Database Users

good gps locator

can anyone tell me about a good gps locator which I can use in conjunction with my phone? I don't want to spend too much on it either, but at the same time don't want it to have bad quality, any suggestions?

Holux 236 is the best for me... My future one !

holux
wow bluetooth gps thats pretty sweet! it would automatically work with Pocket Streets right? As far as software goes, is there anything that can give like Voice Directions while you drive?

some good apps that has voice guidance: Tomtom, iGuidance.
The current best of the crop GPS which everything is compared to (according to gpspassion) is Globalsat BT-338.
buygpsnow dot com has combo packages on all of these.

I have one of these and it has outperformed any of the PDA/GPS combo units I have seen.
It's over £20 cheaper than when I bought mine 6 months ago too.
Have a look.
http://www.inter-activeinformation....id=31&osCsid=22355926e8caeb052f2d717d6cd2e370
I mainly used it with TomTom Mobile on a Nokia 7610. Now I have the wizard, as soon as I get my memory card in the post Tomtom 5 is going on that.

Pixel69 said:
Holux 236 is the best for me... My future one !
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I just bought a Holux 236 on advice from the forums here and it's grest. And tiny too, about the size of a small box of matches! I got it from a Taiwan dealer on eBay, they sell every hour for about £40-£44 plus £13 shipping to UK.
20 channels for good location finding, and it even works inside my house. Connectiing with my Vario (Wizard) was a dream - just remember to set up an outgoing COM port (I used port 7) to let other programs see the device.
Highly recommended.
Andre

I just got the i-Blue reciever and it's worked great!!
http://www.semsons.com/ibhiseaublgp.html
the thing I like about it, is it has auto on and off sensing technology...
Auto On/Off - When you use i-Blue for the first time, just power up and place the receiver under the windshield in car. Anytime when a paired PDA or laptop computer with Bluetooth connectivity is onboard, i-Blue will wake up on Bluetooth for your navigating usage. When Bluetooth signal is not present, i-Blue will go into sleeping mode automatically (Slow blinking blue LED).
Works perfectly too, I got a external antenna for it, so the antenna is mounted on my dash, and the reciever is secured in my glove box, so all I have to do is turn bluetooth on on my 8125 when i get in the car and the i-Blue pairs up within a second or two.. pretty slick!

I like my Holux 236. Quality piece plus it's small and even in the tall buildings around Shanghai I cab still pick up 6-8 birds and a very close lock (10m or so).

g0nk said:
Works perfectly too, I got a external antenna for it, so the antenna is mounted on my dash, and the reciever is secured in my glove box, so all I have to do is turn bluetooth on on my 8125 when i get in the car and the i-Blue pairs up within a second or two.. pretty slick!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Definately slick mate. I didn't realise how these things had progressed.
Any idea of battery life with this sleep mode thingybob?
What we could really do with is an external antenna with a uilt in solar panel to recharge/power the gps unit.
A truly "Fit 'n' Forget" situation

Jerry-S said:
g0nk said:
Works perfectly too, I got a external antenna for it, so the antenna is mounted on my dash, and the reciever is secured in my glove box, so all I have to do is turn bluetooth on on my 8125 when i get in the car and the i-Blue pairs up within a second or two.. pretty slick!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Definately slick mate. I didn't realise how these things had progressed.
Any idea of battery life with this sleep mode thingybob?
What we could really do with is an external antenna with a uilt in solar panel to recharge/power the gps unit.
A truly "Fit 'n' Forget" situation
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
not quite sure on the battery life yet, i've only had it for about 4-5 days.. and it's been "on" and in my glove box since then.. everytime I get into my truck, i turn bluetooth on and it's there magically.. and it only took about 3 hours to fully charge it when i first got it.. comes with a car charger/wall charger as well..

The Holux 236 is very, very sensitive, but i use GARMIN GPS10, very professional, very discret, waterproof, and with the best battery life. And it´s the only one that measures velocity up 400Km/h. If you try in a plane the HOLUX 236 for example, passing the 400-450Km Velocity barrier, the HOLUX 236 receives signal but do not comput it. It´s unuselless in a aero trip...

I bought a Holux GPSlim 236 about 3 months ago and it is brilliant. It will last for several hours without gharge but runs fine from the cigarette lighter socket when low. It locks on as quick as my TomTom loads. Can't fault it.
ps
Got it off e-bay for about £50.

tomtom? do i need an external GPS device?

This seems like a silly question even while i am the one asking it. but by the looks of things i need to buy a bluetooth GPS to get my tomtom working.
is this correct..
thanks jay

Yes I'm afraid so - Unless your Pocket PC has a built in GPS (but as far as I know none of the HTC models do).

you could also use a SDIO GPS, but BT is a more elegant solution.

by bt you mean like the bt phone company?

jamiehutber said:
by bt you mean like the bt phone company?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Bluetooth GPS Receiver, from £50 inc vat. - http://www.gpsw.co.uk/cats/cl3_209.html?OrderBy=Price&

ye sounds good. i was looking on ebay they have solo panel bt one. any preference on the number that they have. the one you pointed to is a "36". whats that mean?! :lol:
cheers for the help

Ill recommend you the Holux GPSlim 236 Bluetooth GPS with SIRF Star III chipset, imho the best you can get for your money right now.

How about the Solar GPS reciever
http://cgi.ebay.com/New-Solar-Bluet...9709303933QQcategoryZ4668QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
I have heard of people using this one with the universal.
Anyone have any info about that one?

My advice is don't waste time on gimmicks.
The priority is to get a SIRF III chipset inside as beachmeat suggests.
Solar panels do not stop you having to charge the device, they merely slow down the rate of discharge, providing it's day time, in the winter evenings and at night, you'll probably find they have less battery power then a non-solar panelled device. The guys over at Pocketgpsworld.com did not rate solar panel recievers very well and took time to recover from the piece of advice on the instructions which say "Contains sensitive electronic parts, keep out of direct sunlight"
Another excelent device is the Globalsat BT-338, or the Holux that was recommended earlier.

another Vote for either the Holux 236 works really well with the Exec

well i took your advise even though the solar panel did have the new chipset... i ended up getting a Globalsat BT-338 for £70.. so when i get it i'll let everybody how it goes and works

other options
being 3g the universal is able to run telco programs which help u with traffic like tomtom, even better they can give you more personalized information because the telco can feed u life information.
I live in Australia and Telstra is currently testing a live road map system through 3g, optus does this also.
hope that helps

I might be talking rubbish, but I recently read somewhere that there is a GPS receiver built into the Universal or something like that. From what I remember it was called the 911 GPS and is used to give position information to the emergency services when they are contacted. I heard somewhere it was possible to integrate this to work with navigator software, but would like to know whether or not this is actually correct.
Thanks
Euan

Cheap as possible GPS

Hello!
I am looking for a cheap as possible GPS reciever that's actually any good, and I don't know where to start. I'm in the UK so somewhere that delivers to the UK for cheap or that is in the UK would be great!
I've seen around for £30, but I forget where. Are they actually any good?
It doesn't have to be critically amazing, I won't be using it *that* often I just think it'd be worthwhile to have if its only £30 for the reciever.
Thanks!
Laurie

Hi laurie
Your best bet is to look on Ebay, you'll find a good range of bluetooh GPS receivers at around the 30 - 40 pound mark. Your also going to need some navigation software such as TomTom 5 or Navigon MN5 (latest versions). These are not so cheap! Go for a receiver with either a RFMD or SIRF III chipset as these are the quickest TTFF (time to First Fix) even though the RFMD chipset is quicker than the Sirf. :wink:
James

Thanks! I'll have a look! I didn't know why I didn't just look on eBay. Possibly cos they look cheap and rubbish but as long as it works that all I care about!

http://www.mobilefun.co.uk/product/8590.htm
Anyone have an opinion on this one? seems the cheapest and the site has 5 pages of good reviews, with only a couple of bad ones.
Ebay was very difficult to find a better price for one that actually works with the o2 XDA Mini S.
Thanks!
Laurie
edit: helps if I post the link doesnt it

I recently bought and used the Holox BT-321 :
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/HOLOX-Bluetoo...9729903430QQcategoryZ4668QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
works great with tom tom 5 for me.. u need to have tom tom 5.21 update to have it pair properly
o2 xda mini S
tomtom 5.21
holox bt-321 GPS receiver
hth

lozzd said:
http://www.mobilefun.co.uk/product/8590.htm
Anyone have an opinion on this one? seems the cheapest and the site has 5 pages of good reviews, with only a couple of bad ones.
Ebay was very difficult to find a better price for one that actually works with the o2 XDA Mini S.
Thanks!
Laurie
edit: helps if I post the link doesnt it
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've got this - works well with the wizard and got it next day from the site above too.
Charger for gps is usb style so its perfect for keeping the wizard charged while in the car. The bt. gps worked fine without charging on 5 hour jouneys, and i've been using it regulary for 3 months now with no problem.
Don't think its the best one with regards to fas tlock or number of satellites, but it does the job well enough.

Thanks for that input, I went ahead and ordered one. Can't wait to get playing with TomTom

hi lozzd, i checked the mobilefun site re the gps you mentioned, it seems its a good one and its got good reviews. did you received already? so how was it? could you post your experience or probably just a mini-review. id like to know how is it easy to configure it with gps software (such as tomtom if you got one), the time it takes to connect the phone with the receiver and getting signals from the satellite, battery usage, etc...
many thanks.

Hello,
I recieved the GPS the next day! Top marks to the people at mobilefun. So far I have used the GPS a couple of times, and most of the time TomTom reports 3-4 out of 5 bars signal, and when on a clear motorway, 5 out of 5. However, this is in my Land Rover Defender which has an almost vertical windscreen, so reception is reknowned to be pretty useless as you can only get satellites infront of you. So I expect in a normal car, the reception will be pretty good most of the time. This counts too for the time it takes to lock on... sometimes it takes 20 seconds, sometimes it takes a couple of minutes. For a GPS that isn't relied on every day, its fantastic for the money, and I can highly recommend it. It's cheap small, comes with a charger that you can use for both the GPS and/or the Wizard, and since the battery in the GPS runs for 6 hours (apparently) you could even swap between the two.
People make a big deal out of how difficult it is to set up. As long as you have TomTom 5.2+, it's pretty damn simple. Turn on the GPS, pair using bluetooth window, go to the COM ports section and add any port you fancy for the GPS, go into TomTom, select "other bluetooth gps" select the port and it picks it up right away. Not only that, but if you leave bluetooth off most of the time (like me), TomTom will turn on Bluetooth when you open the program, find the GPS straight away and use it, and then turn the Bluetooth back off again when you close it!
I was worried a hefty program like TomTom would bog down or run really slowy on the Wizard, but it runs brilliantly. It's a pretty awesome piece of software! All in all I highly recommend the GPS and TomTom to anyone who happens to want a very cheap GPS for occasional navigation (or just to play with!)
Now when people say "wow, whats that?" I can now say its a Phone, PDA, and GPS all rolled into one. And it does it pretty damn well.
Let me know if you have any other questions! Hope that helps!
Laurie

hi lozzd, thanks for the review! i have some questions.
1) what charger does the gps receiver comes with? a wall charger or a car charger? cos im planning to buy a usb car charger. if its a car charger then probably i dont need to buy one.
2) what do you mean by "...and since the battery in the GPS runs for 6 hours (apparently) you could even swap between the two"? you can swap batteries between the gps and the wizard?
3) is the gps battery compatible with nokia phone batteries?
4) did you try operating it inside your home? can you get signal?
i think thats all for now. thanks again.

1) it comes with a car charger, and a USB cable used for charging. So you can use (i assume) the wizard charger to charge it, you can use a laptop/notebook using the supplied charger cable, or you can use the car charger with the usb cable. You can also use the car charger and the usb cable to charge your wizard.
2) What I meant, is that because the GPS battery life is 6 hours, if you were on a really long journey, you could charge the GPS, then the Wizard, then the GPS as they each ran out of power, using the same charger. The batteries are different.
3) Yes, I don't know the model as I don't use Nokias, but it looks like a nokia battery to me.
4) I haven't tried operating inside my house, but I can't really see why I would

thanks for the quick reply. will definitely buy this one, best value for money. its good to know that it also comes with a car charger, that could save me money from buying one. thanks a lot!

this one looks great to bad i cant buy one because I live in the U.S.

I had holox...
It has major problems when walking..... it pauses for 50-60m every 10-20sec
I bought holux GPSlim!!!
It is the best!!! it has great acc when walking and driving!

one more question. is it possible to charge this gps device using the mains charger that comes with the htc wizard (mine is mda vario).
btw, i ordered it already at mobilefun today.
thanks.

Well this reply may be a bit pointless as if you ordered it before 4ish you will probably already have it but still, I think you can, I'm not sure. I assume if the car charger works for both, the wall charger should too.

i got my bt-gps yesterday. i recharged it with the wall/mains charger and it was fine. thanks.

lozzd said:
1) it comes with a car charger, and a USB cable used for charging. So you can use (i assume) the wizard charger to charge it, you can use a laptop/notebook using the supplied charger cable, or you can use the car charger with the usb cable. You can also use the car charger and the usb cable to charge your wizard.
2) What I meant, is that because the GPS battery life is 6 hours, if you were on a really long journey, you could charge the GPS, then the Wizard, then the GPS as they each ran out of power, using the same charger. The batteries are different.
3) Yes, I don't know the model as I don't use Nokias, but it looks like a nokia battery to me.
4) I haven't tried operating inside my house, but I can't really see why I would
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just to go through this post bit by bit, all I can say is that my BT GPS is of unknown make / model.
It sounds like you have the same model as me so here goes.
1. Just make sure the voltage from the car charger is 5 volts. If it is the same as mine, it'll charge the wizard, as mine does.
3. My GPS battery will fit in my Nokia 7610. (Good if you don't need GPS and your phone goes flat.) LOL
4. Take the GPS outside, get a signal and then wander back into and around the house. Mine works all the time and is really sensitive.
I hope this is of use. Happy GPSing. LOL
By the way, if you are into outdoor pursuits and stuff like that, ave a look at GeoCache activities.

Is there Soft GPS on MDA

Hi,
Have a T-Mobile MDA/HTC Wizard.
Is there some GPS software which can connect via Wifi/T-Zones or Internet and do the same routing/function such as a GPS Device?
I dont want to spend $600 to buy a GPS device and then connect it to my MDA. Rather buy some GPS software which can work on the MDA by itself.
Thanks.
--

No GPS software is going to work properly without a GPS receiver from which to extrapolate your current position.

If you want GPS capability of any kind at all, you will need to get a receiver, period. There's nothing GPS related on the phone except for a settings applet that is disabled by default and only lets you set the port of a bonded receiver. There's also no way a network connection is going to be able to determine your position and software that attempts to do so using cell towers are only accurate to within a few miles, if it works at all. There's a bunch of receivers available on ebay (and elsewhere) for cheap...I got a Holux GPSlim236 for a little over $100 and it works great with the wizard via bluetooth. They are your options....getting a receiver or forgetting about it.

Or try Navizon. It was created to do exactly what you want. http://www.navizon.com
Used to be free, now you have to pay for it. But theres a 14 day trial i believe.
B

nextbond said:
I dont want to spend $600 to buy a GPS device and then connect it to my MDA.
--
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I saw some bluetooth GPS receivers as low as $80. And you can use your GPS receiver anywhere.

If I have the tomtom software, do I have to get the tomtom gps receiver or can I use another brand?

I have TomTom 5.21 and use a non TomTom bluetooth GPs reciever.

Hi all,
Thanks for the responses. Seems I will need a GPS device. If thats the case, why bother with a PDA? Should just buying a Gavin or TomTom GPS device be enough?
--

Depends on what you want. If you have the phone already, $100 for a GPS unit and maybe $100 for decent mapping software is a whole lot cheaper than $500-$800 for a decent Garmin unit. Plus you get a phone and a PDA out of the deal. I went on vacation a few weeks ago and the mapping software plotted a route and told me how to get there. Once there, I used slingplayer to watch my home cable channels while sitting on the beach, I used the camera to take pictures of the beach and whatnot, the network connection to upload those pictures to a phlog, IM with friends and coworkers and check the weather and news with IE. Oh yeah...and it rang when I got a phone call or text message. Then it plotted a route back home (presumably the same way backwards but I didn't really check) and told me how to get there. Depends on what you want.
TomTom can work with other bluetooth receivers. Works with my Holux, at least.

I'm interested in buying a bluetooth gps receiver I found a few on amazon but this one caught my attention because of the price
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...6698/ref=pd_bbs_3/102-8138642-5399340?ie=UTF8
is that one any good?

I strongly advise you to check the type of GPS chip used in the receiver. The best one for the moment seems to be the Sirf star 3.
It's not as much of a detail as you may think : older chips can take a very long time to get fixed (which means that you might wait for dozens of minutes before even getting a GPS position), and are usually more power consuming.

GPS on Hermes without receiver. Possible?

Hi guys n girls,
I'm kinda new here and I have a question I've been dying to ask since I got hold of my HTC hermes. I'm currently using Vodafone's version of HTC Hermes, which is the V1605.
Is it possible for HTC Hermes to use GPS navigation without an external GPS receiver such as a bluetooth device? I learnt that HTC Hermes has no GPS chipset so it will definitely need a receiver, but I'm just curious and I wanna confirm. Thanks

Afaik, it got a GPS Chipset but no antenna
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=292466
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=291181

thanks for the clarification.
so, it will need a receiver to act like an antenna?

I'm not sure if you search for GPS or looked at the Wiki on the Hermes but its been covered a few times. The only thing you can really do is get a bluetooth GPS receiver or something along those lines.

Read and Search
http://wiki.xda-developers.com/index.php?pagename=Hermes_GPS_FAQ

I use a Holox bt-321 GPS receiver, works fine!
I was going to link to an ebay auction for one but its possibly the ONLY day when there isnt an auction for one!

I bought here from a user a Holux M-1000. Works fine and without any problems.

Give Navizon a go - > http://www.navizon.com/
its a virtual GPS for phones without GPS, Goes on Phone Cell info and Wifi AP Signals, you have to use wifi but it does pinpoint where you are better with wifi on
also out puts the data via a com port so you can use Satnav an other GPS enabled apps with it

Garmin GPS 10
I'm using an older Garmin GPS 10 that I purchased a few years ago, but it stills works great. It is rechargeable and the battery seems to last forever. I also using the Beta version of Garmin's Mobile XT, which gives my 8525 the same look and feel as "modern" GPS-only devices.
Some of the cool "toys" the software uses is:
2-D or 3-D map view
PeerPoints (sending GPS coords via SMS or MMS)
Local gas prices near you
Real time traffice
Weather
POIs ( you can have up to 4,000 waypoints/favorites/locations)
Voice prompts
Hotels.com info
etc.
Of course, some of the features depends on whether or not you have a data plan or WiFi access. I also like it because it is very small, works via bluetooth and is very accurate. I also use BeelineGPS because I also like to Geocache.
http://www.geocaching.com/
P.S. The current version of my GPS is the Garmin Mobile 10 for PDAs/Laptops

im using a "54 channel Holox" (Fake Holux) but i havent seen a quicker connecting device