Question about GPS in general...

[Billwaa]

Hey guys, I just got my first smartphone yesterday, an ATT Samsung Captivate. I am just wondering what's the deal with GPS. I go on geocache trips in the past, therefore, I have a handheld GPS. A few years ago, when I talk to a phone company agent, they said that the GPS in cell phones are different from real GPS. If I remember correctly the one on cell phones are Assisted GPS, and it cost money to use. Now I also read online somewhere that the phone company only really charge you for the data that you use in using their navigation apps, and not the GPS.

Google Sky map and Google Map are free apps, so I am wondering if it will cost me $$ if I was to use those apps.

thanks,

 

[adi19956]

the Samsung Captivate doesn't have aGPS it has a proper, normal GPS. It is free to use although if using mobile data to load maps or other things used with your GPS without a suitable data plan, you will be charged

 

[takeshi]

the Samsung Captivate doesn't have aGPS it has a proper, normal GPS. It is free to use although if using mobile data to load maps or other things used with your GPS without a suitable data plan, you will be charged

Samsung's own site isn't very helpful but a few other Google hits seem to indicate that it is aGPS-equipped. It seems unusual for any new device to not have aGPS.

GPS seems to be frequently misunderstood. aGPS is NOT tower triangulation. It is "normal" GPS. You can't call something GPS if it doesn't use the GPS satellites to determine location even though a lot of people seem to use "GPS" to mean any method of determining location.

The only difference between a GPS receiver that runs in standalone mode and aGPS is that aGPS uses assistance servers to obtain a a faster initial fix. That's it. I'm not sure if all aGPS receivers will do this but all the ones that I have looked into will fall back to standalone mode if the assistance servers are not available. That said, my real world experience with smartphone GPS receivers is that my standalone receivers seemed to work reliably and quickly while my aGPS receivers occasionally have problems obtaining a fix and require clearing the aGPS data at times to get them working again. I've only used aGPS receivers on Android devices though.

A few years ago, when I talk to a phone company agent, they said that the GPS in cell phones are different from real GPS. If I remember correctly the one on cell phones are Assisted GPS, and it cost money to use. Now I also read online somewhere that the phone company only really charge you for the data that you use in using their navigation apps, and not the GPS.

aGPS does not inherently cost money to use. Additionally, as I stated above, there are smartphones with standalone GPS receivers and you can definitely end up paying to use GPS software/data even with them.

Any GPS receiver works without data. The GPS app(s) you intend to use, however, may require data. This is another area where people seem to be commonly confused. The GPS receiver and the GPS app(s) are entirely separate entities on your phone yet they always seem to get lumped together in threads like this. If your GPS app doesn't require data then there's nothing you'd pay to your carrier to use the app unless they charge for the app itself.