We’ve seen the ads from Nokia promoting the maps feature on their phones. That’s great if you buy one of their new phones, all of which cost a lot of money. But what if you have an old phone, aren’t really in the market to upgrade but still want the GPS capability for cheap? In that case, you’ll find your prayers answered with a Bluetooth GPS receiver. I wanted to share my experiences with this wonderful technology.
I discovered that there is a veritable feast of GPS receivers out there with many manufacturers like Holux, Globalsat and others in addition to the well known Garmin and TomTom. A friend of mine had purchased a Holux Slim 236 receiver from China, a device that I had used extensively with my mobile phone and N800 internet tablet. Since I knew it worked with most of the devices I intended to use, I was tempted to go for it. However, I did want to try something new. After reading a few reviews, decided on a Globalsat BT-359. It cost me around 85 USD on amazon.com. My friend who ordered it for me delivered it to me in Bangalore last Saturday.
The device is a sleek one measuring around 3 x 2 inch and less than .5 inches thick. It fits easily into the shirt pocket, that was a big change for me from the Holux, which was much thicker. It has a single button on front for power and three LEDs, one for power, one for the GPS signal and the third for Bluetooth. The receiver has a mini-USB port for charging. In addition to the receiver, I got a 110-240V charger with a USB plug, thus freeing me from the computer. An added advantage is that I can hook other USB charging devices like my ipod to this.
The device is simple to operate, push and hold the power switch for 1 second. The GPS LED is always on when seeking the signal, but once it has obtained a fix, it constantly blinks. You then need to pair this with another device like a mobile phone or laptop and voila, you have a real time fix on your current location.
I’ve been using this in a number of different ways
- On my N800 tablet, I use the Maemo Mapper application. This fabulous application can download maps from a number of source like Google Maps, Yahoo Maps etc on the fly and overlay your location/track etc.
- On my N73 mobile, I have a couple of mapping applications, Nokia Maps and Google Maps. I’ve never been able to get Nokia maps to recognize my receiver, but google maps is able to show my location. Unfortunately, it cannot provide driving directions in India
- The bulk of my usage is the wonderful and free Sportstracker application from Nokia, which I use on my cycling trips. It keeps track of your location, distance covered, speed etc and even provides real time graphs of speed vs distance/time. At the end of your workout, you can export the data to Google Earth as well.
Of course, I’ve only had this for a few days and I’m sure I will discover new uses (like geotagging photos etc) for this over time. In the meantime, I'm also curious to find out other uses that people in this forum have had for GPS and the software programs that you use.
I discovered that there is a veritable feast of GPS receivers out there with many manufacturers like Holux, Globalsat and others in addition to the well known Garmin and TomTom. A friend of mine had purchased a Holux Slim 236 receiver from China, a device that I had used extensively with my mobile phone and N800 internet tablet. Since I knew it worked with most of the devices I intended to use, I was tempted to go for it. However, I did want to try something new. After reading a few reviews, decided on a Globalsat BT-359. It cost me around 85 USD on amazon.com. My friend who ordered it for me delivered it to me in Bangalore last Saturday.
The device is a sleek one measuring around 3 x 2 inch and less than .5 inches thick. It fits easily into the shirt pocket, that was a big change for me from the Holux, which was much thicker. It has a single button on front for power and three LEDs, one for power, one for the GPS signal and the third for Bluetooth. The receiver has a mini-USB port for charging. In addition to the receiver, I got a 110-240V charger with a USB plug, thus freeing me from the computer. An added advantage is that I can hook other USB charging devices like my ipod to this.
The device is simple to operate, push and hold the power switch for 1 second. The GPS LED is always on when seeking the signal, but once it has obtained a fix, it constantly blinks. You then need to pair this with another device like a mobile phone or laptop and voila, you have a real time fix on your current location.
I’ve been using this in a number of different ways
- On my N800 tablet, I use the Maemo Mapper application. This fabulous application can download maps from a number of source like Google Maps, Yahoo Maps etc on the fly and overlay your location/track etc.
- On my N73 mobile, I have a couple of mapping applications, Nokia Maps and Google Maps. I’ve never been able to get Nokia maps to recognize my receiver, but google maps is able to show my location. Unfortunately, it cannot provide driving directions in India
- The bulk of my usage is the wonderful and free Sportstracker application from Nokia, which I use on my cycling trips. It keeps track of your location, distance covered, speed etc and even provides real time graphs of speed vs distance/time. At the end of your workout, you can export the data to Google Earth as well.
Of course, I’ve only had this for a few days and I’m sure I will discover new uses (like geotagging photos etc) for this over time. In the meantime, I'm also curious to find out other uses that people in this forum have had for GPS and the software programs that you use.