Cleared to Upgrade: iOS 8.4 Fixes GPS Issues

"Apple has released iOS 8.4 with Apple Music, Beats 1, and an all-new Music app."

Trust us, we're excited for that headline, but we're just a little more excited (and relieved) to finally announce to our very loyal and patient customers that with the release of iOS 8.4, the bug that prevented most GPS accessories from providing location data has been fixed.

This morning we ran the public iOS 8.4 release thru our "quick QA test matrix" which covers 4 iOS device models (both cellular and Wi-Fi only), 7 GPS accessories, and 5 apps.  That's 140 steps, and we're happy to report all passed.

We perform extensive testing with the beta iOS builds, so this is what we were expecting.  However, there's no guarantee that the public releases will match the beta releases exactly.  Also, beta builds are considered confidential under the Apple Developer Program, which limits how much we can discuss publicly -- but they give us a chance to work through any issues via direct communication channels with Apple and our app partners.

We'll be posting some more details soon regarding our revamped QA process, called Cleared to Upgrade, which will improve our communications to you regarding iOS and firmware updates, app compatibility, and any known issues. 

And for folks who may have older GPS devices from Dual or Garmin, who may not have been getting many status updates: the iOS 8.4 update fixes these devices as well.  But if you're ready to upgrade to a Bad Elf GPS accessory, we're happy to announce our Bad Elf Summer Trade-Up 2015 rebate program, which gives you up $100 cash back on the purchase of a new Bad Elf Bluetooth GPS receiver.

Finally, we want to say thank you to our loyal customers for your patience over the last 12 weeks.  This has been an extremely frustrating experience for everyone, and we'll do our best to work closely with our industry partners to ensure this does not happen again.  

As always, we're standing by at support@bad-elf.com to answer any questions!