You are correct, John, and I apologize for my verbosity on the topic. Others may have the last word, if desired, I'm done.
Bill On Sat, Jan 1, 2011 at 8:48 AM, John Ackermann N8UR <j...@febo.com> wrote: > All, this has drifted way off track and should have stopped many messages > ago. I really hate having to jump in here but I've been getting > well-justified private complaints. > > Can we *please* try to keep things on topic??? > > John > ---- > > J. Forster said the following on 01/01/2011 12:14 AM: > > HNY, >> >> I disagree. The reason a high performance GPS costs 100K or more is that >> the engineering cost is ammortized over a few hundred units. >> >> Say the thing cost $10M to develop and you make 1000, that's $10,000 NRE >> per unit. >> >> However, if you have a successful commercial unit and sell 1,000,000 the >> NRE is $10. >> >> I'd doubt any of the hand held GPS units costs even $50 in million >> quantities. >> >> Ditto with the SW. >> >> The errors I've seen are map, not position, errors. >> >> YMMV, >> >> -John >> >> ================== >> >> Hi, >>> >>> first, a happy and hopefully healthy New Year to all of you. >>> >>> I think, some of you are going slightly overboard, in what you expect a >>> $150 Dollar car navigator should do, >>> I also don't believe some of you you realise what exactly it was >>> designed to do. >>> >>> It is not a device to accurately shoot a missile trough somebodies >>> toilet window and hit a specified turd in the bowl. >>> >>> It is designed to get you relatively easy and close to a specified >>> designation. preferably when used in a motor car >>> >>> This it does perfectly well. It may be a few meters out from an exact >>> house number, but it got you there without you having >>> to look at the map, (or worse get your spouse to read the map and >>> navigate you). >>> >>> It improves the road safety, especially at night time, when you often >>> don't see the street names and have to slow down to a crawl >>> with a lot of cars bunched up behind you. >>> >>> The mind boggles if some of you think because the GPS is not 100% >>> accurate, The Fire brigade gets either lost, or tries to extinguish the >>> house next door to the burning one, just because the GPS is 30m out. >>> What you're actually are saying is: The Fire brigade is full of idiots. >>> >>> To sell an item for 150 or so Bucks, on can not reasonably expect it >>> to be as perfect than another item which sells for 100 grand or more >>> and nobody >>> except a few government institutions can afford it. >>> >>> Not every instrument is mad by Agilent for a cost which is prohibitive >>> to the normal punter. >>> >>> Just get back down to earth, a few years ago you had to learn how to >>> read a map, or follow the often useless instructions somebody else gave >>> you. >>> >>> Now for hardly any money, you get to your destination with least amount >>> of effort and a lot saver than before. >>> >>> Regards, Horst >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> gonzo- >>>> "A GPS is a precision device. >>>> A Navigator is a consumer device. >>>> To confuse the two is to fail to understand either." >>>> >>>> A navigator IS a GPS. Surveying GPSs may use carrier phase tracking or >>>> whatever to get about 2mm accuracy. Just because it is optimized for >>>> navigation >>>> instead >>>> >>>> of location accuracy and gets about 3m accuracy doesn't mean that a >>>> navigator >>>> isn't a GPS. >>>> >>>> Note that map accuracy has nothing to do with GPS receiver accuracy. >>>> Also >>>> some mapping data has built in errors or incorrect POIs to identify the >>>> data in >>>> case it is copied. For instance, one company's street mapping software I >>>> owned >>>> had, in the small town I live in, a POI that said: "***** Institute Of >>>> Technology" >>>> >>>> even though there has never been a school there and it was a actually >>>> closed gas >>>> >>>> station. >>>> >>>> -Arthur >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> _______________________________________________ >>>> time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com >>>> To unsubscribe, go to >>>> https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts >>>> and follow the instructions there. >>>> >>>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com >>> To unsubscribe, go to >>> https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts >>> and follow the instructions there. >>> >>> >>> >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com >> To unsubscribe, go to >> https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts >> and follow the instructions there. >> > > _______________________________________________ > time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com > To unsubscribe, go to > https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts > and follow the instructions there. > _______________________________________________ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
