Of all the custom built ROMs I have used, on a majority of Android built phones I have noticed one common element/problem. They all seem to have specific problems when attempting the GPS fix and this is with the already downloaded AGPS data. Now the problem lies within one file within the final build of the cooked roms, probably a very important file that is used when creating the satellite fix. The file in question is the gps.conf file which lies within the main OS, luckily it can be changed.

 

Now the reason the file needs changing is because the majority of custom roms (especially non-sense roms) are keyed with the incorrect NTP server set. So the solution is quite simple, yet you still need to be an advanced user obviously.

 

Firstly get over to http://www.pool.ntp.org/en/ and find the most active server closest to your area.

Make sure you have a file manager installed on your phone which will allow you to edit specific files.

Navigate the file manager to /system/etc/gps.conf – Edit this file and change the NTP server to the one that you found was the closest in your area.

Save the changes you have made to the file.

Reboot your phone.

 

Now your phone should pick up the config when it boots, but what you can do to assist it is to reset the AGPS data that would have been downloaded previously. To do this you will need to download an app from the market place. It is free and the one I have used quite a lot is a tool called “GPS Status & Toolbox”. Once downloaded if you go into tools then manage a-gps. If you hit reset and then again fo into tools and manage a-gps, then hit download.

This will refresh the assisted GPS data that your phone/device is supposed to download automatically when “trying” to make a gps fix.

 

Hopefully that will help kick start the GPS and it should be a lot more responsive in getting a fix. Key point here is to remember to reboot otherwise no changes will take place!!

I’m sure we are all aware of the famous IOS screenshot capability and how it came on all versions of the iphone without any sort of manipulation required. Well now we can rest at ease fellow android lovers, as turns out android have started to put it into the main distribution.

Now I am unsure as to how far this new reach goes, but as far as I am aware any android releases that include sense 3.0 or higher will include this new feature. It can be activated by pressing the power button and the home button (much like IOS) but of course we all now that android is better.

The screenshot is stored within your photo directory/gallery where you can obviously go in and review it, look at it or share it whatever really takes your fancy.

Overall this sort of development is a big step up. I remember when I had a G1, and the Hero – where you had to actually have the phone rooted before you could even consider taking screenshots. Even with the phone rooted it turned into a bigger pain trying to run the app than what it was worth.

Maybe this is a turning point. I’m not going to say that Android was missing loads of points and it was awful, because that is far from the truth. Overall the android OS is one of the leaders in its field and it is something to be proud of. Maybe now we can get just those little things that it was missing previous – you never know

Usually you aren’t required to even think about the eMMC chip, what it does or what consequences a specific action has on it until you break it.

This is when things go wrong:

E:Can't mount /cache/recovery/command
E:Can't mount /cache/recovery/log
E:Can't open /cache/recovery/log
E:Can't mount /cache/recovery/last_log
E:Can't open /cache/recovery/last_log

Now luckily I’ve only ever had one failure of a chip and that was with a G1 which basically couldn’t take any of the re-building any more and just gave up. What I will say is that before you go jumping into anything regarding replacing the chip, or following another persons advice I would seriously read up on all that you can that is online. There are thousands of postings on the internet where people have had problems and been able to resolve them without having to take the phone apart and replace the chip.

Plenty of people have experienced what you are experiencing so the best port of call is to find a nice friendly forum (kind of hard to find now-a-days) and make a post detailing all of the issues.

Now what to do when you are posting all the information regarding the phone you have, model, age, firmware version. If you have adb set up on your computer – which I would expect you to have if you were flashing roms, what to do would be to enter into recovery mode, plug the phone into the PC, and open up a command prompt on the pc. Now you want to connect via adb to the device and once connected run


dmesg | grep mmc0


Now if the output contains this message:


mmc0: failed to get card ready
mmc0: reinit card
mmc0: Starting deferred resume
mmc0: Deferred resume failed


Then I’m afraid there isn’t much that can be done, if that set of messages rolls into your command window you are basically looking at getting a replacement chip. There are unfortunately no work a rounds to save you from this, no other solutions at all. Basically new phone or new chip – the choice is yours.

For the people that didn’t get that message, remember to post the output in your forum post and you may be able to save your lovely handset.