Assisted GPS (A-GPS)

mkennedy · 02-09-2006 5:18am #1

hi.
can anyone tell me if Assisted GPS (or A-GPS) is free like ordinary GPS.

i was looking at a ppc-phone device there with A-GPS and was wondering what exactly it was.

basically i understand that it's gps that is enhanced by the mobile masts of a cellular network but
does this mean the mobile network can charge for using it.

and if that was the case, would it be possible to just use ordinary GPS on an assisted GPS enabled device and not bother with the assisted element.

any advice would be great. thanks

Tom Dunne · 02-09-2006 1:42pm

I'd never even heard of it until you posted here. You learn something new every day.

Anyway, old reliable Wikipedia has something on it.

damo86 · 02-09-2006 2:06pm

doesnt some samsung phones have this built-in?my guess the wee irish networks doesnt have this feature...sound interesting though!

damo

damo86 · 02-09-2006 2:14pm

just checked there,some american motorola phones,its not new tech,mainly provide location of users for 911 calls..very handy!'
damo

joerules · 02-09-2006 7:53pm

Some of 3s networks, eg: 3 Austria, have A-GPS enabled on the network (assuming you have a compatible phone). It's actually really useful. I used it all the time in Japan. It's amazing how often you actually need to find something!

Anyway,the advantage of A-GPS over GPS is faster acquistion of the GPS signal because the phone network helps, and that you can (kinda) get an accurate fix even when indoors. It could even be more accurate than bog-standard GPS but that depends on lots of variables.

mkennedy · 02-09-2006 8:41pm

joerules wrote:

Some of 3s networks, eg: 3 Austria, have A-GPS enabled on the network (assuming you have a compatible phone). It's actually really useful. I used it all the time in Japan. It's amazing how often you actually need to find something!

Anyway,the advantage of A-GPS over GPS is faster acquistion of the GPS signal because the phone network helps, and that you can (kinda) get an accurate fix even when indoors. It could even be more accurate than bog-standard GPS but that depends on lots of variables.

hi.
thanks for that.
were you charged for using it by the mobile network.

also when you used the A-GPS phone can you revert to bog-standard GPS if there is no A-GPS available e.g here.

the reason i ask is i'm wondering if an A-GPS phone will work here on basic GPS if there is no A-GPS network here.
thanks.

damo86 · 02-09-2006 9:07pm

hey mkennedy

what phone are you looking at that this feature?

damo

mkennedy · 02-09-2006 9:54pm

damo86 wrote:

hey mkennedy

what phone are you looking at that this feature?

damo

hi.
it's the htc trinity, not released yet but due for release this month.
it's a ppc-phone apparently due to have wi-fi, bluetooth, A-GPS, 3G (HSDPA), nice form factor (relatively thin), a kind of update to the htc prophet apparently.

but my question is: would A-GPS be any use here and if so would it be free like ordinary GPS or would the networks charge for it.

damo86 · 02-09-2006 11:10pm

have Been looking at the trinity,slight prob though,it uses the omap850 200mhz processor,which from experience is too slow thought i could live with it..but its driving me mad,never keeps up with me!

IMHO i think the irish network havent even considered it!

damo

mkennedy · 03-09-2006 12:12am

damo86 wrote:

have Been looking at the trinity,slight prob though,it uses the omap850 200mhz processor,which from experience is too slow thought i could live with it..but its driving me mad,never keeps up with me!

IMHO i think the irish network havent even considered it!

damo

from the previews/reviews of the htc trinity i have read on the net, they say the trinity has a 400mhz processor (samsung i think).
where did you see it has a 200mhz omap processor?

btw, are you finding your xda mini s slow?

joerules · 03-09-2006 4:02pm

I thought I posted this reply earlier but it seems to have been deleted or something. oh well....

mkennedy wrote:

were you charged for using it by the mobile network.

I paid a monthly subscription to access the service called ezNaviWalk. It cost about 2euro a month. When I used it I had to pay packet charges but this wasn't a problem because I was on an unlimited-packet plan.

mkennedy wrote:

also when you used the A-GPS phone can you revert to bog-standard GPS if there is no A-GPS available e.g here.

No, it needed to access the network for it to work. Some people on Verizon have attempted to access the GPS data on their phone but I think they have had limited,if any success.

mkennedy · 03-09-2006 5:36pm

joerules wrote:

I thought I posted this reply earlier but it seems to have been deleted or something. oh well....

I paid a monthly subscription to access the service called ezNaviWalk. It cost about 2euro a month. When I used it I had to pay packet charges but this wasn't a problem because I was on an unlimited-packet plan.

No, it needed to access the network for it to work. Some people on Verizon have attempted to access the GPS data on their phone but I think they have had limited,if any success.

hi.
damn.
that's exactly what i didn't want to hear.
1) that it's of no use here and
2) if it was, i'd be charged for it.

what's wrong with plain old free GPS, the mobile networks have to go and ruin everything by charging for it

tbh, from what i know about it i can't see the appeal of this over free GPS. does anyone else see things differently?

Tom Dunne · 03-09-2006 6:05pm

joerules wrote:

I paid a monthly subscription to access the service called ezNaviWalk. It cost about 2euro a month. When I used it I had to pay packet charges but this wasn't a problem because I was on an unlimited-packet plan.

I take it that was not in Europe? I am not sure any of the networks in Europe support AGPS, from what I have been reading.

mkennedy wrote:

that's exactly what i didn't want to hear.
1) that it's of no use here and
2) if it was, i'd be charged for it.

So I don't think you could be charged for it over here if the networks don't support it. So that probably means the GPS funciton of the phone would be useless over here.

damo86 · 03-09-2006 6:24pm

@mkennedy
if you go to modaco.com or msmobiles.com,it shows that the htc trinity doesnt have gps but had 3g etc but the htc artemis/love does have gps (not a-gps).has the omap 850 but no 3g/hspda,thats what i make of it anyway!apologies for not putting direct links writing this via opera mini!

as for the mini s,yes the processor is a bit slow cos started to put today screen extras!

damo

mkennedy · 03-09-2006 7:45pm

damo86 wrote:

@mkennedy
if you go to modaco.com or msmobiles.com,it shows that the htc trinity doesnt have gps but had 3g etc but the htc artemis/love does have gps (not a-gps).has the omap 850 but no 3g/hspda,thats what i make of it anyway!apologies for not putting direct links writing this via opera mini!

as for the mini s,yes the processor is a bit slow cos started to put today screen extras!

damo

yeah, the more i read about it on the net, it seems it doesn't actually have gps/a-gps atm.

but there are suggestions about it possibly including this at a later stage.

but as for those omap processors e.g in the artemis i'm not so keen on them.

joerules · 03-09-2006 8:32pm

I used it while I lived in Japan. All the networks have the function, but nearly every one of AU's (http://au.kddi.com) phones have them.

Actually, if a phone uses Qualcomm's chips, then the hardware might be there but it's not enabled in the software. Early Motorola phones on 3 had it built in and it was functional. The functionality is used on 3 Austria's network (http://www.drei.at/SelectMenu.wa?seIDM=6675D708-7A07-4F13-8A8D-937C904D5198 )

Assisted GPS (A-GPS)

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