We have investigated the relationship between electrical activation and residual defects in GaAs implanted with 1 MeV Si ions to a fluence of 3×1015 cm−2 and subsequently annealed, using rapid thermal annealing (RTA) for 10 seconds, at temperatures up to 1050°C. Hall measurements show n-type activation that increases in magnitude with increasing annealing temperature to reach a sheet carrier concentration of 2.6×1014 cm−2 after RTA at 1050°C. Two main types of extended defects, perfect and partial dislocation loops, had previously been identified in the as-implanted samples. In addition, a large number of discrete point defect complexes are certainly created but escape detection. We show here a correlation between the annealing of the defects and the recovery of the electrical transport properties. Most of the point defects anneal out between room temperature and 700°C, and it is in this temperature regime that the transport properties show their most significant improvement. For annealing temperatures between 700°C and 1050°C, the mobility of the carriers decreases slightly while the carrier concentration gradually approaches saturation. Concurrently, the loops grow in size while decreasing in number and eventually anneal out. However, after annealing at 1050°C, while most of the extended defects have disappeared, only about 9% of the implanted atoms had been activated, suggesting that residual point defect centers control the activation of Si dopants in MeV implanted GaAs.