GadGetZzz

GPS is nly part of the feature of Onstar, but it is actually more accurate than stricktly GPS. Onstar does use sattelites to pipoint vehicles, but they also use stationary towers scattered throughout the country (usually piggy backing a cellular tower) which gives them all sorts of information than just your location. It can detect you speed and directions of travel, elevation as well as software that controls parts of your vehicle remotely... Innovative, but a little scary at the same time.... Big Brother anyone?

2007-08-28 10:50:48 by kfount400

www.worldchristianmarketplace. com VehSmart GPS is an industry leading satellite data location based technology system providing personal ...

I am looking for a handheld GPS that I can throw anywhere in my car (even the trunk). I've heard of products that go under the car (not interested). I know from experience several years ago that you need a clear (or almost clear) field of view. Now I hear of devices that contridict this theory. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

I looked into this a few years ago. I wanted to build my own Lojack, so to speak. It appears that the common GPS receivers are cheap, but anything that sends out a GPS signal costs around $500. So the 6-700 that Lojack charges is pretty reasonable given the cost of the technology.

If you just want to track where someone is going then yes you can use a handheld gps and look at it when you the car comes back. You would need one with some type of external antenna because in the trunk will not work.

2007-08-05 08:26:34 by Bozie Bear

Price: $99.95 $49.97

Auto-Finder Essential Kit contains: one Finder key fob with batteries, one In-car Beacon with hook-and-loop adhesive pad and batteries, convenient belt case, user Manual, instructional DVD.
Auto-Finder? never needs location marking and gives you specific directions that literally point the way to your car, or whatever you are looking for.
Designed to find cars within up to ½ mile range. Does not require open sky like GPS, so the Auto-Finder works in multi-level parking structures and underground lots.

This is for commercial vehicles. The system does not require outside assistance (i.e. a company who charges a monitoring fee) but can be operated by someone within a company.

What is a good brand?

When you say "automatically downloads" you're talking about not having to remove the device to pull its info into the computer manually.

These exist, but I've worked with them for about 8 years without finding a system that works reliably. If you're comfortable with Wi-Fi wireless networking technology, then you may find these systems acceptable once you figure out where in your lot/yard you can park your vehicles and still get a connection.

These are becoming difficult to find now that real-time tracking via cellular is becoming so affordable, but I think Laipac still makes them.

If you don't mind having to manually detach a magnet mounted tracking device from under your vehicles once every few days and uploading the data to your PC, I highly recommend one of the "Tracking Key" models from a company called Rocky Mountain Tracking. They use the Google Earth mapping engine.

2008-01-23 13:06:06 by MeThink2

Monitor commercial drivers
Track young drivers
Easy to use, easy to setup

How does it work? What power source does it run off? Does it display an accurate listing like a normal GPS device does?
And how does the bluetooth feature work? Do you need online access on your mobile phone? Would love to hear from anyone cheers

I have never heard of this product but I have installed many of the TrackStick GPS Car Tracking Systems for my commercial customers and they work great plus they have been around awhile also you can read about them at their site and if interested you can buy them off ebay.....

2008-04-27 23:04:51 by Rikki S

I recently purchased a used car that has a gps tracking and disable device wired into it from the previous owner. I would like to remove it or disable it since I do not want someone to be able to gain contro of the car.

call the NSA and tell them to remove it.

2006-08-01 11:34:26 by Rick D

We have a Garmin e-Trek Vista C. The tracking mode can be set to work in distance or time or "auto" mode. It's pretty obvious what it is doing when set to distance/time mode - just takes a reading every so-many metres or so-many seconds. But does anyone know what it is doing in auto mode? We've looked at the track data it records and cannot see any logic to it? We thought it might have been tracking when triggered by a change in direction, but that's not supported by the sample data it is producing. Does anyone know?
Yes, reading the manual hints that in Auto mode it is based on "frequency" but that seems to imply a time basis (for which is a separate setting) and certainly the track logs produced from Auto mode don't seem to be taken at any remotely predictable time intervals (varies from 1 second to 39 seconds in the log I have inspected in some detail). Clearly there is some algorithm that underpins it, but from inspection alone, I can't figure it out.

First off a disclaimer about any answer you get other than from a Garmin person: Garmin doesn't say how their system works so anything anyone else says is an educated guess.

I spent a little time trying to figgure out what determines when it marks a point.

I think you are close but are limiting your view. I think it looks at the direction speed vector. You can change your direction in three dimensions and the speed can change. The direction speed vector would be a vector in four dimensions, X,Y,Z, and speed. When looking at a track, you can only see two of the dimensions, so changes in dimensions 3 and 4 are invisible to you.

If you are unfamilier with vectors, I put a link to a detailed discussion in the source list. However, the quick way to think about them is that the track you see on your computer is a series of two dimensional vectors and the angle between the vectors is the change. It is easy to understand the extension to three dimensions by thinking of the altitude changes comming out of the screen. The fourth dimension takes a larger leap of the mind. (see the source section for more information).

If you are going straight and change your speed or your route changes slope, the vector changes. If it changes enough from the one that you were on from the last point, it marks the point.

The settings for the auto function change the frequency of points indirectly. They change the amount that the direction speed vector can change before it adds a new point. If the vector is allowed to change more, you will get fewer vectors.

When I am trying to get tracks for use later, I prefer the constant time settings. It uses more points (they keep piling up in the same spot when you are stopped) but any vector that is really different looking on the screen is probably a hiccough in the measurement from the satelite and not a change in the actual locations.

2007-12-28 18:26:07 by kr_afol