macbook tracking solution?

[Spacesim]

I recently downloaded the preycontrol software as a safety measure if my macbook pro would be stolen or lost. The software has the ability to secretly send information about where my mac is, what the thief are browsing, and even take a picture of the thief and send me, among other things.

I tested the tracking function out on myself and got unsatisfying results. Instead of using some sort of GPS interaction with the computer, it showed me where the nearest hotspot was. It gave me a error margin of up to half a mile. Then the service is pretty useless right?

I remember my friend showed me an app to his iphone where he could see exactly where the phone were located. Now, how do i get the same result on my macbook pro? is there any software that connect to the GPS system so i get the exact spot where my computer is through preycontrol if it's been stolen?

 

[LeiQQ]

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A MacBook pro is not equipped with gps unlike the iPhone which is. I think that software or something like it is the best you're likely to get. Most people will not walk around with a MacBook pro --think walking down the street holding it -- trying to find a restaurant based on google map results.

 

[Spacesim]

Yeah you're right about that. But i suppose that there must be a high demand on tracking solutions for laptops nevertheless. There must be something for me out there? It's hard to find a stolen computer if i(and maybe the police) have to search over a half a mile radius for it....

 

[yusukeaoki]

Im not sure if there is such things for MBPs but there can be one like this.

The stolen/lost MBP will use its WiFi antenna to find the nearby WiFis.
In order to do this, MBP might be able to give a good radius to search by finding out where it is using the WiFis around/surrounding it.

Im not sure if there is such things nor if they do they might not have it for Macs.
But its possible.
Innovation for tomorrow

 

[LeiQQ]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3_5 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8L1 Safari/6533.18.5)

Im not sure if there is such things for MBPs but there can be one like this.

The stolen/lost MBP will use its WiFi antenna to find the nearby WiFis.
In order to do this, MBP might be able to give a good radius to search by finding out where it is using the WiFis around/surrounding it.

Im not sure if there is such things nor if they do they might not have it for Macs.
But its possible.
Innovation for tomorrow

The OP said that this is the result obtained but not as good as gps with the iPhone.

 

[yusukeaoki]

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The OP said that this is the result obtained but not as good as gps with the iPhone.

Well obviously the GPS will be more accurate.
But better than having nothing.
I mean, unless if you wanna take your MBP apart and put a GPS or something which is probably impossible and something you never want to do.

 

[AdrianK]

Yeah you're right about that. But i suppose that there must be a high demand on tracking solutions for laptops nevertheless. There must be something for me out there? It's hard to find a stolen computer if i(and maybe the police) have to search over a half a mile radius for it....

You're right, but without the machine being able to calculate a distance from a mast with a known location (a la GPS/A-GPS) it's impossible to determine it's exact location. So, I'm not really sure what you're expecting.

Maybe some company will come along with a GPS tracker incorporated in to an optibay (which replaces the superdrive) or Apple will incorporate 3G and GPS in to the next MacBook Pros.