Gps

General Discussion
21

“I’ve found that relying on a voice telling you when & where to turn causes “unfamiliar territory” to forever remain unfamiliar.”

??

If I am driving in a city or a region where I know I will not return, why would I care about becoming familiar with the territory?

In so many situations where GPS has helped me to find my way, the only thing I cared about was…finding my destination. Learning a local street grid that I would be unlikely to ever visit again is not something that I consider to be important. You may feel differently.

22

For you who like your Road Atlas or smartphone, you should know that a GPS can almost effortlessly guide you to the nearest hospital, ethnic and other restaurants of your choice including BBQ, German, Chinese, American, Bagel or Donut, British, Diner, French, Deli or Bakery, Italian. Mexican, Pizza, Seafood, Steak, or gas station, freeway rest stop, city hall, fire department, library, courthouse, police station, post office, school, bank, parking, entertainment, attractions, auto services, lodging, shopping and airport.

Finding a hospital quickly could be important one day.

A GPS makes travel much more relaxing as it is so easy to find what you need as a traveler.

Not all of the others can do it but a Garmin can be used to find a coordinate type address that is used in some parts of the country. An example is W100N5000 Main Street.

A GPS is not perfect but works for us without error about 99.5% of the time.

We have a Garmin Nuvi with a 5" diagonal screen. I want neither a larger nor a smaller screen next time; 5" is just right. Its antenna is so sensitive that it can read the satellites from inside of our house.

We don’t worry about updates; just buy new every few years. GPS prices have come down.

23
For you who like your Road Atlas or smartphone

The current aps in the latest smartphones can find you the nearest hospital or Pizza place too. My son and I were in Boston last weekend and decided to get something to eat. We didn’t no the area we were in very well…So I got out my IPhone 4s found a pizza place less then a block from where we were.

Here’s a nice little article on how GPS is making us dumber…

And I have to admit…I know some younger people who can’t get from one side of our town to the other without GPS. They don’t even know what direction to head in if they want to go to California.

24

Will agree the actual person to person knowledge seems to have dropped with the advances in technology. I myself tend to be a person that goes by landmarks…can’t give you turn by turn directions yet I can drive you there just fine.

25

Garmin and Tom-Tom are like buggy whip manufacturers and will be gone soon. Even cheap smartphones have navigation apps for free or very low cost. They need a data plan to work since they need to be connected to the web. That is only a problem if you are way out in the boonies. Mine tends to wear down the battery pretty fast so take your charger.

If you don’t have a smartphone or data plan and don’t intend to get one, get a rebuilt Garmin from NewEgg or Amazon for $100 (with a web browser and wifi) and roll with that.

You still need a cigar lighter socket (or power point as they are now called). How can you live without one?

26
"I know some younger people who can't get from one side of our town to the other without GPS. They don't even know what direction to head in if they want to go to California."

You are correct, Mike, but that type of ignorance is nothing new, and predates the advent of GPS by several decades. Back in the '60s, my brother had a summer job as a substitute toll attendant on the NJ Turnpike. He had the misfortune to be stationed at Interchange 13, which is located between a sewage disposal plant, an oil refinery, and a chemical plant. But I digress…

He was always assigned to the late-night shift, and came home with tales of observing both incredible weirdness and astounding ignorance. The astounding ignorance was in regard to people asking for directions. (You don’t really want to know about the incredible weirdness that he observed…)

At least twice each night, he would have people pull up to his entry booth and ask, “How do I get to Florida?” No…not which way is the southbound Turnpike! Instead, these people who were beginning a trip of over 1,000 miles, apparently had done no planning whatsoever, and thought that an appropriate way to decide on their route was to ask the toll attendant who was giving out toll tickets at the entry to the NJ Turnpike.

The first few nights, he gave very detailed directions (which were probably not followed accurately by these morons), as a result of the patchwork of roads that still existed at that time. So, he gave them a very detailed itinerary, something along the lines of…NJ Turnpike South, to the Delaware Turnpike, to the Maryland Toll Road, to I-95 to Route 1 (I-95 existed only in isolated patches in those days), to… (well, you get the idea).

After several nights of trying to give highly detailed guidance to people who probably couldn’t find their way around the block without assistance, he finally realized that he couldn’t really help these helpless people, and he changed his route guidance. After a few nights, his standard line for those seeking The Sunshine State became…Straight ahead–you can’t miss it!

27

My garmin redirected me from a 40 minute delay on the interstate to a local roads approach. I would not know which roads to pick navigating the streets of Chicago, it was an unexpected treat. I often times like to take the scenic route, so after a couple of recalculating it does a great job in unknown territories. Down side, I thought shortest might be a cool option, there I was dragging my boat down 1.5 lane dirt roads, be careful what you as for.

28

If you ever tried to find the Sams Club in Dayton, Ohio you’d be happy to have a navigation system. Its a lot easier and less distracting than a map or cell phone and you can keep your eyes on the road pretty much. Especially through places like Indianapolis, routes are really not marked very well and often you have to know the cities both you want to go to and those you don’t want to go to in order to stay on the right path. Plus you can expand it for detail or get a look at the whole region with a push of a button. Trying to find a restaurant, motel, or Kohls along the way is an added plus. Plus, you can actually read it without a magnifying glass.

29

My problem isn’t getting from A to B, it is getting around in B that makes the GPS worthwhile.

30
Its a lot easier and less distracting than a map or cell phone and you can keep your eyes on the road pretty much.

I don’t take my eyes off the road using my cell phone GPS. It works the same as my Garmin. Gives me voice directions just like my Garmin did.

31

Last summer when I was having to take my step dad to the Columbus airport several times, I would always use my GPS(SR 36/37 out of Delaware to I-71 to I-270 to I-670 to the airport).
While there were signs telling me how to get there, I was more concerned about watching traffic than the signs. Once, I was too far over on I-270 to get to the turn off lane for I-670, so the satnav redirected me to the airport while I was (figuratively) kicking myself for missing the exit. I know very little about north east Columbus, and lord knows how long it would have taken me to figure out how to get to the airport had I not had satnav.

Even here in town, if I don’t know where something is, I’ll put it up on satnav

32

@bscar2, Honda will build the NSX at Marysville. Ever thought about getting on the team?

33

Hackers have discovered how the GPS system works and can spoof local receivers into giving false locations…This has marine and aviation users really concerned…

34

There was a story on the news last year about 4 college football prospects from Houston who were headed to Texas Tech; which is very close to the New Mexico border.

They were almost in Louisiana before the fact they were going in the wrong direction even soaked in…

35

^
Too much time playing without helmets, perhaps?

;-))

36

@ok4450 There’s also the true story of a Swedish couple on vacation starting in New York that dialed in the wrong state and ended up in Wisconsin instead of the South West. They kept wondering, apparently, why it was not getting hotter.

Many states have cities with the same name and many have Washington, Jefferson and other streets named after presidents. There are at least half a dozen Trentons in North America, for instance.

37
Hackers have discovered how the GPS system works and can spoof local receivers into giving false locations..This has marine and aviation users really concerned..

The problem with ANY hackable system is the companies that build them don’t see it necessary to build security safeguards into the system. GPS is one…your cars OBD-II is another. You want to make a system secure it’s NOT that difficult. My company designs and builds extremely secure systems for the telecom industry. After over 2,000,000 cyber attacks every year around the world…we’ve never been hacked. Even if hackers know how our system works…they still need a 128-bit cypher key to decode it. That’s 309,485,009,821,345,068,724,781,056 different combinations. Even a super computer can’t hack it.

38

I’ve had several brands of GPS and all but Garmin were just not very good. Now I’ll stop experimenting and stick with Garmin. I make deliveries and the GPS is very good and helpful in finding houses. For road trips I still like maps and carry them in the car.

My wife has an iphone 4S and there are several free GPS apps and they all seem to work well. The advantage is these apps can give up to the minute road condition and accident reports. Disadvantage is when she is talking on the iphone and the GPS voices cuts in.

My 22 year old son has no clue how to read a map or navigate without his GPS. Younger generations are going to forget how to read and use maps and I don’t think that is a good thing. I often plot a different route than my GPS prefers for various reasons. So, I like the GPS but I’m not overly dependent on it.

39

@jtsanders

I did put an application into Honda several years ago, but you have to go through a temp agency to get in; You need to be a temp for a year or two before they consider you for full time. And from what I hear, the temp place will lay you off right before your 1 or 2 year anniversary, then call you back to work; starting your seniority back to day 1.

Where I work now is 3 miles from my house, and Honda is about 30 miles away.

40

Both good reasons to stay where you are. Things that seem good at 30,000 feet may not be when you get on the ground.