Sirf 3 or Atmel Antaris 4 - Which chipset to choose?

[2ndattempt]

Hi,

I bought a Bluenext BN909GR receiver from Ebay. It uses the Sirf 3 chipset and was excellent at getting a signal very quickly, even indoors. Unfortunately the power button on it broke in about 10 minutes of me using it!

I have now ordered a Bluenext BN905GR receiver from a different seller which has a proper power switch. I have noticed though that although this model is advertised as having more channels it uses a chipset called Atmel Antaris 4. I'm still waiting for this to arrive in the post so haven't yet tried it out.

I intend to use my receiver with my Nokia N95 8gig and I need a decent receiver as I'll be using it in an emergency vehicle when I get lost.

So which chipset of the 2 above will be better? Will the Atmel perform as well as the Sirf 3 did?

I have sent my BN909GR back to the seller who is going to replace it, but as the last one broke so quickly I don't have a lot of faith in it, so I'm not sure if to keep that one or use the other that I've ordered.

Any advice on either of the two above would be appreciated, thanks

[Darren]

Hmm the Antaris is a co-development with U-Blox. It's a low power chipset and whilst capable I'd still rate SiRFIII higher for sensitivity and holding on to a fix although ultimately, the actual receiver design is as important and similarly equipped receivers can have markedly different performance because of factors such as antenna size and placement etc.

I would have to say that if reliability is a requirement you'd be much better purchasing an established brand from a respected retailer than lesser known solutions from eBay?
_________________
Darren Griffin

[2ndattempt]

I tested the new device today and it seemed to work really well.

Connected to the Nokia without any problems at all via Bluetooth and took about 10 seconds to get a satalite fix from cold.

It even kept the signal if I put it in the glove box or somewhere else out of site of the window and it held up well while driving, getting me to a couple of jobs without any problems during my testing (had my A-Z on standby just in case, but it wasn't needed).

So far it seems to perform just as well as the Sirf III device, so I'm happy. The added benefit of this model is that it has a hard power switch that doesn't break like the last one.

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