Some misconceptions here. New GPS/Glonass/etc. receivers are much more sensitive than old. This was all made possible due to the high volume needs of the mobile industry. A
phone GPS chip is much better optimized for
power than a chart plotter chip. Even without getting into the mobile
phone chips, just comparing common chips from uBlox, a v6 chip used in the
Raymarine a65
chartplotter for example, takes a couple of minutes to obtain a fix. It is really a problem when you start your
engine just before
docking (which sometimes restarts the
electronics if you forget to switch batteries) to have to wait for a minute or so to get a fix. A generation 8 chip, that you can buy from Amazon for $15, has all the bells and whistles, gets a fix in 10 seconds while in the bulge pointing down. You can’t deny progress.
Regarding the accuracy, most people say the Glonass civilian signal is slightly more accurate and slightly less reliable. For
boating needs, it is more accurate than necessary, i.e. down to less than 10 ft.
Bottom line is, if you have an older
chartplotter, the best you can do is to get a modern chip and interface it to the chartplotter. Based on your system connections, you can program the uBlox 8 to update 10x, 20x or 50x a second (an overkill).
Lastly,
NMEA 0183 is a
serial connection, good up to 1,000 ft or more and very tolerant to all sorts of
noise.
There are worse things to worry about than
GPS accuracy.
Linear Mode
Recent Discussions