Recycling an Android Phone As a Handheld GPS? 328
imblum writes "So my dad's antique handheld GPS unit just went toes up and I was considering replacing it for him with an old Android Smartphone. All he really needs it for is hunting and camping (no navigation), so I don't want to pay for cell or data service. I found the program Mobile Atlas Creator to download map files onto the SD card, and an app called Maverick Lite to view them. Now all I need is to decide on an Android phone. I was considering a Samsung Behold II ($100-200 on Craigslist), but thought it would be nice to get some input from the Slashdot community. It seems like I can get a lot more functionality for the money out of an old Android than I could from a big name handheld GPS. Does this plan sound reasonable? Is there anything I'm overlooking?"
Battery life might be a concern. (Score:5, Insightful)
Battery life will not be as good as on a real GPS, but should be ok.
Re:Battery availability might be a concern. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Exactly. When I read this " I was considering a Samsung Behold II ($100-200 on Craigslist)" I was starting to doubt the author had even priced GPS units since they're far below $100 now
Since "All he really needs it for is hunting and camping (no navigation)," why not get a device soley created for that purpose like a $75 Garmin eTrex. [walmart.com] High sensitivity, waterproof, and up t
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Airplane mode disables all the wireless including gsm. Battery life will still likely be an issue for hunting, probably can get a few days with occasional checks.
Re:Battery availability might be a concern. (Score:4, Insightful)
Airplane mode disables all the wireless including gsm. Battery life will still likely be an issue for hunting, probably can get a few days with occasional checks.
If he's going out into the wilderness any appreciable distance and doesn't know how to use a map and compass, or how to find the four directions without a compass then he might be a candidate for a Darwin Award except that he's apparently already reproduced.
Seriously. A sharp person can learn basic old-fashioned navigation in about ten or twenty minutes. Do that and a GPS device is just a convenience. Nice to have for sure, but out in the wilderness you need some skills too. A knowledge of common edible plants for the area and the know-how to make basic snares and traps for wild game and makeshift shelters is a good idea too.
Re:Battery availability might be a concern. (Score:4, Insightful)
It's nice to have backup when your phone's battery dies. Or if the thing falls into a creek. Or is eaten by a bear.
Really, it isn't that hard to learn the basics, and it's fun - so why not do it?
Re:Battery availability might be a concern. (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyone who is going hunting and camping (as the Asker said his dad would be doing) and doesn't know the basics of direction finding and survival in the wild has no business there, at least without a knowledgeable human guide. That said, many experienced hunters, hikers and campers these days carry GPS units for that extra added layer of security, as well as making it easy to map out a path in new territory.
Personally, I'd ditch the idea of buying a cellphone to "repurpose" it as a standalone GPS unit. Not only is this inefficient and potentially expensive, it's not really repurposing at all. Repurposing is finding a new use for something you already own and no longer use, not buying someone else's old gear and wasting your time and money on a half-assed solution.
In this situation, I'd prefer my dad to have a true GPS unit that is weather resistant, has long battery life, and (ideally for a hunter or hiker) topographic maps. A device like that has much more to offer than a used cellphone for perhaps $100 more.
Re:Battery availability might be a concern. (Score:4, Insightful)
I agree with you on the standalone GPS... they have plenty of decent models for around the price OP was talking about.
I disagree with you on everything else. OP never said his father wasn't capable of using a map. Just because he knows how to use a map, though, doesn't mean he wouldn't want a GPS unit for its convenience. Also, think about why you would need a map for hunting... it's not just trying to find your way back where you started. It's keeping track of where you've already been and sticking waypoints in "good spots" and on each (if any) of your tree stands, etc. With a GPS unit, you can set a waypoint at your vehicle and start walking wherever you want. Then when you get to your tree stand, you can set another waypoint... If you go looking around more and find a good spot (maybe you find some animal tracks or scrape marks, etc.) you can mark THAT with a waypoint as well. Doing the equivalent on a map would involve: 1) taking out the map 2) unfolding it 3) figuring out roughly where you are since you know the direction from your compass but don't know how far in that direction you've traveled since the topographical map doesn't necessarily help much if the entire wooded area is flat and homogeneous 4) physically making permanent marks on your now-one-time-use map
With a GPS unit you can both add and remove waypoints with the touch of a button. If your batteries die, then sure, pull out the map and get a compass and figure out roughly where you are based on geography and start walking in the direction of your vehicle. (you don't need a distance measurement for that)
As for the "repurpose" argument, you're poisoning the well [wikipedia.org] with a false definition of "repurpose." Here [google.com] are six definitions of the word and not a single one requires prior possession of the object. "Taking a thing or a material and using it for a purpose not originally intended" You're taking an object intended to be used for communication (a phone) and using it for navigation instead by adding an application to it. If you ask me, it's ridiculously petty to say that it's not "repurposing."
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He lives (and goes hunting) in Alaska, and they don't have GPS in most of the state because of how far north it is. He could not see enough satellites to determine his position. I was stunned to think that GPS didn't work up there. I had no idea, and neither did my dad.
Nonsense, Alaska isn't far north. Most of it is on the same latitude as Finland, and we have no problems with GPS here. In fact, you can go to the north pole and have your GPS tell you you're at N 90 degrees. [yellowairplane.com] I think your dad was probably between too many mountains.
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This is incorrect.
The GPS constellation is arranged so this should be impossible unless:
Although none of the satellites are in a direct polar orbit (this avoids occasional "bunching" of satellites, a problem encountered by a forerunner to GPS called "Transit".), the constellation is divided into six orbital planes at varying inclinations. There is nowhere on the surface of the Earth whe
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That's idiotic. Cell service is tower based. GPS is satellite based. If you have clear sky to two of the satellites, you can get a decent idea of where you are, three and you can really only be two places and it's a safe bet you're in the place closest sea level. The general idea is that GPS should be visible from anywhere. Cell towers are located close to population centers because it's cost efficient.
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Yes, the cell service assists the GPS to find a signal quicker. That doesn't mean you can't get a GPS signal if you don't have cell service. It will just take a little longer.
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wifi and gps can also be turned off to save battery.>
Or you just turn the whole phone off when your not using it. Add in push maps and you just turn it on to get your bearings with your existing maps.
Re:Battery life might be a concern. (Score:5, Interesting)
It might not be a good idea for multi-day hikes, but you can probably get reasonable single-day battery life out of many or most models. Particularly if you power off the other radios, and if you can power off the unit itself when it's not being actively used.
As to why this and not a dedicated GPS unit - sure, a dedicated unit will probably have better battery life, and it might be better for GPS usage in other ways as well. But it's almost certainly less flexible. I can really only use it for GPS - what if I also want to take pictures or make notes about each location I'm at? Sure, I could carry more dedicated devices to handle those functions. But at some point, isn't it worth carrying one device which can serve several functions while fitting in my pocket? Also, a dedicated device probably comes with the software package that it comes with. Adapting a smartphone means that you're running a mobile computing platform which just happens to have a GPS sensor - you can probably pick among several options for the software, or even program your own. Some smartphones also have additional sensors like accelerometers or compasses which could improve the functionality - not all, of course, but potentially valuable if you can get it. Maybe some dedicated GPS units have this as well, but I doubt that the really cheap ones do.
For the subby, the situation they describe really does make it sound like a dedicated unit is at least worth a serious look. A dedicated unit is more likely to "just work" and that's likely all the guy wants.
Re:Battery life might be a concern. (Score:5, Insightful)
As someone who owns an Android phone AND a dedicated GPS, perhaps I can inject something into this conversation:
Another consideration is how well it will hold up under the elements. Even the cheapest Garmin eTrex (which I own BTW) is pretty rugged. I wouldn't trust my Android smartphone out in the woods in the rain, mud, etc. Some other pluses of going the dedicated route:
- Battery life is better on the dedicated GPS, and when it does run down, it takes standard AA's.
- The dedicated GPS seems to have a better "time to first fix" than my Android phone, but that just might be because of the specific model. However, if your one purpose is to do GPS, it makes sense that you would do it better than a multipurpose device.
I do think it would be cool if there was a dedicated GPS that took pictures too. You could use the GPS to geotag the picture and have it as an icon for a waypoint to help remind you what that waypoint is.
Re:Battery life might be a concern. (Score:5, Informative)
I did a reasonably extensive amount of research into how to do this, and I'm pretty confident I know the answer.
1. Get OruxMaps - it allows you to use maps without an active internet connection.
2. While connected to wifi, download the tiles from google terrain (or one of the other map sources available). If you know exactly where you're hiking, you can get zoomed in maps for say a 20 mile square around the center of your hike with amazing resolution.
3. Put your phone in a plastic bag, and only take it out if you actually don't know where you are (I find that I almost always do).
In terms of battery life, I was using my android phone as a camera too, and checking GPS every few hours to verify I was in the right place, and it lasted for three days taking down the battery by 40%. Make sure to turn off the cell tower seeking and such or else you will drain the battery really fast. Airplane mode probably won't allow you to receive GPS, unfortunately, but you can at least turn off wireless, data connections, etc.
If you aren't going to be gone very long, and you want a cool log of your trip, you can have OruxMaps poll the GPS in "power saving" mode, which as far as I can determine seems to mean connecting, and then dropping to low power (non-receiving) mode for 10-20 seconds before polling the satellites again. Then you can tell it to make a "track", and it will record your hike -- average speed, immediate speed at each point, speed distribution, altitude map, total distance, and other cute information.
Hopefully someone will mod this up high enough that the submitter can see it... this is the part of ask slashdot that always confuses me. Hopefully a few hundred other people came up with the same solution, so at least one of us is actually noticed =)
Where are the maps? (Score:2)
I don't know what Android does with the maps. But if the maps are fetched dynamically from the network, your old Android phone is going to need a subscription, and you're SOL when you take a wrong turn and wander off the grid. Been there / been burned by Blackberry.
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Oh, I guess I could actually read the summary. :-)
Does this third-party software do routing and announcements?
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The summary mentions offline maps, and there are lots of android apps that use them.
Why? (Score:5, Informative)
You're talking about spending $100-200 on an Android phone, and you can get a real dedicated GPS receiver for $90 that requires no effort to set up, no purchase of an additional flash card, has a warranty, etc.
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and for 'you' that would be fine.
this is for his dad.
you didn't think of that, did you?
give him a regular gps. forget the trendy mobile phone crap and get him a proper reliable device.
dollars to donuts, he does not need or want to 'browse web' while he's out there.
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I did, my dad would think it was lame. GPS while out hunting and web toy in the house would be pefect for him, I am now considering getting him one for Christmas.
Re:Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Right, but not everyone needs that. I bought a GPS for about $50 and it works great.
I have a cell phone that will play music, games, video, and act as a gps...yet I have an mp3 player because it's a better solution for the task, a Nintendo DS because the games are more than brief distractions, and a GPS because I don't want to pay the carrier for the right to use the GPS chip on the phone. Video, don't really care about video, but I suppose I could do that with the mp3 player or DS if I had to. There's something to be said for single purpose (or focused purposed) items that know what they're supposed to do and do it flawlessly.
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So you have a purse or what?
How the hell do you carry all that crap all the time?
Re:Why? (Score:5, Funny)
It's not a purse! It's a satchel, damnit!
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Indiana Jones has one.
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Re:Why? (Score:4, Insightful)
Right. You're talking about a hunter.
WTF is the "MP3/ video player, and camera" contraption supposed to be useful for? Which part of "need" do those tasks fit into?
(Footnote: My Garmin is lighter than my Droid, and the battery lasts longer with GPS.)
Re:Why? (Score:5, Informative)
Huh? You're not paying for the right to use the GPS chip, any more than you pay your carrier for the (ahem) "right" to use the audio chip.
I take it you've never been a victim...errr, customer of Verizon. My dad has them, and he actually has to pay an extra monthly fee to be able to move pictures and video from his phone to his computer. It's the craziest shit I've ever seen. I don't care if they have better coverage than T-Mobile, at least I'm on a carrier that gives me complete control over what I do with my phone.
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And noting else will drain the battery of a navigational aid with possible life-safety implications.
Might be a good application for a specialty appliance.
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Yeah, a map and compass. Relying on a GPS for live safety is moronic.
Re:Why? (Score:5, Interesting)
No. It is moronic to be less prepared than you could be. In some cases using a map and compass instead of a GPS is moronic, because it puts you at risk, even if you're pretty good with them.
I've certainly been in that situation. I once got caught on a high plain by a sudden blizzard. The day was beautiful, not a cloud in the sky. I looked up and saw the clouds boiling over the mountain range to the east, and I started running like hell to the west. I had about three miles to where the plain dropped off as the crow flies, maybe twice that on foot. Meanwhile the storm roared down the mountainside like an avalanche. I made it about halfway before it caught me, pelting me with big fat icy snowflakes that were whipped by the wind so they hit like snowballs.
Now, I probably *could* have made it out of there with my map and compass, but it would have been a challenge and taken much longer. Just trying to read the map in the wind and driving snow would have consumed precious minutes. So instead, I whipped out the GPS which made navigating down to lower altitude a piece of cake. Most importantly, it made getting to lower altitude quick. I passed dozens of potential false trails on the way out that I was able to ignore with confidence. After reaching the edge of the plain and descending a few hundred feet, the blinding snowstorm turned into a relatively gentle rain.
I'm not saying throw away your map and compass. You should have them and know how to use them well. But its reasonable and sensible to make GPS your first line of defense (and carry backup batteries) because when you're in trouble, time matters.
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The military still uses compasses for backup, and the spend more than $100 on a GPS.
Yeah the GPS is nice to have, but relying to save your life on it is moronic. Same with math, calculator is nice to have but relying on it for all your math needs is pretty dumb.
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built in maps
Probably not. The maps included on most hiking GPSs are totally worthless -- they might show a few huge highways, but nothing else. You generally have to buy topographic maps, or download free ones from a site like GPSFileDepot [gpsfiledepot.com].
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Just do clarify, my response assumes that you mean "comes with the unit" when you say "built in maps." If you really meant "no need for a signal to fetch maps on the fly from the Internet," the author of the summary seems to have already found a work-around for doing that with a phone.
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Or be smart and use the GPS for positioning and have a paper (and laminated) map... so when your batteries die you can still use a compass (you have one of those right?) to get your location, plot a course, etc (you do know how to do that the "old fashioned way" right?)
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Spare batteries are cheap.
learn something, daily... (Score:3, Insightful)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AGPS [wikipedia.org]
Some A-GPS devices cannot fall back to standard GPS, needing cell tower or internet signal as these A-GPS devices won't function with only GPS satellite signal.
Many mobile phones combine A-GPS and other location services including Wi-Fi Positioning System and cell-site triangulation in a hybrid positioning system.[2]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_devices_with_Assisted_GPS [wikipedia.org]
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Actually, many cell phones use assisted GPS. They can receive a normal GPS signal for rough positioning, but also use cell-based GPS services to increase accuracy and for situations where a clear view of the sky is not available (not enough birds available). The GPS works just fine without a network.
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No, my phone has a for real GPS receiver. Many smart phones do.
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A cellphone does not obtain your position using the free signal received from GPS satellites that dedicated GPS units use
Huh? My venerable G1 does exactly that, in addition to using cell-tower triangulation (my understanding is that it uses the cell tower method to provide a rapid initial location and then refines it using true GPS.) You can actually disable triangulation in the phone's configuration screen, in which case it's a pure GPS device. I'm sure there are older phones that don't have actual GPS receivers in them, but any smartphone capable of running navigation software will. GPS chips are cheap, and they're in every
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Android phones can be used without contract for PC like purposes. They will even connect to wifi or let you use the GPS receiver.
Used GPS are cheap (Score:5, Informative)
I just bought a used Magellan explorist 500 ion Amazon for $7. Why bother with hacking an android phone?
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Because buying a GPS doesn't overcomplicate the solution to this person's dad's issue.
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Used GPS are cheap
and often nearly useless. sorry, but when I'm backpacking, a screen with an arrow pointing up and a set of geo coords are worth almost nothing to me. there may be hundreds of kilometers between me and a road.
BR though, I guess that's part of the joy of being canadian.
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there may be hundreds of kilometers between me and a road.
Not in the US. In the mainland, no matter where you are, you are never more than 25 miles from a road. Might not be a heavily trafficed road, but a road none the less.
-Rick
Cell phone GPS not the same... (Score:5, Informative)
Cell phones rarely have WAAS. Cell phones usually also use the cellular system to receive the phase of the GPS satellite transmission to aid in reception--but--if you don't have any service, the accuracy can get pretty deplorable (well, compared to say my GPSmap 60CSx that usually locks within fourteen to sixteen feet)...the battery life isn't as good, cell phones are horribly made, and the chipsets and antennae are simply much, much, much better in a dedicated unit. Pick up a used GPS--that's a real GPS--and it will be much better suited to hunting and camping rather than looking for the closest Starbucks. Real GPS units have rubber gaskets for a reason.
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Re:Cell phone GPS not the same... (Score:4, Funny)
...chipsets and antennae are simply much, much, much better in a dedicated unit.
He said "Android", not "Apple"...
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You know Android is the operating system. And has no say on the quality of the hardware it is setup on.
Re:Cell phone GPS not the same... (Score:5, Informative)
I know you're trying to be funny, but I've been in a situation where I had to find out how worthless all the "GPS-capable" smartphones in my hiking group really were. For the discussion at hand, it doesn't matter if it's an Android, WinMo, or Apple. They're the same: absolute crap.
You're looking at a few crappy metal traces which are shared with all sorts of other radio gear compared to an actual hard-core ceramic patch antenna.
Want to see quick numbers? Let's go to sparkfun.com:
Cell phone class antenna: GPS-09131
Gain: 2.6dBi
Mini wussy GPS helical antenna: GPS-09871
Gain: 18dB (typical, they claim)
Old school generic ceramic GPS antenna: GPS-00177
Gain: 26dB
A group of us got lost in the hills hiking. Given that most phones depend on cell tower assistance for GPS, all of them couldn't tell us where we were. So after wandering into the next park's guest station, they drove us 45 minutes back to our starting location. Next time, I'm bringing an old WinMo2003 handheld with a GPS CF card because it actually has the right kind of antenna. (as well as WAAS support, etc)
Android phone as a GPS in the woods? Hell no.
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Yeah. You have a fundamental misunderstanding what antenna gain means. As a passive device, an antenna can not provide "gain" in the sense you are thinking of. Antenna "gain" is merely its directivity minus its insertion loss. I do not doubt that the insertion loss may be lower on a dedicated unit. Still, "gain" is not a good thing.
Gain is approximately directivity. Directivity tells you how "pointy" your beam is. A high gain antenna will allow you to measure fainter signals, assuming you are aiming
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That's because he's looking at LNA gain on an active antenna. Oops.
I can pretty much guarantee you that those helical and ceramic patch antennas won't be much more than +3 or +4 dBi. There are only two ways to improve antenna gain: directionality and physical size. Directionality (aside from "up") is exactly what you *don't* want in a GPS antenna. You ideally need 360 degree azimuthal and 180 degree elevational coverage, and that's only if you don't plan on ever tilting the device from the horizontal pl
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You have totally sidestepped the question. No, he wasn't looking at LNA gain on an active antenna, he was looking at a chart on a website.
PipsqueakOnAP133 appears to have been copying figures including the units (or lack of meaningfull units as I explain below) from product discritions. I don't see any evidence of a chart being involved.
Lets take a proper look at the three products he listed
GPS-09131 is a passive PCB mount antenna, a figure of 2.5dBi is given in the product description (dunno why Pipsqueak
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It sounds like GPS antenna in your phone is borked in some way, or GPS controller is. I own a nokia 5800, and while accuracy leaves a lot to be desired, usually between 50m and 100m (as it should, the antenna is about a centimeter long), it exhibits none of the problems you mention. Initial lock is acquired within minutes of activation (no aGPS, no data, no wifi, internal GPS antenna only), and once it's in, driving instructions are impeccable, actually beating older tomtom standalone navigators by a very w
Assisted GPS (Score:2)
A lot of phones download satellite positions from time to time to enable them to pick up a signal quicker. You could do this over wifi, but it isn't quite as convenient as having it doing it over the cell phone data connection automatically. Or you could not download it at all and wait a few more minutes every time to get a position.
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My phone has something called "Quick GPS" which is scheduled to download something every week.
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All GPS receivers (AFAIK) have a map of ephemerides
Sort of. It depends on whether you're cold or warm starting the GPS device.
http://gpsinformation.net/main/warmcold.htm [gpsinformation.net]
First, here is how Garmin defines their FOUR startup modes.
Search the sky - Time, position, almanac, and ephemeris data all unknown.
AutoLocate - Time, position, and ephemeris unknown, almanac known or partially known.
Cold Start - Time and position known to within some limits, almanac known, ephemeris unknown
Warm start - Time and position known to within some limits, almanac known, at least 3 SVs Ephemeris are known from previous operation.
The satellites (SVs) broadcast two types of data, Almanac and Ephemeris. Almanac data is course orbital parameters for all SVs. Each SV broadcasts Almanac data for ALL SVs. This Almanac data is not very precise and is considered valid for up to several months. Ephemeris data by comparison is very precise orbital and clock correction for each SV and is necessary for precise positioning. EACH SV broadcasts ONLY its own Ephemeris data. The validity of this data is dictated by the particular satellite and may be valid up to 4 to 6 hours. Each set of ephemeris data gives a "fit" indication which tells how long the particular Ephemeris data is valid. The Ephemeris data is broadcast by each SV every 30 seconds so GPS receivers have frequent opportunities to receive and log this essential information.
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Not quite. The ephemerides data changes with position and over time. Normal gps units download updates slowly from the satellites themselves. Cell phone gps can speed this up by grabbing the data over the cell data network. IIRC most of the cell phone gps chips can ONLY do this, which means they can't work without a cell data connection. It appears that the cell companies here in Canada let this data pass even if you don't have a data connection. Others may not. And if you're outside cell reception you mig
For you dad... (Score:5, Insightful)
Get a good Garmin or other hand held GPS. One that can be operated with winter gloves on or such. If he's like my dad, he's not going to want to mess with any other applications or functionality. He wants a device to tell him how to get to the next camp site or hunting spot. Not listen to MP3s. He's also going to want something that is probably water proof, drop proof and has a battery life much longer than that of an old phone.
Garmins are by far the easiest to hack and even allow you to use your own maps. TomTom from what I've heard locks their stuff down hard. Plus Garmin has been around longer in the 'off road' GPS device market.
For yourself, sure, sounds like a fun project. I'm considering an iPod Touch + Bluetooth GPS + Jailbreaking as an in car GPS device. I was looking for an application to make the maps from OSM, but it looks like Mobile Atlas will do that.
garmin ique 3600 (Score:2)
maybe these (or similar) are available, cheap, used?
https://buy.garmin.com/shop/shop.do?pID=177&ra=true [garmin.com]
I have one that I use on bike and motor scooter. they even make handlebar mounts (ball mounts) for them.
it is a REAL gps unit with antenna and NO need for a-gps or any of that stuff.
touch screen is great, color is great, speed is great. but it IS a very old model, by today's standards.
still, I do think a dedicated satellite antenna-based gps is the way to do.
if I had to COUNT on a gps, it would not b
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If you "COUNT" on a gps, you get what you have coming to you. Always have at least a topo and a compass if you really want something to count on.
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Look up, that ball of fire in the sky it rises in the east and sets in the west. This with the topo can be used.
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"if I had to COUNT on a gps, it would not be a 'cell phone' version.."
If I had to COUNT on a GPS, I'd have maps and compass too.
Never neglect your land nav skills or Very Bad Things could happen to you.
durability (Score:4, Informative)
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Delicate?
My Droid has gorilla glass, even keys won't scratch it. I have dropped it onto tile floors and it just scratched the bezel. I have used it in temps from 100+ to -20. Water is an issue that smartphones need to deal with.
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Sure and I think they should fix that. No reason why it could not.
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Sure, and if cost is all that matters that is the best route.
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Looks like not yet, but if he waits I might sell him mine.
A real GPS is better suited for wilderness use (Score:5, Insightful)
An android phone will have a bigger, more colorful screen and a more open/versatile OS, and it will undoubtedly be easier to load whatever maps you want on it, rather than vendor-approved, possibly expensive ones. Without some sort of additional protection, though, the device will break the first time it gets dropped on a rock or rained on. It'd be more suited to city and car navigation than camping and hunting.
Get him a dedicated GPS device (Score:4, Insightful)
I live within eyesight of Mt. Hood so I don't take a "quick jaunt in the woods" at face value. Prepare for the worst, pack your gear like it'll be the last trip you ever take.
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Then bring a real map and a compass and know how to use them. That is my backup to my smartphone when I go out into the woods.
I tend to try to live ready for anything though, knife, firestarting stuff and various other tools on me at all times.
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Get him a dedicated GPS device. What are they, under $100 now? They work off satellites and don't require any spotty cellular phone triangulation. Do it. You seriously don't want to be the guy who sent his father out into the woods with sub-par gear. That's how people fucking die.
I generally agree, but having one's GPS go out is not a good reason to die in the woods. The GPS should be treated as a convenience, not a necessity. At some point we always have to rely on the tools we are carrying with us, but
old android phone is an oxymoron (Score:5, Insightful)
Android is what, 22 months old?
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In tech terms, 22 months is "mature". Windows 7 is half as old and is already well accepted in the community. Then again, after Vista, I would have accepted Windows 98 with newer drivers as a replacement.
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Windows 7 is half as old and its existence is already well accepted as not going away any time soon in the community.
Fixed that for ya. I know a lot a lot a lot a lot of workstations, servers, kiosk that are still running just about everything pre-7. Accepted in the community and being considered old do not necessarily have a 1 to 1 relationship.
Outdoor GPS more ruggedised (Score:4, Informative)
Depends on how your dad uses his GPS and what he needs to do with it, but Android smart phones aren't generally designed for rough conditions.
I've got a Garmin eTrex and an Android phone. The Garmin is way more ruggedised than the touch screen smart phone (Motorola Milestone). I don't think the Milestone would cope with pouring rain, snow, getting knocked about in rucsacs, dropped in puddles, sat on, etc, and still function in bad weather at night when I really need to know where I am: it might be life or death. "Smart phones" with a few exceptions are much too flimsy for outdoor use in severe conditions.
Dear SlashRock- make new wheel with rocks? (Score:5, Insightful)
Dear slashrock,
My gene donor's old wheel finally broke. Sure, I could tell him to buy a new one that would work perfectly but I have some old rocks laying around and was thinking of learning masonry so that I could build him a new one. I have pretty much everything I need, and it'll only cost twice as much as a new wheel. I plan on using rocks. I know its older technology, and not as reliable, nor are they made for wheels (not since bronze finally got out of beta, anyway) but I figure that re-using old technology would be good.
So, what kind of rock should I get? Granite? Sandstone? And which quarry should I get it from? I was thinking that granite would last longer but sandstone would ride nicer and would be easier to lob at a dinosaur in case of attack.
Thanks SlashRock!
Re:Dear SlashRock- make new wheel with rocks? (Score:5, Funny)
"So, what kind of rock should I get? Granite? Sandstone? And which quarry should I get it from? I was thinking that granite would last longer but sandstone would ride nicer and would be easier to lob at a dinosaur in case of attack."
Wheels made from rocks are quite a demanding application. Most rocks are very strong under compression (e.g., in a building or wall), but many are relatively weak under tension [wikipedia.org] with low elastic [wikipedia.org] strength, and therefore they will break relatively easily when a wheel is sheared laterally, such as when rounding a turn (due to forces acting perpendicular to the direction of travel). A way to mitigate this is to make the wheel rather thick, but the disadvantages (weight) are obvious.
Granite [wikipedia.org] is probably a better choice than sandstone [wikipedia.org] because most sandstones have individual grains that are in contact only over a small part of their area, with the spaces in between cemented together by other minerals that are often quite soft (e.g., calcite). Worse, many sandstones don't have those spaces fully infilled (i.e. the sandstones are porous [wikipedia.org]), which does increase their elastic modulus [wikipedia.org], but makes the material more prone to surface wear (it's easier to rub the mineral grains off the surface -- and it's even worse if water freezes in your neighborhood). Cracks tend to propagate [wikipedia.org]easily in sandstones. By contrast granite and other intrusive igneous rocks [wikipedia.org] are comprised of mineral grains that grew together as the molten rock crystallized and therefore the grains interlock quite tightly with virtually no open spaces between them (i.e. they are holocrystalline [wikipedia.org] and often equigranular [about.com]). A downside, however, is that some of the more common minerals in many granites (e.g., feldspars [wikipedia.org] and micas [wikipedia.org]) have good mineral cleavage [wikipedia.org] (it's not what you think, it's planes of weakness in the crystal structure), and the more coarse-grained granites therefore tend to break more easily (because the cracks propagate along the relatively large, weaker cleavage planes in the large grains). One way around this is to look for a granite with less of the minerals that have cleavage (i.e. less feldspar and mica) and more of the minerals that don't (e.g., quartz [wikipedia.org]), and to choose a granite that is as fine-grained as possible (then the random orientation of the cleavage planes from grain to grain will mean the cracks can't propagate as far along them before bumping into a grain boundary). As a bonus, quartz has a greater hardness [wikipedia.org] than feldspar or mica, so frictional wear will be reduced too. Therefore, a nice, fine-grained quartz-rich granite (ideally a quartzolite, but they are quite rare) is probably your best granite option. A fine-grained, non-vesicular [wikipedia.org] mafic [wikipedia.org] igneous rock, such as a basalt [wikipedia.org] or diabase/dolerite [wikipedia.org], might work well too, although they have higher density and don't have significant quartz (but the very small grainsize partly offsets this).
But why limit yourself to granite or sandstone? You can get
Not Samsung (Score:2)
I was considering a Samsung Behold II
Samsung phones are known to have GPS problems. I can also confirm this first-hand. I don't know whether it's the GPS chip they use in Android phones, or it's a more widespread problem, but you'll have a lot better quality GPS hardware if you go with HTC or Motorola.
GPS (Score:2)
Blackstar? (Score:2)
http://www.blackstarnavigation.com/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page [blackstarnavigation.com]
I use Blackstar + Mobi Pocket Reader for paperless one-device geocaching. Its ok for city work but I wouldn't rely on it in the countryside. For one, the phone boosts the power to try and get a cell signal and drains the battery in just a few hours.
Maybe there is a link in there to an Android app for you.
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Put it into airplane mode, if blackberries do not have that then buy a better device:)
Cell Service (Score:2)
Had this problem with one of my old phones years ago, if it didn't have signal to a tower it was a paper weight.
I don't have a smartphone so I don't know if this is still an issue.
I would second (third, fourth, N+1) getting a dedicated GPS unit if you need one for hiking. Its always better to get something built for the job than a hacked solution, just not as much fun.
May be better off with a dedicated GPS unit (Score:2)
Last year while camping in Canada, I tried out the free version of MotionX's GPS app on my iPhone 3G. It worked quite well, so I bought the full version when we went into town for ice and I found some wifi. Earlier this year, a coworker got a few of us into geocaching. With my new iPhone 4, MotionX GPS seems to be just as accurate as the others' Garmins. However, the iPhone seems to be much more impacted by leaf cover while in the woods. When I get right on top of the target in the woods, it gets jumpy
Motorola Droid, not so good as GPS (Score:4, Informative)
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Last weekend I used an iPhone as a GPS while doing some backcountry stuff. It was an area I was already very familiar with so I figured, why not try using the phone instead of my normal GPS unit and see how it goes? The GPS app I used was MotionX (paid version) and I found that it performed quite well, with quick lock-on and solid signal maintenance. Battery life was about as good as my Garmin unit, but you have to put the thing in airplane mode. When it's not in airplane mode it sucks juice like its water
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On any phone other than an iPhone you could. Not all of us buy sealed magic boxes.
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Cheap lithium ion batteries.
http://www.amazon.com/Motorola-Droid-1300mah-Standard-Battery/dp/B00317ZW48 [amazon.com]
$6.28 including shipping, cheap enough for you?
If you want a spare battery charger it runs ~$10.
Of you could use a device that charges the phone from AAs, you can even use that on your iPhone.
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I use my G1 hiking on multidays hikes with maverick. In airplane mode I can get a day of hiking with occasional GPS use, though using the screen to plot out courses and things does definitely sap battery power. G1 batteries are about $7 each and super light, i don't really see the problem carrying a stack of them
The quality of maps is way better than my etrex ever did and while i'm sure the new Garmins also come with better maps, I don't see myself going back. Though I do carry my Forerunner 405cx GPS with
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You don't get the maps from google maps at all. Why would you even think that is how it worked?
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No most are not. In fact I am not sure of a single one like what you describe.