Resolved (twice) - Omnitech GPS loss of signal

There are many reports on the internet of these units (from this deal) failing late Saturday and Sunday. See here, , here, and here.

Some are speculating that it may be related to the switch over to DTV, but at this point, that is speculation.

What does seem to be known

1. Regardless of the software used these units are no longer able to acquire2. T satellite lock
2. The problem started around 5PM Eastern time, Saturday night
3. The company tech support line is 1.888.554.6628. (At IVR 1,7,5), but no one has yet talked to a live agent. If people get through, they are leaving voicemessages
4. Staples ( 800-333-3330 ) does appear to be taking responsibility for the units. (Theirs and Quills). I was forwarded to another department, where the CSR said they were already getting flooded with calls. They gave me a case number for all 4 units that I bought, were calling their supplier, and were going to try and call me back within 48 hours - of they could find anything out

Per this link
dealsearch said: Great, first our GPS died, now tech smart tips also died.

Anyway, in case you did not see my post on tech smart tips, GoNav has posted an official notice on this problem. All GoNav GPS products cannot get lock since 6/14/09 00:00 GMT. The problem is in GPS chipset. They promised to provide a solution in 2 days.

Here's the new autoresponse when you report the problem to the manufacturers of Omnitech

We apologize for the inconvenience you are having acquiring a GPS signal.
Due to the high volume of calls and emails, you will not be able to
speak with a representative. The problem is not only happening with
your device.
GPS receivers are having a problem communicating with the GPS
satellites since saturday June 13th,
the GPS manufacturer is currently working very closely with the GPS
satellite authorities trying to
resolve this matter urgently, a solution is expected to be available
within days.
Please send your contact information to info@navsupport.net or fax
them to 6269560622 and we will get back to you as soon as possible.
Please submit only one request
You do not have to call us back regarding this matter, we will get in
touch with you directly as soon as a solution
is available within the next few days

Thanks for the info. Although I still haven't even opened mines yet and I already found out that it's not working.

Its looking like the problem is related to the GPS Week Rollover problem (This is the GPS equivalent of Y2k). There are even some reports that the problem will solve itself come Sunday 12AM GMT

Similar to Y2k, the GPS week rollover problem is a counting and field length issue.
1. The GPS Week count starts at midnight 5-6 January 1980 UTC
2. The GPS Week field is modulo 1024
3. 1024 weeks from 6 January 1980 was 22 August 1999. There were documented GPS issues at that time

Per here problems related to the Week Number Rollover issue in receivers that have not properly interpreted the WN parameter are very hard to predict. Problems might range from a few seconds of position error to a complete failure of receiver operation. Published accounts of failure modes for “non-compliant” receivers have no common pattern of failure. One of the more common failure modes is a failure to acquire the satellites that are visible from a particular location at a given time.

Combinations of problems resulting from improper interpretation of the WN, WNa, WNt, and WNlsf bits can lead to all sorts of possible failure modes.

A software failure was reported (Brottlund and Harris 1995) that specifically related to UTC calculations related to UTC Week Number (WNt) and GPS Week Number (WN) parameter interpretations in September 1994, during GPS week 767, some receivers incorrectly identified the UTC week number by 256 weeks, resulting in the calculation of an erroneous GPS-UTC offset and rate.

Of course any hardware and software system is subject to occasional failure modes and GPS is no exception. There have been failures in the Control, Space, and User segments of GPS since the beginning of the program. See the examples of GPS time dissemination failure modes in (Dana 1997).

The next failure of a non-compliant GPS should have been 2048 weeks from "zero" - or sometime in 2019. Now, for our event there are exactly 1,536 weeks between 6 January 1980 and 14 June 2009 1536-1024 = 512.

If there was poor programming or they repurposed the "high order" bit, this could be the cause of the failure. And the fact that 512 is 1/2 of 1024 (given the single high order bit difference in base 2), and that the failure occurred at exactly midnight GMT strikes me as not coincidental (As opposed to the DTV switchover which always struck me as coincidental - since digital broadcasts had been under way for months) See here for some more analysis

Step by Step update for a stock unit:

WARNING : RUN THIS PROCUDURE AT YOUR OWN RISK

Download the files. http://www.kingelect.com/en/SOFTWARE/GPS-update-20090615.rar

Four files:

main_compass_sw.5.11.00.bin
gps2gmouse.3.24.00.bin
AutoUpdate.ini
Autorun.exe

1. Place the following for files on the SD card .. I placed a copy of the files in root & a copy in Destinator folder to be safe.

2. In the Destinator directory rename Destinator.exe to Destinator2.exe

3. In the Destinator directory and rename the Autorun.exe to Destinator.exe

4. reboot.

5. Let the GPS do the update.

6. When it is completed. turn off the GPS completely

7. Pulled out SD card an put in on a computer.-->remove the four files (including newly renamed Destinator.exe) from both the root and Destinator directory

8.Rename the Destinator2.exe to Destinator.exe

9. Place the SD card back in the GPS and turn on the GPS

That is it.

Some posters advise changing the COM Port to COM1. Others seem to have success without making any file changes...I've got a Omnitect 16878-US unit. Which way works?
Thanks

Hmmm, I ran the update and now I am the proud owner of a brick... all it does now is the system loading screen. Anyone have any thoughts?

spatter1 said: Hmmm, I ran the update and now I am the proud owner of a brick... all it does now is the system loading screen. Anyone have any thoughts?muoot said: Step by Step update for a stock unit:

WARNING : RUN THIS PROCEDURE AT YOUR OWN RISK

At this point, you could try to apply the official firmware when it becomes available. If that fails, you probably can do an exchange with Staples

spatter1 said: Strangely, it just started working again... I sat there looking at the loading screen for about 30 minutes.Does it still take as long to boot up, if you power down and restart it?

Sorry, Double Post!

riseroom13 said: When is the official update coming?????? I tried updating it as stated, step-for-step, and NOTHING! Nothing at all.Patience, patience. Its been less than two business days. There are multiple vendors involved here. The solution needs to be modified to easily run on the Omnitech.

And then they need to figure out a distribution strategy, which is non trivial as some customers don't have a PC or a memory card reader

spatter1 said: Here's an update about what is going on with mine. I did the update and it has been flakey about turning on. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. Don't know if it might be a bad sd card, but it is being rather flakey.

Thank you for your information. i was about to update it.

When trying to update, I get an error Create COM Port failed... COM PORT open failed.

Anyone experienced this or know how to rectify this error. THX

I don't think that this works for CE 4.2 version.
It seems to give me a 'Failed to get version' error.
Recovering .....
Unable to open FW file.

Ceecil said: Hi

When I first got the error about COM port, I then went and changed the COM = COM1 (changed from original COM2). It still gave me the error. So, I changed it back to COM2. For some reasons, when I attempted to update again, it did not give me the COM port error but seems to give me a version error and that it cannot open FW (firmware file). It's very interesting to note that each time, it seems to give me something else.

Keep in mind that my model is 15223 with Win CE 4.2

I plan to try again but I would like to confirm one thing.

Where do I put the 4 files?.

Do I put duplicates of the 4 in the Destinator folder as well?.

Thanks

1. Place the following for files on the SD card .. I placed a copy of the files in root & a copy in Destinator folder to be safe.

Ceecil said: If I have it on COM=COM2 then COM Port open failed.

If I have it on COM=COM1, not COM port error.

However, it gives me a 'Failed to get version' error when booting.
Recovering .....
Power off and try again.Sounds like the firmware is corrupted. Try waiting for the official fix from Omnitech.

On my unit (16878-US) I got the Failed to get version message before I changed the COM2 to COM1. After that, it all worked fine.

Ceecil said: Ellory,

If you think the firmware is corrupted, what is the solution to correct it?. Will the GPS work after they fix it in a few days or will the firmware not work as is after the fix?.If they redistribute the same firmware, then it won't work. If their patch just does a write with no check, then it might work

Tried the fix and it worked fine....

hello. i accidentally deleted my nk.bin after the update for my omnitech gps. can anyone send it to me please. taylor.philip@gmail.com thanks!