GPS-Storm Vs Droid... I HAVE A DREAM

[poppajeff]

Hi, I was just trippin along, relatively happy with my storm 1, not using my GPS, accepted the reality that verizon really wouldn't let me use it without paying the infamous 9.95/mo..THEN read that droid owners, (AKA dreaded droid , to storm users,) could access GPS without any extra fees...in fact that VZ av would not even be offered. To paraphrase Dr. Martin L King, I have a dream...that one day Verizon will treat all of her children equally, that regardless of device, we will be allowed full access to all of that device's capabilities at NO EXTRA CHARGE, and that any apps that offer to give us our basic rights will be honored by Verizon's masters. Is it only a dream or will we BBerry USERS finally be free... Thanks poppajeff

[LCromwell]

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poppajeff wrote:
Hi, I was just trippin along, relatively happy with my storm 1, not using my GPS, accepted the reality that verizon really wouldn't let me use it without paying the infamous 9.95/mo..THEN read that droid owners, (AKA dreaded droid , to storm users,) could access GPS without any extra fees...in fact that VZ av would not even be offered. To paraphrase Dr. Martin L King, I have a dream...that one day Verizon will treat all of her children equally, that regardless of device, we will be allowed full access to all of that device's capabilities at NO EXTRA CHARGE, and that any apps that offer to give us our basic rights will be honored by Verizon's masters. Is it only a dream or will we BBerry USERS finally be free... Thanks poppajeff

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Jeff all you have to do is enable GPS in the Storm 1 and it works fine. I have Weatherbug, Maps and Poynt and I had BING, but deleted it because it sucked up so much memory. These are all free apps.  Am I misunderstading your problem with GPS and Storm 1 ???

[poppajeff]

'preciate the quick response... alas, I too have those, in addition to google maps, but without VZ Nav enabled (for 9.95) these cannot acquire a satellite and will only use cell towers to approximate your location. In the case of weatherbug, i have to enter my location before i get my weather. Yes, i have GPS enabled. Verizon has chosen to only allow full functionality of those apps, and others which use the GPS function on the storm, to those who purchase VZNav. On the droid...a different story, droid owners are Verizon's chosen people. Poppajeff

[LCromwell]

Jeff did you push BB menu when you have Weatherbug open? There are 1) prefernces you can set in there and 2) you can click update and then always push exit before you leave prefernces. I have mine set to update every 4 hrs now but when we have storms I set it to 30minutes. my maos shows an actual spot on the map which is my home and street. As far as i can tell the GPS works. It also did with BING. 

[ddew]

I think you have this backwards.  The A-GPS only works with VZNav as the subscription is required to get the location info from the towers.  This allows the system to work indoors.  If you have clear line of sight to satellites and have turned on the GPS capability in the phone, the Storm 1 will acquire the satellites.  I just checked and it currently has my location to within 6 meters on Google Maps.  

[LOWFLYER]

Google maps on my Storm pretty much pinpoints me right in my living room........I don't see what the big deal is though whether or not your handset uses cell tower triangulation or satellite....as long as it gets  you there what difference does it make?  VZW's network is virtually everywhere and if you do happen to hit a dead spot, chances are if you keep going for a while you'll be back into some sort of svc area again anyway.  I could be wrong but I believe the Storm uses both cell tower triangulation and satellite should the need arrise to give you directions.  Don't quote me on that though.

[LCromwell]

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ddew wrote:

I think you have this backwards.  The A-GPS only works with VZNav as the subscription is required to get the location info from the towers.  This allows the system to work indoors.  If you have clear line of sight to satellites and have turned on the GPS capability in the phone, the Storm 1 will acquire the satellites.  I just checked and it currently has my location to within 6 meters on Google Maps.  

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Whom were you addressing as having it backwards?

[ddew]

to poppajeff, 

backwards in the respect that only the tower data is available.  As far as I can tell VZNav is the only app that uses the A-GPS data.  That might have changed as there was the addition of a "location aiding" option with OS5 and it does seem to work better indoors now than it used to.

[LCromwell]

Thanks for clarifying that.

[SureTypeBandit]

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poppajeff wrote:
'preciate the quick response... alas, I too have those, in addition to google maps, but without VZ Nav enabled (for 9.95) these cannot acquire a satellite and will only use cell towers to approximate your location. In the case of weatherbug, i have to enter my location before i get my weather. Yes, i have GPS enabled. Verizon has chosen to only allow full functionality of those apps, and others which use the GPS function on the storm, to those who purchase VZNav. On the droid...a different story, droid owners are Verizon's chosen people. Poppajeff

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The only diff between VZ Navigator and those other apps is the turn by turn navigation.  Google maps pinpoints my location precisely to where i am.  I was just in NYC last weekend, and i only used Google maps to direct me around.  Tell you what it is a life saver!! 

Im not really sure what is that your whining about! Who cares if droid users get VZ Nav for free!! I get by just fine w/o it!