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UK Users How Accurate Is Your Position?

wrkactjob

wrkactjob

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Feb 29, 2008
1,357
0
London
Please state your phone provider and what app your are using to determine your current location.

For me IP4, O2, Google maps, I'm about 1.5 miles away from myself in London.


Personally I think it makes a mockery of the find my iPhone/iPad app.

I guess with a TomTom app it's using satellites so would be more accurate?
 
iPhone 3, O2, Google Maps.

At home: very accurate. Within 10-15 meters.

At work (inside a tall building with poor phone reception): pretty accurate. It thinks I'm in Jubilee park which is just outside our building. I am on that side of the building at least!
 
It's very accuarate for me, however I live in quite a good 3g area. Saying that though even when I'm on GPRS mine seems very accuarate
 
using iphone 4, google maps, on o2...
without a view of the sky i.e. indoors, the pin drops on or around my house (or any other building), usually within about 20 metres actual

with a view of the sky it shows me essentially the same thing with a better degree of accuracy 5-10 metres, certainly good enough for me
 
iPhone 3G, O2, google maps

i'm in Cambridge.

very accurate most of the time, within 5 meters. if i'm in a big building, then 10-15 meters.
 
nednarm said:
It's very accuarate for me, however I live in quite a good 3g area. Saying that though even when I'm on GPRS mine seems very accuarate
Click to expand...
gps doesn't rely on being on a 3g or gprs connection it has it's own antenna.

as for accuraccy my phone is bang on well give or take a couple of meters
 
I'm in London. Using google maps, sometimes it is way off (approx 1 mile) but usually corrects itself before too long.
 
If im not mistaken does it not use mobile tower triangulation and wifi networks to give a rough position first, then it gets more accurate when it gets a satellite fix and then even more accurate with more satellites. Im not sure if the first bit depends on the mobile network or not, as it might just use your networks towers for triangulation or all the networks?

This will most likely be why yours show you as a mile or so away, as its not got a satellite fix. If it never gets a fix and gets more accurate I would say you have a problem with your phone, give it chance to though and it works best if you have a clean line of sight to the satellites, ie outdoors and no trees etc.

Mine in my house drops the pin on my house with the ring circling my house, outdoors its accurate to about 2 meters.
 
I use the app Device Locator and have it set up to push my location to Google Latitude.

Right now it's about 10 metres out. It's rarely more than 100 metres out for me.
 
wrkactjob said:
For me IP4, O2, Google maps, I'm about 1.5 miles away from myself in London.

I guess with a TomTom app it's using satellites so would be more accurate?
Click to expand...

The phone uses Cell Towers and Shyhook (Wi-Fi networks) first.
Then uses that data to look at the expected satellites in range.

GPS accuracy is limited by the US military to no better than 20ft or so

Mine is as expected on O2 using all map apps. Try downloading "Elevation For Real" which states horizontal and vertical accuracy:
http://itunes.apple.com/app/elevation-for-real/id348065130?mt=8
 
wrkactjob said:
Please state your phone provider and what app your are using to determine your current location.

For me IP4, O2, Google maps, I'm about 1.5 miles away from myself in London.


Personally I think it makes a mockery of the find my iPhone/iPad app.

I guess with a TomTom app it's using satellites so would be more accurate?
Click to expand...

Im using a 3GS with cellphone connected I work in a tall building and alway get perfect GPS reception.

Maybe it's an error with you're phone?!?
 
andybno1 said:
gps doesn't rely on being on a 3g or gprs connection it has it's own antenna.

as for accuraccy my phone is bang on well give or take a couple of meters
Click to expand...

I know what GPS is. I believe the phone uses 3g and gprs to give a more accuarate location.
 
I'm sitting still in an office building and my blue dot is moving around as if I'm walking LOL - After a few minutes of doing this, it eventually settled down and laded pretty much on my head over the office building.

Using iPhone 4, o2 and maps. :D

EDIT: Wait, it's on the move again and gone for a walk up the road! Now it's about 100 meters out :(

EDIT: Wait again, it's come back - this is not very good it keeps going for a walk, but it's back on my head again now.
 
You've got it backwards

Location services uses the cell towers to get an estimate of your location; this reduces the time it takes for GPS to get a fix. GPS works best with line of sight to the satellites, if your indoors or in an area with lots of tall trees or buildings, you will not get as accurate measure of your location. Wi-fi can also be used If you can find a network registered with Apple's location database.
 
I'm on O2 and my location is spot on at home and various work locations.

I don't have great signal at home (1-2 bars only) whereas in Bristol I have full 3G signal strength and both locate me very well.
 
There are perhaps three things that people are mixing together here:

Cellular "triangulation" or Wi-Fi "triangulation" - these use a database of cellular base stations and Wi-Fi hot spots to determine where you are based on the signals that your phone is receiving.

GPS - using the Global Positioning System Satellites to establish where you are

Assisted - GPS (A-GPS) - using the GPS plus a connection to a server (which can happen over a 2G, 3G or Wi-Fi connection) to work your location out much quicker (the server can perform the necessary calculations to work out your location much faster than the phone can)

GPS can function fine without a data connection (although most people will want to use it in conjunction with a mapping application that usually needs a data connection). The other two types need a data connection to function correctly.

It's not really helpful that people are used to the GPRS - these acronyms are very confusing!
 
Mine is way off

I have an iPhone 3GS running iOS4 no JB and an iPhone4 with JB.

The iPhone 3GS has no problems.

In Central London and around London the iPhone 4 GPS fix is DIRE.

http://twitpic.com/2de8jp

http://twitpic.com/2de5t0

What is causing this? It breaks all location based apps. Foursquare thinks I'm miles away. All the Cycle hire apps fail because they think I'm miles away.

Yet the 3GS with iOS4 is fine.

Service provider is Vodafone UK btw.
 
In fact I'd point out that the screenshots above are from the signal.app and you can see where I am usually from the tower I am connected to (in red) but the blue dot should be near that and it's not.

It's driving me crazy.
 
rockjam said:
In fact I'd point out that the screenshots above are from the signal.app and you can see where I am usually from the tower I am connected to (in red) but the blue dot should be near that and it's not.

It's driving me crazy.
Click to expand...

What about using the Maps application?

I'm not sure, but I don't think that App uses GPS to help represent the location of the cell sites you're looking at.
 
Find it great. I use Golfshot GPS all the time too - and get a signal fix really quickly and accurate.

In town it is good too - far quicker than my old 3G.
 
Daveoc64 said:
What about using the Maps application?

I'm not sure, but I don't think that App uses GPS to help represent the location of the cell sites you're looking at.
Click to expand...

It's calling Google Maps and overlaying the cell towers over the top. Or it should do, it can't because location services is not working. If I open Google Maps then the blue dot is in exactly the same place..because that is in effect Google Maps anyway.

Location services is not working in iOS4 on the iPhone 4. The 3GS right next to it works fine. So does my Jailbroken 3GS with iOS4.

Here's a swerveball tho. When I got out of London, outside the M25 delimiter, the location services is accurate again. 100% accurate.

Hence it might be a London issue. Or something.

Someone clever please tell us the answer and maybe throw in the winning lottery numbers too. Ta.
 
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