https://bugs.maemo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=2878

Near the bottom of the discussion I think we hit the problem. Sulp ( the daemon that manages the a-gps data ) can silently crash/go away and gps will never lock. There is no feedback to the use that the application has crahsed and the only way they know to clear it is a reboot. I suspect there are situations (like mine) where a reboot does not clear it.

i was able to bring it back only after apt-get remove libsulpd1 and agps-ui and then reinstalling all the dependent system libraries that are compiled against it. Rebooting, running till a gps fix, and only then installing and enabling agps-ui.

I still don't know if it's doing any good, but the satellite list does seem to be almost full pre-populated when starting a fix.