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NRF9160 Geolocation Problems

Joao Filipe

Hi Everyone

I have an nRF9160 DK v0.8.2 and I'm running the asset_tracket sample. 

I'm from Portugal so iBasis sim card doesn't work here. So I went to Spain and tried there.

I flashed the asset_tracket sample, inserted the iBasis sim card (Spain has LTE-M coverage), opened the LTE Link Monitor, opened the nrfCloud and it was all fine. At Link Monitor when I pressed the "Show serving station location" the geolocation appears and it was correct. So after that, I checked the Regional Sales Manager where in Portugal(Altice, Nos and Vodafone) and none of them had LTE-M or NB-IoT coverage open to general public. So I talked with Altice if they could provide a sim card for testing purposes and they gave me a NB-IoT sim card.

Now, after flashing the asset_tracket sample and using the testing sim card, I got connection in LTE Link Monitor (which previous doesn't occurs because my previous sim card was not prepared to connect to NB-IoT),and everything was green (like in Spain), but when I press "Show serving station location" doesn't appears nothing. I search and I found that versions of the DK until v0.8.5 have some problems with GPS. But if that so, why in Spain it was correct and working, and here in Portugal isn't?

So, I was doing some tests on https://locationapi.org/dashboard with the values that I got from LTE Link Monitor in Spain (mcc, mnc etc) with iBasis sim card and it gave me the same location as LTE Link Monitor. Perfect.

But when I did the test with the LTE Link Monitor values in Portugal, with NB-IoT testing sim card, it says "No matches found". And didn't found any base station near me. Why this could occur??

I also installed an app on my phone (witch haves normal sim card without NB-IoT) , just to test if I could connect to base station with that sim card. The operator for my cellphone sim card is the same as the sim card at nrf9160 (ALTICE). The app provided me with the data(mcc, lac etc).

When retrieving the values I was surprise because, my phone and the nrf module are centimeters away from each other, like 4/5 centimeters, and both have different "LAC" and "CID", witch means that both are connected to different Base Stations. And when I test at https://locationapi.org/dashboard the retrieved data from phone app about the sim card, it works. But the more impressive for me is WHY WITH NORMAL SIM CARD WE CAN FIND THE BASE STATION, BUT WITH THE NB-IoT sim CARD WE CANT? Check the images below please.

This images below are in Portugal(NB-IoT card)

And this ones below are in Spain(iBasis card)

So basically:

Spain:

---LTE-M Coverage

---iBasis sim card

---LTE Link Monitor everything green and gives location

Portugal:

---Not LTE-M coverage

---NB-IoT coverage ONLY for testing purposes. Not open to general public

---LTE Link Monitor with NB-IoT card  everything green but no given location.

Images where I test the geolocation to (https://locationapi.org/dashboard)

Spain Values from iBasis sim card

Portugal Values from NB-IoT testing sim card

Portugal, Values from phone app with normal sim card without NB-IoT

Thanks in advance

  • +1

    Hi! 

    This doesn't seem to be a problem with the device or LTE Link Monitor since the same error shows up in the location API. The problem with GPS in the earlier versions of the nRF91 DK is not your problem either.

    I suspect you are connecting to a base station that is not yet public, which would explain why the location API cannot find it. I suggest contacting Altice and asking about the NB-IoT network you got access to.

    Also, since your cell phone isn't connecting to the base station with the same protocol as the DK, it's probably connecting to the closest one, while the DK connects to the closes one that supports NB-IoT.

    Best regards,

    Heidi

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