Waiting for device

[Brooklands]

Deker, 

Glad to hear that its worked for you as well, I had no isses yesterday on my trip to/from Halfpenny Green with pingmon running.  I'm not sure that the reverse ping would work though: my suspicion is that by forcing the tablet to constantly ping the PAW it stops the connection dropping some how.

@Colled - what make of tablet are you using?  I'm trying to work out if this is purely a  Samsung issue or a more general Android issue.  I'm not running iGrid so that's not causing the problem.  Try installing and running pingmon as this seems tohave 'fixed' the issue for Deker and myself.

I don't think its the lack of internet connection as my Nexus 7 (running Android 6) doesn't drop the connection to the PAW even though it recognises that it doesn't have an internet connection.

Brooklands

[colled]

I am using a Lenovo M9 so different hardware to you, so does sound Android 13 specific.
I'll try using pingmon, does it affect battery life having that running?
If a ping from that app is enough to keep the connection open, I would have thought the data that PAW sends across the connection to Skydemon would also be enough to keep the connection open!?

[Admin]

Its a strange one
One thing you could try is connecting as flarm rather than pilotaware
The flarm setting uses TCP, rather than UDP

Thx
Lee

[Brooklands]

Colled,

I don't know how pingmon affects battery life on the tablet for certain, but I don't think it has a significant effect - I haven't noticed anything on the flights I've done since I started using it.  I can only guess why it keeps the connection up whereas incoming data doesn't.

@Lee - I've done a test on the ground were I tried setting the PAW to TCP/Flarm and connecting SD using that but I still get dropouts, although they are not as bad as setting the PAW to "All"

Brooklands

[Vic]

Putting this out there as it's maybe worth a try and easy to do..

I was plagued with this issue on my previous tablet, a Lenovo device which I eventually  permanently solved with an 'off the wall' so to speak solution.

This was to create another user on the machine such as Guest (which you never have to use BTW) This can be done on the Samsung device from Settings / Accounts and Backup /Users / Add guest

How and why it worked I haven't a clue, but worked it certainly did!

The original post is here http://forum.pilotaware.com/index.php/topic,1091.msg16603.html#msg16603

My current device, a Samsung Tab A7 Lite SM-T220 (not a SM225 like the OPs) has never had the issue even without the Guest account and IGrid

[colled]

I've now tried flying with Pingmon firing a ping every second to 192.168.1.1 and it made no difference for me, I still got multiple PAW disconnections 
It always seems to happen at just the wrong time as well, when I most need to know where I am in confined airspace and is very distracting, bordering dangerous.
I can't justify buying a new tablet until I find one that works with PAW so I think I will need to find an alternative to PAW that will work.

[Deker]

Last flight I forgot to run pingmon and after about 10mins I got the dreaded "waiting for device".
Quickly started pingmon and was all OK for the rest of the flight and the return.

i've set up a guest account on my android 13 device and will test to see if this is an alternative fix to pingmon.
ATB
Deker.

[steveu]

I've now tried flying with Pingmon firing a ping every second to 192.168.1.1 and it made no difference for me, I still got multiple PAW disconnections 
It always seems to happen at just the wrong time as well, when I most need to know where I am in confined airspace and is very distracting, bordering dangerous.
I can't justify buying a new tablet until I find one that works with PAW so I think I will need to find an alternative to PAW that will work.

Connect the audio out from the PAW to the audio input of your radio or intercom, and get audio alerts for traffic.

Run the tablet using its own location services. Then it will not lose its location when you are transiting airspace. There will be no on screen traffic, but then you have audio alerts.

[colled]

If I connect PAW to the comms audio instead of the tablet I won't then get the airspace and other warnings from Skydemon through the headset which I find quite useful. And if I use the tablet location service instead of PAW on Skydemon then I also don't see the traffic on screen. So I lose both traffic and airspace awareness which is no good.

[PaulSS]

I am using a Lenovo M9 so different hardware to you, so does sound Android 13 specific.

If it's Android specific you know the answer.

[steveu]

If I connect PAW to the comms audio instead of the tablet I won't then get the airspace and other warnings from Skydemon through the headset which I find quite useful. And if I use the tablet location service instead of PAW on Skydemon then I also don't see the traffic on screen. So I lose both traffic and airspace awareness which is no good.

In which case, as Paul has posted, you either need to to do some fault finding with a different Android device or try the same with iOS.

[colled]

If it's Android specific you know the answer.

I could look for an older 2nd hand android tablet or switch to Apple, but in the meantime PAW is no longer compatible with new Android tablets, which seems less than ideal.

[steveu]

If it's Android specific you know the answer.

I could look for an older 2nd hand android tablet or switch to Apple, but in the meantime PAW is no longer compatible with new Android tablets, which seems less than ideal.

I think you're looking at a miniscule sample of the Android user base.

Where the aircraft is flying with some form of internet access for the PAW, the Android device will be more likely to stay connected because there is Internet access.

One solution is to get a simple mobile broadband router or MiFi and to connect the PAW to that wirelessly via the iGrid dongle.

Then any device connected to the PAW with the PAW router function enabled sees the Internet and has no reason to move or drop the connection.

Have you thought of trying this?

It is my own set up and comes with other benefits, like the licence auto updating without retyping the new key, supplementary traffic and rainfall radar, and so on.

[colled]

If only it was that easy, I already have this setup with iGrid on to a hotspot and get all the additional traffic and weather etc. but it doesn't help with my disconnections unfortunately.

[steveu]

If only it was that easy, I already have this setup with iGrid on to a hotspot and get all the additional traffic and weather etc. but it doesn't help with my disconnections unfortunately.

As an engineer working in the field we often fix or diagnose problems by substitution. Given that most of us have iGRid working on other Android phones/tablets with no problems, it would be a good fault finding technique to swap out the tablet. If the fault goes, you are happy. If the fault remains, we can look at other areas for a more complicated fault, secure in the knowledge that the tablet has been exonerated.

Does the tablet get used for anything else and have you used a Wifi diagnostic tool to check RF levels? With a Wifi tool on a known working phone and the tablet in question  difference of received RF levels might be a clue. Also, you could see how well the tablet receives the PAW Wifi.