In 90 PC GPS 'Woes' - Minor but REALLY annoying...

[Hybrid_From_Hell]

Hi all,

Need some help maybe here......

I now have :

A working Tablet PC 10.4 screen active pen input - Running windows XP Tablet 30GB HD and 256MB Ram

Memory Map and installed Maps for green lanning - working

Navigator 7 Sat Nav - Turn By Turn Road system - again working

Megatune (Via a USB to PITFA Serial Converter) - Working

A GPS Haicom HI-204III-USB GPS Reciver (SiRF Star 111 Technology), it seem to load up a serial interface even tho its USB Powered ?

The problem I have is that if / when I run either Memory map or Navigator 7

BOTH times and EVERY time I select the program I have to reset the GPS to "Find Itself",...............

......... it seems to just drop out the settings, ................not the end of the world but a RPITFA.

I have loaded all the GPS Software, and it seems to default to COM1, whereas it needs COM4 on the USB to switch on and read the satilites, move from one prog (Comm 4) to the other and back to Comm 1 and some faffing, switch off and then on boot up the faffing has to recommence....

Having spoken to BBC today he mentioned something called 'GPS Gate', anyone know about this ?,

or indeed why its doing what its doing, or ways around. ?

Frankly the Software(s) seem V Good, but the GPS Unit with its fantastic "Ingrish" handbook of gibberish from ebay may be destined for the bin and a less touchy replacment maybe ?

HELP I am out of my depth now !

Nice bit of mounting bracket to come, but I would like to just switch on the PC, load up either MM or N7 and have the GPS active and reciveing straight away ??

Thoughts ?

Nige

[V8 Freak]

Nige,

Are you suggesting that one program is making the GPS move to COMM1 from COMM4 ?

Normally, the GPS software will load the mini drivers and effectively fool the PC into thinking the GPS is connected via an RS232 port (Old version of Comms ports for modems etc.)

However, the GPS should stay on which ever COMM port it starts on.

You normally need to configure each piece of software to look on COMM4 (Or whereever it is..) The each should start first time when loaded. Mine is very similar and I was able to configure Autoroute7 and Memory Map to the necessary COM port. I could not get GPS gate to work with the USB GPS mouse, but that would only be needed if you wanted both to work at the same time on the same GPS mouse.. (Not normally necessary)

If I've grasped the wrong wnd of the preverbial nettle, let me know and I'll see if I can help further.

Neil

[discojmz]

i take it you're running both pieces of software concurrently and they wont share and play nice?

gpsgate is your friend nige!

usb is a type of serial connection, it's what the s stands for so dont let that worry you

if you do get fed up with that particular gps receiver, id be happy to send you some beer tokens for it unless its being a pain cos theres something wrong with it!

[white90]

http://franson.com/

[pugwash]

You have lots of little bits of software running to get the USB gps to talk to the PC.

First off the GPS mouse is in effect a modem that turns it's signal into a USB compatible signal.

This signal passes down your cable to the PC, which for a number of reasons, can only talk to a modem through a com port, so you need a little program usually called a USB miniport to turn the USB signal into a Com port.

it sounds like the the miniport MAY be having some issues, which is a bummer, however it could be a problem with the GPS unit itself. To check this go to http://www.sirf.com/free_demo.html and download Sirf demo. This program is a great little app which allows you to directly adress the GPS unit (which is what you will need to do when you pull the USB cable out and the GPS modem has a fit and won't let either memory map or Nav 7 talk to it0- some say you have to send the unit back to be reset, but you don't as Sirf demo will do it for you). Sirf demo is complicated but if you have enough of a fiddle you will get the hang of it- if it really baffles you then give me a shout and i'll go through it with you when i'm at my own in car PC. What you can do with Sirfdemo is hard reset the GPS unit and clear the memory, this then forces the GPS unit to use bog standard settings which may solve the problem.

Alternatively you allow the GPS unit to install to com 1 and use either fransom, or my preferred App- X-port (a very simple and lightweight little thing) http://curioustech.home.insightbb.com/xport.html which takes seconds to install and even better is totally FREE. you basically set Com1 to replicate to com 4, 5, 6 etc then set the map programs to look at those com ports. This means that you can then use more than one program at once.

if none of this fixes the problem then you definitely have a miniport issue which can be hard to resolve. best thing to do is to try re-installing the miniport a couple of times, if that doesn't work then uninstall the unit, wait 20secs and try plugging the USB lead in again- you might be lucky and find that the XP CDC virtual com port will do the job for you (if you have it installed, some versions of XP do and some don't). If you google virtual com port you will come up with some software that will also do the job, however this is outside of my area of expertise and i have a funny feeling that some virtual com ports are model specific- ie you may need the virtual com port that came with the GPS receiver

[western]

The main purpose of GpsGate is to share one GPS between several GPS applications running at the same time. In its simplest form GpsGate is very easy to install and setup for a novice user.

just what you need then

[Les Henson]

I have GPS gate on my PDA and it switches between Tomtom and MM with no problems at all. Although how or why it does it you'll have to ask V8Freak as he installed it. I'm a muppet not sure how it works.

Les.

[Hybrid_From_Hell]

Ta all for the thoughts above, can't say I am clear in my mind the route to try next, so will clarify as mentioned.............

I am not trying to run both at the same time.

If I have it all working, then it only stays working until I close that program (Either MM or N7 or switch the PC Off) when I then eiother start the program (whichever one) or start the computer up etc then I have the "Hunt and faf for the GPS Comm to work game"

I have tried setting the Comm within the GPS Settings, and also from within BOTH the programs, none seem to keep the memory I what I have asked it to remember to use

Based on the clarification above th0ughts as to the next route to go ?

Nige

[Jon White]

Can you change the address of the Comm port in the bios to change the physical com port (usually com1) to a different number? You can on some pc's. Alternately can you dimply disable the com port in the bios?

This would then allow you to install the USD virtual com port as com1.

I've got some different USB comm port software you can try if you like.

Jon

[imspanners]

Ta all for the thoughts above, can't say I am clear in my mind the route to try next, so will clarify as mentioned.............

I am not trying to run both at the same time.

If I have it all working, then it only stays working until I close that program (Either MM or N7 or switch the PC Off) when I then eiother start the program (whichever one) or start the computer up etc then I have the "Hunt and faf for the GPS Comm to work game"

I have tried setting the Comm within the GPS Settings, and also from within BOTH the programs, none seem to keep the memory I what I have asked it to remember to use

Based on the clarification above th0ughts as to the next route to go ?

Nige

Have you gone into system settings/device manager and set the com port within? (with the gps plugged in)

Sorry can't remember what it comes under, and it's cold outside (so I'm not going to the motor to check)!

[Hybrid_From_Hell]

dimply disable

Oh Gawd,

I am now begining to feel so lost that I am unsure if the above is a typo or a PC speical disabling command

I'll have a carefull prod about the BIOS

Nige

[TJ101]

Nige

I had similar problems, losing the GPS signal feed ?,on reboot,, myself and others tried for hours !! down loaded the Franson GPSGate, (14 day free trail) jobs all cured, finds the receiver, whether via USB or Bluetooth on start up, and can now runs 2 mapping systems, along with a marine chart program, all at the same time,

Do not know the technicalities all i know is that it works

[Hybrid_From_Hell]

[Moves this to the top of poss fix list ? ]

Ta

Nige

[Mark90]

GPSGate may well solve the problem. However it seems a little odd that both programs are failing to keep their GPS com port settings. I don't know about N7 but MM stores these settings in the registry and updates them when you make changes in MM, even before you exit MM.

The location of the MM com port settings in the registry is...

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Memory-Map\Memory-Map Navigator-OS\settings\GPS_params

OS migt be OS5 depending on version of MM.

For a SirfIII GPS on com port 1 it should be 6,3,COM1: ,4,1,0,0,6,100,500

The 6 at the front refers to Sirf (2 for Garmin, 1 for NMEA).

If you're not confident editing settings in the registry get a grown up to do it for you.

[Gromit]

just to throw something else into the mix.

Where all of you that have working applications running XP home/Pro etc, or were you running XP Tablet edition?

I only ask as XP Tablet edition has some features such as restoring the OS to it's original settings/overwriting the registry etc after a reboot.

[Jon White]

just to throw something else into the mix.

Where all of you that have working applications running XP home/Pro etc, or were you running XP Tablet edition?

I only ask as XP Tablet edition has some features such as restoring the OS to it's original settings/overwriting the registry etc after a reboot.

Ah.............now that sounds like a more sensable answer..........

[David Sparkes]

H from H.

Did you sort this?

More Specifically:

Did you get GPSGate working on your Tablet, and did GPSGate allow both programmes to work even after restarting the Tablet or programmes?

If the answer to Sorted? is Yes, but GPSGate answers are No, how was it sorted?

Thanks.

[Hybrid_From_Hell]

H from H.

Did you sort this?

More Specifically:

Did you get GPSGate working on your Tablet, and did GPSGate allow both programmes to work even after restarting the Tablet or programmes?

If the answer to Sorted? is Yes, but GPSGate answers are No, how was it sorted?

Thanks.

I poked it swore at it (a Lot) played with comm settings is both the GPS software MM software and Sat Nav Software, reset to comm 4 time and time gain and in the end it seemed to learn

I kid you not seemed like EVENTUALLY it sorted and saved the settings, must have done it 7x at least then bingo

No, I did work out why either

Traaaalaaaa !

Pooters hate them sometimes !

Ta for the interest David, who knows it may revert back yet, but have shut off rebooted etc and all seem ok

Nige