Review: Franson GPSGate
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I first came across GPSGate by Franson back in 2005. At that time, I was using the O2 Mini and was starting to drive more often. So I figured that it would be a good time to get a Bluetooth GPS receiver to use with my Pocket PC. After trying a few navigational software, I found one that was perfect for me. It was a constantly updated map created by a community of users.
Unfortunately, to use those maps, you needed to use the Garmin Que application. The problem was that my Bluetooth receiver was not by Garmin (it’s output was NMEA). The solution? I could either use a freeware called GPSProxy or go with a commercial version of GPSGate by Franson. Guess which one I went with?
Introduction
There are a few versions of GPSGate out there for the various platforms available. Even on the same platform, say Pocket PC, there are 2 different version, the full Standard version and the lighter Express version. Standard goes for $19.95 a license with Express costing you $12.95. For the purpose of this review, I will be covering the full Standard version. The latest version, 2.6 build 319, supports all version of Windows Mobile from 2002 to the current latest 6. Unfortunately, only devices with touch screens are supported.
So What Is GPSGate?
That’s a good question. It’s more than just an application that allows you to share your GPS data from unit to another. It let’s you log those data, simulate them and even combine several streams into one (not sure why you would want to do that though). You just need to set it up once and it runs in the background. So how can it be useful to you?
Share One GPS Unit With Several Applications
That’s what I mainly use GPSGate for and I suspect a lot of you will to. Windows Mobile 5/6 has an application in the Settings that seems to suggest this but after some tweaking, I am still unable to run 2 navigational software at the same time. Why would I want to run 2 software at the same time you ask?
There are times when Garmin Que is not accurate and for that, I prefer to use the power of Google Maps to find my way. Or sometimes, the POIs in Que do not give me what I want, Google Maps usually does. Or for users who run Navizon and want to earn credits while at the same time do not want to sacrifice their navigational capabilities, GPSGate is one such application that they can look into.
Use a Garmin Receiver With Any Application
Or a non-Garmin receiver with a Garmin application. Older units of Garmin products, be it receivers or applications, use a different type of standard (if I may call it that). Most other navigational products use the NMEA standard. So if say you wanted to use your Bluetooth GPS receiver with an older version of Garmin Que, you’d need to convert the standard to Garmin’s proprietary. Same thing if you wanted to use a Garmin GPS receiver with say TomTom. This time, you’d need to convert the data to NMEA standard.
With GPSGate, this problem can be easily solved. Just set it up when you first install the application (or you can do it anytime after that) and you are all good to go. If you have a Garmin GPS receiver, you can also enter it’s 10 digit ID into GPSGate so that you could continue to use your other Garmin products with your other GPS receiver and Garmin would still function. If you do not know what I mean, don’t worry about it. It’s only applicable to those with such a setup.
Share Over Other Connections
Just because your GPS receiver is built in or operate via a Bluetooth connection does not mean it cannot be shared with other devices using other connections as well. It all depends on what kind of connection your Pocket PC.
If you answered USB, Bluetooth, WiFi and mobile data, then those are the connections you can share it with. That means your GPS receiver’s data can now be sent to your PC via an ActiveSync connection or through the internet. You could even share that same data with other Pocket PCs over WiFi or Bluetooth if you so desire. The possibilities may not be endless but there’s sure a lot of ways.
Log & Simulate
What if you want to keep track of where you were heading? Well you have your navigational application for that. But if you wanted to keep those raw data to play back on another device, GPSGate lets you log them as well. When it runs, it also logs if you have set it up as such so you don’t have to fumble with extra settings or applications.
You could even use GPSGate to simulate data that you have gotten from another device and see where it has been. For example, say you have another friend who sends you his trip data. Copy it over to your device, run it via GPSGate and then run your navigational software and you can see his movements as well.
Connect To GPSGate.com
Speaking of tracking movements, Franson has created a site called gpsgate.com and it allows you to track your friends as well as view a history of your’s and their journey. Just sign up (for free) and setup your device connect to it (through another output) and you can see where your friends are in real time.
Instances (Settings)
Instances in GPSGate are what you and I would call settings. Most users would only need to use one set of settings but if you are one of those power users who have multiple GPS receivers or have multiple needs for your one unit, you can set up GPSGate to have different settings for different scenarios.
What’s great about this is that you can run multiple instances at one time if you choose. I did not manage to test this out as I did not have the capabilities to do so but for those who do need it, GPSGate covers it.
Close Connection When Not In Use
One thing that bothered me about such applications is that you need to run them before launching your applications which can be troublesome. You could overcome this with MortScript (or something similar). Or you could use the option built into the application.
That option is to turn off the GPS connection when the device is idle (meaning no software that requires GPS input is running). Which is a great option to have because now you can set GPSGate to always start but to only open the GPS connection when say Google Maps or TomTom is running. Saves you battery. Saves you time.
Edit COM Ports
This is something more advanced users might want to play around with. I say might because GPSGate can usually setup your device using the Wizard pretty well. But if for some reason you have no more COM ports to use for an output, you can use GPSGate to manually delete some of the COM ports in use. So much easier than going through your registry with an editor and making the same changes. Needless to say, unless you know what you are doing, I would recommend you not touch it.
GPSGate is a really powerful application to have but there were some issues that I encountered during my experience.
Wizard Settings Not Optimized
For one, I noticed that the Wizard, while great at finding out what kind of GPS receiver you have and setting it up, did not use optimal setting. This means that the baud rate was at the lowest setting for me. I am not sure why it chose the lowest number (for stability?) but when I ran with a highest number, I did not encounter any problem. I was using the built in GPS receiver on my ETEN Glofiish X500 when I encountered this so I am not sure if everyone else will as well.
Wrong COM Port Used
Another issue I encountered is that it set me up with the wrong COM port. You see, I wanted a Virtual COM Port so that I could share one GPS receiver with more than 1 application. It selected a COM port (COM Port 1) and set it all up nicely but when I tried to connect a software to the COM port, it did not work. Changing the COM port solved the issue.
Receive GPSGate.com Input
This is not exactly a problem but more of a suggestion. Considering that I can use GPSGate.com to track my journey, it would be great if GPSGate also allowed me to access it as an input as well. That way, I could also track my friends’ journey or even the elderly or children under my care.
Summary
What I Like About It
- Wizard mode makes setting up a breeze.
- Able to convert between NMEA and Garmin standards.
- Multiple connection sharing capability.
- Ability to log GPS data and simulate it later on.
- Connects to GPSGate.com to online tracking.
- Have more than one settings if needed.
- Close the connection when not in use.
What Could Be Improved
- Optimize the connection when using Wizard settings.
- Better management of COM ports to ensure that it is not in use by other applications.
- Ability to use GPSGate.com as an input.
Conclusion
In case you were wondering, I went with GPSGate and not GPSProxy. There were a few reasons but the main one was that GPSGate turned out to be more stable that GPSProxy. As you would have probably guessed by now, GPSGate is not for everyone. Even if you plan to use Garmin XT with your Pocket PC, an application like GPSGate is no longer necessary as XT supports non-Garmin GPS receivers as well.
So who is it for? That’s kind of hard to narrow down so instead I will tell you who it’s not for. If you are happy with your current GPS setup, you don’t need this. If you are using one (GPS) receiver with one (navigational) application at any one time on your Pocket PC, you do not need it as well.
But you need something more, than I would recommend you give GPSGate a try. It’s a very powerful and featured application. So much so that there are other applications out there that does some of the things GPSGate does (like GPSProxy for example) but I doubt there are any that does all.
Give it a shot. You have 14 days of trial to see if it’s the one for you. There’s 2 commercial versions out there. The one that does everything (and probably more) listed in this review is called the Standard version and goes for $19.95 a license. The light version, called Express, goes for $12.95 a license and it allows you to only connect up to two GPS applications to one GPS. Need further comparison? There’s a table at the end of this page for your reference.
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