[aprssig] D710 GPS Port

[Rich Mulvey]

Jason Rausch wrote:
> --- Rich Mulvey <aprs at mulveyfamily.com> wrote:
>
>   
>>    Honestly, what Kenwood really needed to do is
>> make it easier to make 
>> a professional installation, not harder.  For
>> example, didn't any 
>> Kenwood engineers actually sit down, consider how
>> people are actually 
>> using their rigs, 
>>     
>
> I have come to the conclusion that the survey that
> Kenwood had people fill out at Dayton, a couple of
> years back was just lip service and a stunt.  If they
> had really listened, there would have been a built-in
> gps, some kind of SmartBeaconing algorithm, bigger LCD
> that can display more information, a customizable LCD
> display format, open source (at least the front end)
> and a whole host of other options I have seen people
> ask for on this list.
>
>   


   I would have argued against a bigger control head, actually.  ;-)   
The size of the current version seems fine to me - what I would like is 
the ability to selectively choose data items and have them displayed in 
a large font.  I don't tend to use about half of the information on the 
APRS display, so that's all just wasted space.

   But yeah, a built-in GPS seems to be a no-brainer.  I picked up a 
very cheap ( and boy, is it built like that... ) GPSSlim 236 Bluetooth 
GPS last week, and have been playing around with it.  The small size and 
sensitivity are *incredible*.  My Garmin GPSIII+ typically is 
hit-or-miss outside my house - I live in a steep-walled stream valley - 
and yet the GPSSlim was happily reporting 6 satellites - in my 
basement.  In a road trip last weekend, I threw it inside the enclosed 
CD holder in my wife's Subaru, and it had an excellent fix the whole 
way.   Putting something like that in the control head would be ideal - 
after all, they're cheap, sensitive, and and if you want to use APRS in 
any reasonable fashion, you'll need the GPS, anyhow.  Obviously you'd 
still want the ability to use an external GPS too, but that would just 
be icing on the cake.

- Rich



- Rich