CF31mk5 Win10 GPS Problems

Hey all-
I'm new to the forum, but after reading through some of the other posts I was hoping you guys might be able to help.

I have a fleet of 7 new CF-31mks, they were shipped with Windows7x32, and another person at my department wiped them and upgraded them to Windows10x64. He then went on vacation, and left me to work on them.

I'm working with Panasonic Technical Support, and the issue I'll described has been escalated to a regional technical service manager, but that was a week ago and no response yet.

The issue is related to the internal GPS. When Windows10 was installed, and GPS enabled in the BIOS, the OS recognizes the device as "Microsoft Serial Ballpoint", and as such the cursor goes haywire. The only way to stop the cursor going haywire initially was to disable GPS or disable the ballpoint device in the device manager. I've since figured out how to disable it in the registry, but that hasn't changed the fact that COM3 (which appears when GPS in enabled) is being recognized as a generic serial port (drivers: serenum.sys and serial.sys). I've run the uBlox GPS fix, no change.

Anybody have any ideas?

Thanks
~Jeff Howard
Captain, Durham County Fire Rescue
Durham, NC

 

What is ublox gps fix? I think you have to install u-center with drivers and you'll get a virtual com port in your device manager.

 

Howdy.

The GPS uBlox fix is meant to reconfigure the system to recognize COM3 as a GPS device... but it doesnt work. Its a .bat file given to me by Panasonic that I run from an elevated command prompt.

I do have u-center installed, but didn't get a virtual com port when I installed it, and don't see any drivers in the application directory. I installed version 8.21.

 

From the CF 31 page at Panasonic..

OS Windows® 10 Pro (available Windows® 7 Professional downgrade option), Windows® 8.1 Pro.

Can you buy an official CF 31 Win10 recovery image direct from Panasonic?

 

ok, can you check whether gps data is present on com3?
ucenter, gps viewer etc

 

For Windows 10 image...no.

GPS Viewer refuses to start, I get an side by side configuration error when I try to run it as an administrator.

U-Center opens, and when I select COM3, I get a red connection icon at the bottom of the screen, and nada for data.

 

Try to change gps com port in bios.

p.s. honestly, I don't remember a solution, but I had this problem some months ago, and victory was on my side )

 

The BIOS options under Enabled (other options are Auto and Disabled) are 3F8/IRQ4, 2F8/IRQ3, 3E8/IRQ7, and 2E8/IRQ5. I've cycled through them, went back to Device Manager each time, scanned for hardware changes a couple times, tried u-center, no change. I noticed every time I went back into the BIOS, the GPS setting was back on Auto.

 

a thought or two ...
personally , i would give the panasonic boys and M$ some time to *figure out* what is going on and incorporate the fix across the board on both sides .
in the meantime , you still need working GPS configurations (hence this thread) ... a "downgrade" (!?) to W7 in the meantime might be the option to exercise .
are you required to use W10 as per SOP ?

 

This is the problem with a new operating system. Just to many bugs right now. I would stay with W7. If you need W10 then order the W10 Panasonic restore disk from Heartland services.

 

Guys, I know you don't like Win10. But it's a Windows bug since Windows 2000. So, more than 16 years of "figuring out".
Proof.

 

Return to W7 or stay w/W10. CF-31 registry patch and gps viewer are available from Pansonic downloads. (for MK1-5)
I didn't look in the Driver Bundles but they may be there too.
Do you possibly need a USB driver? Maybe that is the ublox file you referred to.
Off-topic this page is really messed up.

 

Set to auto and then run the patch(which is available at panny site). If it refused to run. Disable the gps on the bios and run again the patch. When its done, set again the gps to auto. Your good to go.


ohlip

 

We had this problem with an external (Trimble) GPS running on COM1, Windows 7, but only on certain Toughbooks. The solution we did was to leave the serial ball mouse in device manager but DISABLE it. Then Windows stopped adding it on reboots and the GPS port was left open for the application to use. Every now and then the ball mouse would reinstall after a major windows update though, and the process had to be repeated (right click serial ball mouse in device manager and set to DISABLE)

 

this is the reg fix we used (from Panasonic) to stop jumpy mouse issue. NOTE!! THIS WAS FOR WIN 7 64 bit!!!!!!!!!!!
NOTE 2: this was from Panasonic site---I would imagine they have a Win 10 version of this same fix

called "GPSRegistryPatch" at panny website


Win 7 64 version:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Enum\ACPI\PNP0501\a\Device Parameters]
"SkipEnumerations"=dword:fffffffe