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Tablet for navigation
Chrisvr6
Member Posts: 166 ✭✭
So i bought a cheap refurbished android tablet for the boat. Wanted to have gps navigation basically. The app i got is called "navionics usa lakes". I just tested it out on lake michigan and it works awesome. The tablet has built in gps so no service is needed. It displays water depths, speed and a lot of other important markers. It'll trace your route too. Mounts right to the windshield.
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No pics of it mounted though.
Details on the tablet and the app would be great too. My Garmin G2 Satt maps absolutely suck so I've been looking for an inexpensive alternative to occasionally help find my way through some of my skinny water anchorages.
Mike
The tablet is an asus transformer tf300. I wouldn't recommend for everyday use. It lags pretty bad. It works awesome for what i use it for though. Just make sure the tablet you use has built in gps.
Check out "Boating USA"
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=it.navionics.singleAppUsa
I'm looking for inexpensive portable high rez satt maps that overlay my position. Charts I already have on the chart plotter.
Not too bad. I guess because its Lcd.
Mike, I bought a vizio tablet (droid OS) off eBay for $90 that has two gps's.. one on comms card and one independent.. it's a 9" screen.. i use navionics on it and love the vector maps... There are other free apps that do what you're asking, which is a rastor sat image...
How can you tell that it has two gps's?
mostly because I sought it out...
Most with GPS aren't an actual GPS but a triangulation between towers... It's part of the comms card which has Bluetooth, WiFi, 4g, ect... This one has that, as most do, but it has a stand alone GPS, too... It took me forever to find it, as it isn't that common..
Truth is, I don't use it anymore... I.have a htc one max, which is a tiny tablet or a huge phone, depending on how you wanna look at it...
Mike... $50? If you don't like it, just send it back.. navionics is already on it and paid for, w/ SE coastal waterways.. and like I said, you can find raster GPS plotters all over the place- Google maps and Google earth, for two, which are loaded on it..
thats the reason i got my asus tablet. Heard it had a standalone gps. Works great. Outdoors, that is.
Is it dependent on cell phone reception or will it operate off-line if the maps are somehow loaded in the memory? That satt image storage is where you typically have issues due to their size and copyright issues with the guys who own the satellites.
I have 2 tablets and searched last year and didn't mind paying a reasonable fee but couldn't put it together w/o breaking the bank for something I may not need very often.
most of the apps are going to rely on connection to provide the sat images.. and if they didn't, the images you'd have to work with would be raster based, which suck in my opinion- as the feature (a buoy, let's say) is displayed as a precise size instead of a percentage of available pixels in size, which means when you zoom all you're doing is magnifying... I prefer vector hugely, which in the same example would render the buoy the same size in pixels no matter how closely you zoomed in or zoomed out, which allows you to see items that are 'hidden' until warranting closer exam.. the raster is fixed, and you (as represented on the screen as a GPS signal) as superimposed above it. the raster base map doesn't change.. a vector is all layers with you (as represented as a GPS signal) as the base map..
navionics and the downloaded SE coastal waterways use vector for layers, and store it locally (on a micro SD card)...
you're right about the sat mapping, those files even saved locally would be massive in size and take some serious computing to render- which would generate heat and cut seriously into battery life.
I have several navigation apps on that thing, but kept returning to Navionics... their nav function is better than the others, but their tide tables, speed and speed log, and other lil functions make it superior to all of the others, and especially the ones that use raster base maps.
the vector layers, displayed as maps, are in the memory for navionics... there are no satellite images at all, though... those rely on a connection..
Thanks for the details Drew. I got close with a program called mobile atlas creator that could download and store the hi-rez satt maps for off-line use in a specific overlaid area I might be traveling/boating to keep the file size reasonable. It would've worked but was a little complicated to set up. It slipped down on the priority list and I eventually moved on to other vices.
My goal wasn't just for boating but also for travelling/ camping/off roading etc where cell coverage is spotty but the built in gps would still function as a locator.