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| Don't trust your GPS so much! | |
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| Topic Started: Jan 1 2010, 11:09 PM (106 Views) | |
| Post #1 Jan 1 2010, 11:09 PM |
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Another family led down the garden path! I am kind of a GPS hobbyist--and not just the road map kind. I once had the opportunity to develop and teach a course in GPS long before most people knew the satellites existed. So, I am kind of confident in giving some advice: 1. Regardless of how your GPS tries to route you, stay on Interstates, US highways, and state highways. Avoid county roads, local streets, and unnamed roads, except as necessary to get to the highways or from the highways the last little bit of your trip to your final destination. First, the map companies information is not perfect and is likely to be downright wrong when it comes to other than highways. Second, cell phone services, regardless of what their coverage maps imply, have huge holes in coverage everywhere. Their towers tend to follow major highways, so your best chance of having service in an emergency is on the highways. 2. Don't rely solely on GPS. They fail. Batteries die. Data gets lost. Satellites can be blocked by mountains and buildings. Take printed maps of your routes with you. 3. Plan your trip on your car GPS and on online services like Yahoo Maps or Google Maps. Compare the routes. Make sure that you are not being routed on mountain trails. 4. Don't blindly follow the GPS. Be willing to hear it say, "Off route, recalculating," as you don't take that suspicious turn. 5. You can force the GPS to route you on main roads. All major GPSs that I am aware of can be configured to stick to the main roads. If not, you can use waypoints to force it to recalculate an obscure route. If you know a better route, select waypoints along that route. The GPS will be forced to route the way you want to go. 6. Most importantly and more generally, be able to do stuff without technology. You can't always count on it. But, for some reason, most of us do. |
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1:50 PM Feb 7