GPS Navigation in the Great Outdoors

What you need to know about GPS navigation so you don't get lost in the wilderness. This article discusses the several basic features of GPS navigation that will keep you from getting lost and show you the way back to your starting point.

GPS Navigation in the Great Outdoors
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Taylor_Gray]Taylor Gray

Heading out into the wilderness or unknown outdoors? Make sure a handheld GPS receiver goes along! For as long as you know your final destination, a GPS would guide you through. In its simplest form, a GPS receiver calculates your exact location based on range signals it receives from various satellites in the space. But when you are out in the wilderness, knowing your current position alone is not adequate, what is just as important is to know how to get where you have to be. Mostly, simple GPS receivers, apart from measuring the position, would also measure additional information like speed and time. Depending on how sophisticated a GPS unit is, you can get various other details such as bearing and distance to your destination, an accurate compass direction, height above sea level as well as almanac information such as sunrise & sunset timings.

Of numerous details that a GPS receiver is capable of providing, what you actually need to know is to be handy with your unit. Once you know how to use it, you can make an effective and intelligent use of your GPS unit. It is of key importance to know how to store the coordinates into your GPS receiver, which has a two-fold benefit:

- First, by storing the coordinates of your current location you can always find your way back to where you started from.
- Second, you can store the coordinates of your destination and the GPS unit would continuously provide you with a bearing and distance of your destination as you move along the direction of the bearing.

Most GPS units label this feature as "Go to". The current location in most receivers can be stored by simple depression of a single key, which is usually labeled as "Mark". A second method of storing the coordinates of a position is by manually entering the latitude and longitude of a location as a waypoint. Once the waypoints are entered, a route can be created by using two or more waypoints. A GPS receiver would then calculate the bearing and distance of the second waypoint from the first in a route.

Following the bearing, by an inbuilt compass in GPS unit or an external magnetic compass, would then lead the user to the destination. As you go along a route, guided by your GPS receiver, it is a wise idea to store your location coordinates at regular intervals especially while you are in the wilderness. This would be useful in case you need to trace back your track exactly. It is much easier to use the "Go to" feature, then following your breadcrumb trail.

So before you head out for your next excursion, just know:

- The coordinates of the destination
- How to enter a waypoint
- How to follow a bearing and/or use the "Go to" feature

Now go learn these basic steps of GPS navigation and then hit that trail and start exploring! Just don't forget to bring along extra batteries!

Taylor Gray is a GPS enthusiast. Please visit http://www.gpsvilliage.com for more information.

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GPS - Bringing The World Together

GPS, or Global Positioning System, has become for the 21st century what bloodhounds and used to be for police forces and bread crumbs were for Hansel and Gretel: both a way to find a person or target, and a way for a person to keep from becoming lost.

GPS - Bringing The World Together
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=David_Faulkner]David Faulkner

GPS, or Global Positioning System, has become for the 21st century what bloodhounds and used to be for police forces and bread crumbs were for Hansel and Gretel: both a way to find a person or target, and a way for a person to keep from becoming lost. GPS uses its “eyes in the sky”, a group of twenty-one operating and three backup satellites in orbit nearly twelve thousand miles above the Earth, to interpret the signals sent from GPS devices down below.

GPS translates those signals into information about the latitude, longitude, and altitude of the device that sent it, and beams the information back to a GPS receiver in the same device. The whole operation is done in split seconds, accurate to within five meters, and is the result of over three decades and twelve billion (and rising) dollars spent by the US Department of Defense.

Military GPS Applications

While the DoD initially installed GPS systems in their Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles to help them locate their targets with pinpoint accuracy, the GPS technology has now fund applications far beyond its use in weapons systems. The US military used it once again in 1991, during the first Gulf War, when GPS was essential for the mapping of huge uncharted tracts of desert.

Because GPS information can be provided as a readout, interpreted, and printed as a map of the target terrain, it saved the military countless man-hours and risk to the personnel who would otherwise have had to map the desert while airborne. GPS has its defensive purposes as well; it allows a country to monitor the movements of military troops in another country across the globe and to prepare for an attack well lin advance.

Commercial GPS Application

The first non-military use of sGPS was for marine applications; those lost at sea and unable to navigate by traditional means could simply push a button to signal the [http://www.gpssystemsreview.com/Articles/GPS_Systems.php]GPS satellites and have their latitude and longitude appearing on a screen in a matter of seconds. Today GPS is most widely used in the aviation industry, as an aid to routing aircraft.

GPS technology has advanced so much, in fact, that it is now possible for ships’ computers to be linked to a GPS system which automatically navigates to a preprogrammed destination. GPS can function as both s ship’s navigator and captain, although it is highly improbable that it will replace them.

GPS, in both its military and commercial applications, has made the world a much smaller and safe, place!

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What GPS Do I Buy?

With so many GPS choices out there,how do you decide? Read my article and get some thoughts and insights as to what you may consider.

By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Tony_Magazzi]Tony Magazzi

So you want to buy a GPS. Choices, yes - staggering numbers as of late. So what should you do? We recommend buying Factory Remanufactured units.

So what's the logic behind this choice?

There are many reasons, lets examine a few.

1. Price - New verses Factory Remanufactured can be as much as a 50% savings or more.

2. Warranty - New verses Factory Remanufactured? Guess what? Exactly the same at 1 year.

3. The cheaper price allows you to purchase a higher end unit with more features than some new lower end units. Think about that for a minute. You can buy a higher priced model with more features than most new lower end units. No brainer here.

4. This to me is one of the most important reasons I personally buy Factory Reconditioned units, and the reason is just how quickly these units become obsolete and are replaced with newer models with even more bells and whistles.

5. Finally, notice the large price drops on the older units the manufacturers are trying to get rid of to make way for the newer models. When you buy new and pay top dollar, your investment quickly loses its value in obsolescence and you probably have many less features than the newer models.

6. One more thing that is very important. "Theft" Leave your unit in your car even if it is locked and you return to find your unit gone and hundreds of dollars worth of damage to your car also that the thief left behind for you. One of the things I personally appreciate about the newer units is that most of them are not much bigger than a new deck of cards and they are so easy to take with you Just pop it in your top pocket and go. This will also allow you to use it while you are walking around in some unfamiliar city. This is really a great new feature.

Many of the larger wide screen models again can be purchased used and are a favorite with truckers and RV drivers who appreciate the larger easy to read screens.

In closing let me also say that many of the new units are multi functional in that you can use them in your car and just take them with you and you can also use them in your boat with the new software mapping that may be used in the same crossover type units that have just recently come out. Let us not forget the motorcycle units that are really built more ruggedly to withstand the vibration and off road uses of many motorcyclists.

So again I ask you to review these thoughts and to consider a Factory Reconditioned unit for any of the reasons above.

Tony Magazzi (Owner) http://www.actiongpselectronics.com

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