 Like
Just my 2 cents here - with my user hat on, as even if I work for Jolla, I’m not really involved in any GPS stuff.
I believe many of the XA2 GPS issues are really caused by faulty hardware - someone even reported that replacing the screen had major impact in GPS performance. Personally, I never had any issues with the GPS on my XA2. And I used it quite a lot for finding geocaches.
Now, for a few months I’ve been using 10 II as my daily driver, which gave me a possibility to perform a small test: I hadn’t used my XA2 for about two months. I turned the device on, and then turned GPS on. I got fix in 4 minutes. Inside my home, near window.
2 Likes
Hello Vige,
Thank you for taking the time to reply. Sadly my GPS experience with the XA2 doesn’t reflect yours.
I’m not sure it’s a hardware issue.There are some reports of GPS issues with the stock Android firmware. Some people complained about the hardware. It’s always hard to determine how widespread the issue is.
One report said the problem was fixed by carrying out a “Software Repair” using a programmes call Xperia Companion.
Another report said that by going into the Service Menu and purging the “Assistance Data” they were able to restore GPS fuctionality.
If these reports are correct then it seems it is a firmware/software issue.
The problem seems to have got worse with later versions of Sailfish. Perhaps it not so much the later version but the update process that has caused the problem. Pure speculation on my part.
It would be nice to be able to try a repair to the Android “blobs” or what ever is used to interface between Sailfish and the GPS hardware or be able to purge any assistance data. I’m not sure this can be done at least not without flashing back to Android then back to Sailfish.
Once again thank you for taking the time to rely.
2 Likes
I too am fairly sure it is not a hardware error.
I have two Sony XA2s, both single sim H3113 models. One is on Sailfish Verla 4.2 paid version, the other is now on Android 9. Both were bought new and well looked after. Neither has been dropped, drowned or had any repair work done. The Sailfish XA2 has occasionally had to be returned to Android 8 prior to a necessary reflash after some serious problem made the software non-functional.
The reason I have two phones is that the Android XA2 is a reference phone (I don’t actually use it as a daily driver at all) for when things don’t work on Sailfish and to see if they did work on Android. Now obviously this won’t root out a hardware failure of the specific Sailfish device, but it will probably root out whether there is a generic hardware design issue across the single sim XA2 phone in general.
My observations are:
- GPS work flawlessly and gets a lock in seconds on the Android 9 XA2
- GPS works flawlessly and gets a lock on the Sailfish XA2 when it has been returned to Android 8 prior to re-flashing Sailfish - so there is not an individual hardware issue on either of my XA2 phones.
- GPS does not work almost at all on the Sailfish XA2. The ‘wrong’ position, sometimes a mile or so away, and therefore useless for navigation, is found within seconds (probably due to MLS data, perhaps the nearest cell tower) but a proper positional fix can take over an hour, even outside in the open, and often never.
- The Sony XA2 was/is a mainstream global Android model for Sony. They have sold millions of phones. If there were a general hardware design issue with GPS not working then (a) there would uproar, and (b) such a failure would be visible on message boards, in reviews and so on. It isn’t. So its not an XA2 hardware design issue.
- There are over 335 posts in this ‘GPS not working’ thread, admittedly not all specifically saying that GPS doesn’t work on the XA2, but a huge number nonetheless. Common sense says these GPS issues cannot all be due to individual hardware failures.
The only logical conclusion I can therefore come to is that there is a problem with the Sailfish software, or perhaps more likely, a problem in how Sailfish interfaces to the GPS hardware via blobs or whatever.
Either way I can’t see how it can be a hardware problem - either with an individual device or a generic hardware design issue across all XA2’s of this model.
4 Likes
AFAIR the issues with GPS on SFOS@XA2 began when Mozilla stopped support for online position lock. So I see a chance that A-GPS via Mozilla’s online position lock may hide HW issues of the GPS device. As Android uses it’s own A-GPS service I guess this would hide our possible HW issue as well.
It seems that GPS works much better / quicker on other phones running SFOS, which makes me believe that @vige 's assumtion is right.
So may I suggest you deactivate online position lock on your Android phone and try out how GPS behaves?
3 Likes
You may suggest this!
I’ll change the location services config now as you suggest.
When I take the dog out later for a walk across the fields I’ll take the Sailfish XA2 with me instead of my iPhone 12 and see if this config change makes any difference to how quickly, or not, I can obtain an accurate position lock.
If Mozilla have stopped supporting the online position lock functionality, then why is it still an option in the location services settings on Sailfish 4.2?
My XA2 had this option toggled on by default (never even thought to change any of the GPS settings), so surely this is a bit daft in the circumstances?
P.S. noticing your avatar as, I think, a small Psion 5 (?), somewhere in my cupboards I still have a brand new Psion 5 MX Pro in its original Psion leather case. Taking two AA batteries you were always sure you could get power for it anywhere in the world - a great design apart from the iffy ribbon cable that bridged the clamshell hinge and often suffered from fatigue breakages.
1 Like
I have given up using my XA2 as a satnav. It’s unreliable, so it’s dangerous in real situations.
Once upon a time…Jolla 1 had a decent working satnav with Here. That’s over. I use MagicEarth on a Gigaset290 with /e/, without sim, without wifi or mobile data, that works well. The sim is on my Sailfish device.
Wished it worked on the XA2, but it doesn’t.
When I look back at the old days when we used a Garmin GPS12 it took ages as well to collect almanac data after a cold boot. I’d speculate that our GPS (or it’s firmware) fails to store it’s almanac data and needs to collect it again from the sky.
It’s still a great device, the screen of the (first) Psion 5 was bad, however the OS and the apps were great. If you remember how well navigation with external GPS worked on a device with just 20 MHz clock.
[sorry for beeing off topic and sendimental/]
1 Like
Actually it was me who started the Psion off-topic side-bar, so I’m waiting to be flagged now 
2 Likes
Ok, the behaviour was slightly different. Instead of getting the ‘wrong’ (i.e. not right, but nearby within a mile or so) location quickly within a few seconds, as I was walking across the fields it was just stuck at the last location where I used GPS (at home, using pure maps to test this yesterday against my Android XA2) for about half an hour before it picked up the correct location.
So yes faster than an hour or never, but still in excess of 30 mins so not really usable. Thanks for the suggestion though.
2 Likes
I think jollajo was suggesting trying that with the XA2 running Android. If I understand correctly his hypothesis is that without “online position lock” activated the Android XA2 will be as bad/useless as the Sailfish XA2
2 Likes
Oops, yes, I see than now. My mistake for not having read @jollajo 's post properly. I’ve had a look at my Android XA2, and in settings the only thing that looks relevant is ‘Google Location Accuracy’. I’ll try turning that off and see what happens.
OK, it took 3 minutes to get a cold start lock (its a couple of weeks since I last switched the Android XA2 on) from being ‘nowhere’ (just a map of the world shown in Google maps) to a zoomed in setting of my house, on my road on the South Coast of England instead of a few seconds. So definitely slower, but still in a different league to how long it takes Sailfish.
And what I don’t understand is
if that is the case then surely the lack of Mozilla online position lock availability in Sailfish would affect GPS performance on all Sailfish phones, not just the XA2?
Which then brings me back to the fact that it must be something to do with the way that Sailfish interfaces to the XA2 firmware, low level binaries or whatever, rather than a hardware design fault or individual hardware failure. And the problem is obviously more pronounced for ‘cold start’ locks as those who use GPS regularly, or keep GPSInfo loaded, don’t appear to have such severe problems.
Ij Jolla can’t fix this (and it doesn’t seem like they can, or not easily) could a solution, or workaround really, be for Sailfish to provide an selectable option to regularly, occasionally, ‘wake up’ GPS, get a lock, and then send it back to sleep again? OK, so there would be a hit on battery capacity I guess, but if it worked it might make GPS on XA2 more usable for occasional users when they need it?
1 Like
I’m guessing there are at least 2 GPS problems with Sailfish on the XA2 not including yours. I have little doubt I’ve encountered a bug as outlined above. I have never had another problem on my XA2 bar the MLS thing.
I’m thinking of reverting to 4.01 with MLS Manager but it will involve a reinstall. If I do that, I will try Verla first.
I presume the XA2 uses the Android GPS blobs. The XA2 may be heavily reliant on Mozilla services or equivalent. A ‘fallback service’ may be bugged/weak. Your test disabling online position lock is important.
Is it possible that Jolla’s version of MLS Manager doesn’t work as well as the latter?
You seem to have far more problems with your XA2 than anyone else. Have you tried reinstalling?
Thanks @Steve_Everett for your efforts.
I’m wondering if booting your Android XA2 and disabling Google’s Location Accuracy was enough for the phone to get the position hint from Google. In that case your test wouldn’t be a cold boot as it may had already grabbed assistance data. However I’m just speculating.
I reactivated my old JollaC and testet GPS there. This comes with an option “HERE GPS assistance - Faster position fix” in addition to Mozillas online and offline location services.
With HERE support GPS lock was instant.
After that I switched off the phone moved to another city ~250 km way and two days later it takes around 5-10 seconds to get a lock with HERE disabled and Mozilla online and offline support enabled.
So GPS on JollaC is fine, XA2 is 
1 Like
Why does it also happen on the Xperia X too as has been mentioned by several above.
It’s not just an XA problem.
In my experience the Xperia X does not have the same problem the XA2 has. My X gets a GPS lock within a matter of minutes or less and it’s not using MLS location as it doesn’t have a sim card.
Whereas the XA2 struggles to get a lock on even after 30 minutes or more. Once it’s has a lock on it is OK but some days it just refuses to lock on.
1 Like
Ok, good for you, but others including myself have this issue using an X, please read above when you entered the conversation.
Just because you have one phone without the issue doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist for other users. Many have working XA’s too, does that discount that yours isn’t working?