Today I got a GPS fix in about 1 minute... doing a-buck-twenty... down the Gardner... in Toronto. I know what you must be thinking: how the hell did you manage 120 clicks on the Gardner? Luck, my friends, Luck...

As for the quick GPS acquisition...

I noticed on my unit that when maemo mapper is trying to acquire a fix, it is almost as if it starts and restarts the GPS acquisition process (by way of an on-and-off notification and a hesitant tray icon). What I did, was:

1) Close maemo mapper
2) open the control panel, select 'GPS location',
3) click on 'Location',
4) and then click 'Refresh'. The unit then searches for GPS satellites to update the location and there is no sign of restarting. After a little while, it connects and gives some data.
5) Once this happens, simply pop open maemo mapper and you're good to go!

I'm not sure if GPS acquisition is still an issue, or if this fix works with other units, or if it will work again for me, but I'd thought I share as it could potentially come in handy in a) helping people get locks faster and b) possibly fixing an acquisition restarting bug that seems to be localised to maemo mapper.

Let me know what you all think!


YARR!
}:^)~

Captanada

I've been satisfied with the GPS fix time since I found the "south-facing window" trick.

I put the tablet on the windowsill of my south-facing window, with the tablet's stand opened so that it points at about 45 degrees into the sky. It gives me a fix within a minute. And yet I also have a south-west facing window where I can never get a fix no matter how long I wait.

Of course, in the southern hemisphere you must face the tablet north, i.e. towards the equator. And outdoors with a clear sky I've never had a problem acquiring a lock (except that it's really cold in winter in the UK waiting around even for a minute in the outdoors, hence my satisfaction at discovering the south-facing window trick).

Regards,
Roger

I don't know about the buttons on an 810 but I found that if I mapped GPS to one of the hardware keys on my N800 I could avoid the processor logjam that occurs with trying to simultaneously BT connect to my phone, the net, download a layer, BT connect to my GPS, acquire, then center the map.

Even with a faster BT GPS receiver the N800 still hick-ups when attempting all these tasks at once. If I temporarily disable GPS via my mapped hardware key until M/M does its thing, and then re-enable GPS... things seem much smoother.

Perhaps doing this on an 810 will also see some improvements.

...yo ho me hardy, yo ho.

With an A-GPS installed and with fresh data, I usually get a fix pretty quick. When I leave for work in the morning, I start Maemo Mapper, put the N810 in its sleeve, then in my jacket pocket or bag. I walk out of the house, to my car, take out the N810 and place it in the car holder. By this time it either already has a fix, or grabs one before I hook up my iPod and begin backing out of the drive way.

There are some days when it takes a little longer, but sometimes thats due to heavy cloud cover or something like that.

By the way, did you do all that on the GPS while driving 120 on the Gardner... and what time did you do this at? I think I've only been on the Gardner once when I was actually able to go the speed limit, as opposed to around 40 kph.

[quote]
The last time I did 120 on the Gardner was back in the summer a few years ago before they "fixed" the Humber river bump... and if you think that used to be fun, you should try it in a Jeep with the roof and doors off ;-) Probably a good thing that I didn't have my tablet at the time as the seatbelt only just kept my friend in the passenger seat from bouncing out... I doubt the car mount would have been able to handle that! Seriously though I get the best GPS reception with the roof off... something about a nice clear view of the sky ;-) Obviously not a practical solution for everyone tho...

Well, windshield or sunroof helps. I'm planning on trying to make a fiberglass mold to sit on my dash and have a mount for my N810. Currently I have it mounted a gap where the ash tray used to be, but it's hard to see when it's down that low and with the gear knob in the way.

I'll have to give the 'south-facing window' trick a whirl! Now if I could only figure out which direction is south....

Haha. Yeah, 120 on the gardner, but it was around 11ish in the evening, so not much traffic to speak of. The real challenge was navigating the too-small-to-be-finger-friendly menus of the various apps without rubbing up against the guardrail. Not my finest moment in driving (I'm generally quite responsible), but it was for a good cause! Some N810 apps seriously need more finger friendly functionality...

I *should* try doing that in a Jeep... with no doors... It sounds like a fun way to empty ones bowels.


YARR!
}:^)~

Captonicus 2000

Today I took N810 out of my pocket, started maemo mapper, sat the n810 ontop of the console in the car, took out wallet and phone from other pockets and dumped them on passenger seat, n810 had already acquired a lock.