Car GPS

An Extra-Powerful Car GPS for no Down Time.

People wish that it would be possible one day, to put a GPS unit in everything - your glasses, your pet, your cell phone (wait a minute, that's one that already has a locator called a phone number) that way you would never lose your stuff.
It's not really a fact though, that if you have a GPS unit in everything, that you'd never lose it. GPS signals don't penetrate everywhere - simple things like a sheet of metal can often disrupt the GPS signal - even the roofs of cars at times.

Enter the popular maker of portable car GPS devices, Zoombak. The GPS makers usually hedge their bets for how effective a device they make will be in a given situation, by adding as many tracking features as possible. Zoombak has added the humble cell phone signal to its car GPS devices'arsenal, to help it keep its bearings in the most GPS-parched environment. And what new technology would be complete without a snazzy tech name to go with it? They thought of Locate Assist.

This only works in an assistive role - supplementing GPS satellite information in most cases. As with every other GPS device on the market, this model beams back and forth between the GPS satellites to narrow its location down to within a few yards.

And then, the location it makes out with all the GPS coordinates it gets, it pumps to its computers at the company using a cell phone signal, and you can follow its location online - a good way to keep an eye on a teenage family member, or even a stolen car.

GPS owners complain of regularly been lost for a signal when in a concrete jungle of a city - often 50% of the time. If someone steals your car he just has to store it away in some basement, where the GPS signal can't make it through all the concrete.

So Zoombak's reply to these, is to use cellular technology to supplement the GPS functionality. Since all Zoombak products do come with cellular technology built-in, you just need a software upgrade to turn this on. Of course, whatever location information it succeeds in wringing out of the cellular control channel isn't much when you compare it to car GPS.

Most of the time, it can only narrow you down to so far - cellular signals come in three kinds of accuracy levels - one that narrows it down to 150 yards one that gets you to three-quarters of a mile, and one that goes out to a mile and a half.

After all, they made cellular control signals just so that the cellular system could know which tower could give you the best signal. Still, when you are really struggling for a proper signal, cellular supplemental information can be somewhat useful.