Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)I bought this item to have GPS data to match up to my photos so my friends and family could view them on Picasa. The GiSTEQ met my expectations providing a fairly simply process to add the location data to the JPG files.
My previous GPS experience is with a Garmin Nuvi navigation unit. With that in mind, here are my specific opinions about the device:
1) The GiSTEQ finds the satellites faster than the Garmin and holds them better as well. It of course loses the satellite fix in tunnels or in buildings, but compared to the Garmin it does a better job of receiving the signals, holding them, and reacquiring them.
2) The battery life is great. I used it each day for 10-12 hours, but have no doubt it would go much longer. I recharged it every night just to be safe.
3) It has Bluetooth which I use to connect it to my Blackberry Pearl. Many newer phones have GPS built in, but if you have a laptop or cell phone with Bluetooth and no built in GPS, you can connect the GiSTEQ to add GPS functionality to your mapping programs.
4) The time on the device is set according to your PC's clock and it does not change when you travel meaning the GiSTEQ will not adjust to the local time zone. I found this convenient because I only had to synchronize the clocks on the cameras once. Some people may not like that the photos have a timestamp matching your home timezone, but there are ways around that. The important piece is that the time on the device and the cameras match. My photo timestamps were 6 hours off from the time zone where I was photographing, but because the device and camera times matched so did the GPS data which is all I cared about. You can check it to the minute at anytime by pressing a couple of the buttons. The device will speak the time using the external speaker. Using the software and time display on the PC screen, you can match the camera clock to the device to the second.
5) The GiSTEQ holds 250,000 GPS data entries. You can adjust the logging interval to ensure you don't fill up the internal memory before you have a chance to save it to the computer. I set mine for 6 seconds and used the device for two weeks. At 6 seconds, I figure I could have used it 24 hours a day for 17 days before needing to save the data to the computer.
6) The accuracy is acceptable. I found it to be accurate within several feet (probably less than 10).
7) The software is user friendly, but maybe a little less stable than you would hope. I have only used it on one PC; a Pentium 4 running Windows XP sp3. It sometimes freezes on me, but it processed 2,845 photos adding GPS data to them with no problems. I like the software and got a kick out of the novelty of being able to play back my trip seeing a little dot move on the map tracing my path showing direction and speed.
8) The GiSTEQ has a setting which will turn itself off when it has sit undisturbed for a configurable amount of time. Or you can just have it stay on until you turn it off. The speaker volume is adjustable from silent to fairly loud. The LEDs flash red, green, and blue indicating various status. I don't recall if the LEDs can be disabled.
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