My Nuvi 3770 takes ages to lock satellites and loses the lock easily. I have it mounted to the friction pad holder with the wire antenna connected. The wire is strung along the wind shield above the rear view mirror in my Fortuner.

What annoys me is that my 3 year old ASUS phone with GPS can pick up the satellites while it is in the seat pouch behind me. My Samsung Galaxy Tab is also better, neither the phone or tablet have antenna wire yet they receive the signal better than the Nuvi.

Rant over, does anyone else have problems with poor reception?

Yes .... I have the same problem. Takes 15 minutes to find the satellites, then loses them as soon as I go near the BTS. I posted on here and had some interesting posts about the need for clear line of sight to the satellites and on the differences between GPS and phone assisted GPS.

Mine's OK out of the city, but near to useless in Bangkok (where I need it most).

I've been experimenting with a long-haired GPS, works under the BTS and seems to better at finding short cuts, but tends to navigate via food stalls and department stores and the navigation functions switches off during phone calls.

My initial observation is that your antenna is mounted immediately behind a tinted windshield and therefore you are having reception problems, and off course there is always that pesky BTS skytrain interference if you are in Bangkok. The GPS does need a clear, unobstructed view of the satellites. Smartphones use local base station radio towers. Are you sure that you are not confusing your supposed GPS antenna with the FM traffic receiver accessory?

My initial observation is that your antenna is mounted immediately behind a tinted windshield and therefore you are having reception problems, and off course there is always that pesky BTS skytrain interference if you are in Bangkok. The GPS does need a clear, unobstructed view of the satellites. Smartphones use local base station radio towers. Are you sure that you are not confusing your supposed GPS antenna with the FM traffic receiver accessory?

I have tried moving the antenna to different spot on the windshield and it made no difference. I am seldom near the BTS lines as I stay in the Ram Intra Area, even while on the expressway it take ages to lock the signal.

My ASUS P535 phone is a GPS phone running Speednavi it is a good GPS but a crap phone using Windows Mobile :-(. I stop using it because the screen is so small, the battery would lose charge because of the car charger so the phone was useless because it couldn't hold a charge. I wasn't about to buy new batteries for it.

http://www.gsmarena.com/asus_p535-1780.php

The standard nuvi 3770 GPS does not come with a GPS antenna wire that you can move about the windshield. It does have a FM antenna for the traffic receiver, but that is not a GPS antenna. Have you purchased a special re-radiating antenna for your 3770? Your nuvi 3770 needs to be located directly under a clear windshield with an unobstructed view of the sky (satellites). If your GPS does not lock onto satellites when it is out of the car, in the open and away from tall buildings, then it could be defective. If you have not use the GPS for awhile or moved since its last position fix, then the GPS will take several minutes to reload the satellite Ephemeris and Almanac data before it starts working.

The standard nuvi 3770 GPS does not come with a GPS antenna wire that you can move about the windshield. It does have a FM antenna for the traffic receiver, but that is not a GPS antenna. Have you purchased a special re-radiating antenna for your 3770? Your nuvi 3770 needs to be located directly under a clear windshield with an unobstructed view of the sky (satellites). If your GPS does not lock onto satellites when it is out of the car, in the open and away from tall buildings, then it could be defective. If you have not use the GPS for awhile or moved since its last position fix, then the GPS will take several minutes to reload the satellite Ephemeris and Almanac data before it starts working.

Doh!! I thought it was a GPS wire LOL. That what I get for buying from beautiful ladies who speak no English. The good thing is I can now get rid of the wire. I will reposition it and see what happens. Thanks IO

My 3770 picks up most of the time very quickly...but not all the time...when it was new, some seven months ago now, it picked up inside the house quickly, however now it takes much more time and sometimes just won't inside the house.

However by the time I have backed out of the drive and driven a very short distance it is usually up and running.

Mine doesn't actually have a direct look at the sky..see picture..and the windscreen is tinted (some sort of metallic I guess} and I have to hang my 'easy pass' out of the window to work!

So yes, I think that the performance has dropped off a bit..no idea why..however it works pretty well...maybe worth going back to the shop and complaining...maybe there is a way of boosting the performance. I know that if my mobile phone signal is very weak, redialing a couple of times and the signal bar increases.

The standard nuvi 3770 GPS does not come with a GPS antenna wire that you can move about the windshield. It does have a FM antenna for the traffic receiver, but that is not a GPS antenna. Have you purchased a special re-radiating antenna for your 3770? Your nuvi 3770 needs to be located directly under a clear windshield with an unobstructed view of the sky (satellites). If your GPS does not lock onto satellites when it is out of the car, in the open and away from tall buildings, then it could be defective. If you have not use the GPS for awhile or moved since its last position fix, then the GPS will take several minutes to reload the satellite Ephemeris and Almanac data before it starts working.

Doh!! I thought it was a GPS wire LOL. That what I get for buying from beautiful ladies who speak no English. The good thing is I can now get rid of the wire. I will reposition it and see what happens. Thanks IO

Wait...don't get rid of the wire antenna. That is how you receive real-time traffic date with the Nüvi 3770.

As for my experience, I find that my 3770 reception is roughly the same as the GPS reception on my iPhone when they are placed side by side in my car. When driving under BTS or the expressway, sure, I lose signal sometimes, but that is to be expected when you are under solid concrete and steel with no clear view of the sky.

One thing that does seem slow about it - if you switch it on in something like a car park and it can't get a lock, it will ask you if you want to keep trying. On answering yes, it seems to start all over with a blank almanac, and it really does take a long time to find the satellites and get a lock.

My main complaint: the Nüvi 3770 sold here has a known bug where the unit occasionally crashes, shuts itself down and restarts. Gadget Trend says wait for a firmware update fix, and I have been waiting for months. The suggested workaround is to set the map detail to 'Normal", but that still doesn't completely fix the issue. It really is frustrating when you are relying on the GPS and making a series of turns when all of a sudden it crashes and takes a minute or two to restart. "Recalculating" is the usual result.

My main complaint: the Nüvi 3770 sold here has a known bug where the unit occasionally crashes, shuts itself down and restarts. Gadget Trend says wait for a firmware update fix, and I have been waiting for months. The suggested workaround is to set the map detail to 'Normal", but that still doesn't completely fix the issue. It really is frustrating when you are relying on the GPS and making a series of turns when all of a sudden it crashes and takes a minute or two to restart. "Recalculating" is the usual result.

I got this in an e-mail for ESRI last week.....(If you haven’t encountered any problem with the unit, you don’t have to update the firmware. The new firmware 2.20 is for the units that experience rebooting issue (keep rebooting at certain locations when navigating).

So maybe worth trying..I guess that you know to export you favorites before updating firmware.

Doh!! I thought it was a GPS wire LOL. That what I get for buying from beautiful ladies who speak no English. The good thing is I can now get rid of the wire. I will reposition it and see what happens. Thanks IO

Wait...don't get rid of the wire antenna. That is how you receive real-time traffic date with the Nüvi 3770.

Last I heard, there's no real-time traffic data available in Thailand, so he can either sellotape the wire to the back of the device or cut it off with no loss of functionality while in Thailand.