Outer Limits 4x4 Board

G'day all, i'm in need of a bit of help, I am trying to set up a laptop gps system , so far i have a compaq laptop running windows 7, loaded onto that is a 10 year old copy of discoveraus streets and tracks, running for my signal is a bu 353 reciever. After a lot of teething headaches I have it now all talking to each other and showing me live mapping ect as I wanted. Next to this on the dash I run a magellan XL handheld running the same software for when I leave the 4wd. (I can't get these 2 to talk to each other yet) Now for my problem, the 2 gps's (comp and handheld) show differant lon/lat when in the same position, I have found out that discoveraus runs on wgs84 datum and the reciever plugged into it sends out the same, I have set my handheld magellan with the same datum but I still have a couple hundred metres of error? any thoughts?
cheers

Consumer gps units just aren't that accurate. Although a couple of hundred meters is pretty poor, there is the possibilty one or the other is seriously affected by the vehicle itself, or each other. You could try running a good external antenna, but personally i'd work at getting the magellan talking to the laptop, so you only run the one receiver. Your problem there might be the old software. Have you tried oziexplorer?

Be careful about using a Laptop as a GPS in cab - I can tell you from recent experience that a VDU that faces the driver and can be operated while the vehicle is in motion (even though you aren't) will cost you 3 points and $133 dollars.

I had a GPS in my 200 Series below the level of the dash, in front of the glovebox facing my way, and although I wasn't touching or even looking at it (it was on the home screen - no active or moving content) they slugged me.

Had some respect for all Police officers up until then - my enthusiasm has waned markedly for Highway Patrol since that little episode...

cheers for that, it's only fitted for offroad, and the passenger runs it

Are you sure that all your settings are WGS84?? A GPSreceiver these days should be accurate to a couple of meters.
When I made a config error and ran AGD66 datum on the GPS with WGS84 referenced maps, the readings were out about 200m horizontal and vertical. Your problem looks very similar to that.

Cheers
J

I come home from work with a fresh look at it again this morning, when I had a look at the screen shot of discoveraus on the pc I had a lon/lat in deg/min/sec format showing as my position, when i tried to edit the position it come up with the edit box showing lon/lat in deg/min/mil, (3 digits after the last decimal, not 2) I changed my handheld to suit and all was sweet. Thanks for the assistance all, but it looks like another case of the 'nut behind the butt'

NQCruiser wrote:Be careful about using a Laptop as a GPS in cab - I can tell you from recent experience that a VDU that faces the driver and can be operated while the vehicle is in motion (even though you aren't) will cost you 3 points and $133 dollars.

I had a GPS in my 200 Series below the level of the dash, in front of the glovebox facing my way, and although I wasn't touching or even looking at it (it was on the home screen - no active or moving content) they slugged me.

Had some respect for all Police officers up until then - my enthusiasm has waned markedly for Highway Patrol since that little episode...

I could be wrong here...but I was pretty sure that if it's for navigation use they can't ping you. If you didn't have the GPS running, then yes...they can ping you, but if you have the GPS screen running, they can't do anything about it. This is from the local police when I worked in electronics (in QLD).

Yeah, it was my impression too. The unit was on, but set to the home screen which has no active or moving content - I would have thought this to be safer than having a moving image that could distract you. It also has the capability to run a rear view camera, which also wasn't on as the trailer that it attaches to wasn't on the back. At what point does it cease being a camera/navigation unit and become a highly dangerous VDU? And how does the law differentiate between GPS units, vehicle tracking GPS, UHF console screens and even mobile phones in car kits that face the driver? Seems like you could be booked for "operating" any of these devices if they so wished?

You could look it up to be certain but the law and polices idea of gps navigation is pretty much a hand held unit with a 4 inch screen on the windscreen. A laptop screen can be considered distracting just due to the size of it.

NQCruiser wrote:Be careful about using a Laptop as a GPS in cab - I can tell you from recent experience that a VDU that faces the driver and can be operated while the vehicle is in motion (even though you aren't) will cost you 3 points and $133 dollars.

I had a GPS in my 200 Series below the level of the dash, in front of the glovebox facing my way, and although I wasn't touching or even looking at it (it was on the home screen - no active or moving content) they slugged me.

Had some respect for all Police officers up until then - my enthusiasm has waned markedly for Highway Patrol since that little episode...

probably a copper having a whinge, I had a Sergeant using me in training for the newbie coppers, got a few fines out of that over a month.

The law does say your not meant to have a screen facing the driver, and it's not meant to be below the dashboad as you have to look down but anyone with a double-din or single-din screen would get pinged as well under the law. it even says the drop down screens aren't allowed beyond the front seats yet you see plenty of cars at the shows with them in front of the front seats.

So not many people must be getting pinged for it.