BT GPS Reconnect to PDA’s

[jonasolof]

I have tried Emtac BTGPS with Palm Tungsten T and IPAQ 5450 using CetusGPS (www.cetusgps.dk) latest beta and Fugawi PPC/marine ENC. Both work well but need manual intervention to reconnect after powerdown of the PDA, Palm/CetusGPS one click and IPAQ/Fugawi 7 clicks. This is supposed to be solved in the next upgrade of both softwares. Reconnection of BT links is a constant issue with this technology, in contrast to Wifi. Have you seen any software so far that lets the Emtac GPS reconnect automatically after PDA BT communication has been interrupted? BTW the pairing key for Emtac is 0183 other alternatives flourish



Regards



Jonas
_________________
Fugawi + Emtac BTGPS

IPAQ 5450 Palm Tungsten T

[Dave]

I'm not sure about the Emtac on a Palm, or the 5450 but on an iPAQ 3870 I find switching off the Emtac/Socket BT GPS first, then powering down the PDA will in most cases re-establish the connection on power up and not only talk to the GPS but receive data. Sometimes I do find the Bluetooth Manager fails, and trying to start it manually results in a driver memory error asking to reset the Pocket PC which can be annoying, but it doesn't happen that often.

[MikeB]

Jonas,



If you had a 3870 or 3890 iPaq then you would have no problems reconnecting when switching the units back on. For some reason HP have taken a backwards step with the 5450, where you have to select the BT device, even if it is the only one available.



With my 3870 I used to powerdown the iPaq, then the Emtac. When restarting I started the Emtac first then the iPaq. This worked for me every time.
_________________
Mike Barrett

[bibi]

Hi Jonas,

I'm new to this GPS - PDA world ... which is obviously not your case. I thought I made the best possible choice when I selected an iPaq 3870 in combination with an Emtac BTGPS and TomTom V2. Now it appears that I have a very unstable set up. From the starting of the devices (it takes me always a soft reset ot the iPaq) to the usage while in the car (it seems that the bluetooth link gets lost ?) I have very few opportunities to be pleased with my - expensive - purchase. I installed the latest ROM level and Bluetooth manager version I found on the HP support site. I have the impression it is getting only worse. What could I do wrong or what should else I do ? Help me before I get into a nervous breakdown. Thanks.

[MikeB]

Bibi,



I had the same setup as you running on an iPaq 3780 and using the Emtac BTGPS. This is a very stable platform for GPS. If you have applied the latest ROM and BT software patches from the HP site than you should not have any problems.



First question is have you bonded the iPaq and the Emtac. This is done in the Bluetooth manager. When the devices are bonded they automatically reconnect when switched back on.



Switching the devices on is also critical. Tom Tom will sometimes disable the GPS if it cannot find it. Therefore it is always a good idea to turn the Emtac off last and on first. It may be that Tom Tom is disabling the GPS (in the GPS status screen) this could be the cause of your problems.
_________________
Mike Barrett

[daveg56]

Bibi



Hi. Have recently bought exactly the same (expensive) combination as yourself. When everything is working correctly it's great, but the big problem is a lot of instability. I'm very often having to do a soft reboot, and then it's not guaranteed it will come back up.



I might look at going back to an older version of the ROM to see if things improve.
_________________
iPAQ3970+emtacBTGPS+TT2.02

[daveg56]

MikeB



I've been unable to bond the emtac to the ppc. BT Manager displays a message that the emtac is not responding to the bond request, even though you can receive GPS data from it (on a good day!).



Any ideas?
_________________
iPAQ3970+emtacBTGPS+TT2.02

[MikeB]

Dave,



Firstly: I wouldnt go back to an earlier version of the ROM I found my system was a bit unstable (requiring softboots) until I had installed the latest Rom and BT patch.



Secondly: On all the PDAs (iPaqs) I have used with the Emtac the bonding has worked perfectly. I am assuming that you are entering the correct key "0183" from memory.
_________________
Mike Barrett

[bibi]

Mike,

I come back to you after some good and bad experiences. I have bonded the GPS with the 3870, I also changed my habits (I used to always open the BT Manager and manually connect both devices). During at least one week I hadn't any problem any more and thought evrything was solved. Until yesterday. I passed a spot (were by the way I had the same incident before ... but is this a coincidence) and everything became unstable again. At any moment, TomTom starts to freeze and the only way I found to solve the issue is to soft reset my Ipaq, which is quite dangerous in the car ! I don't think the GPS is to blame. Is this BT on the 3870 (I read on another forum that the 3870 is not really a good device as far as BT is concerned) or is it Tomtom (their site refers also to that type of disfunctioning but without a clue to solve it).

I start wondering if I wouldn't be better off with a sleeve Emtac GPS ??

[Dave]

Bibi, I think the first question I would ask here is did you travel past this spot that you think causes this problem when you didn't have any problems with the Bluetooth connection for a week ? If not, and it's the first visit in a while then I would suggest one of two things.



a) there may be localised interference which is interfering with radio waves



b) it could be a map issue if it's causing TomTom Navigator to hang



I agree, soft resetting is a nightmare when driving, especially on high speed roads and not for the faint hearted. There have been known issues back in TTN1 where you could travel along a section of road which was badly mapped or contained corrupted map data and this would start to throw you off to lots of different areas, and could cause Navigator to hang.



If you do however travel past that spot on a regular basis and you did when you didn't have any problems for a week, then I would suggest it's localised interference, other standards do share the same frequency range as Bluetooth and I have seen a situation where WiFi networks can interfere with Bluetooth and vice versa.

[bibi]

Dave,

this is indeed a spot which I didn't visit for a while. Hence, your explanation makes sense. However, I have the same repeated problem since then on every regular road (including my travel to work/home)like I had before. And that I can't understand. By the way, I haven't installed any software on my iPaq for a long time (which exludes other compatibility issues).

[Dave]

This may be a silly question, but you don't have any other Bluetooth connected devices like Mobile Phones that might be enabled ?

[bibi]

I don't think this is a silly question, but NO I don't have any other BT device at all. I used my set again this week-end during a trip to the Belgian Ardennes. I had again the same problem. I noticed however that when I remove the GPS in the BT Manager settings and than search it and bond it again, it works again fine ... for a while

[Fuego]

Just to try and consolidate threads :



help gps freezing



GPS stops responding to Navigator 2



BT GPS Reconnect to PDA’s

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