Electronic Device, GPS, Spot, Tom Tom, ETC.

[Kinarfi]

Got some information about Spot, But I'm tired and Gotta go to bed to clear my head

I'll be editing this tomorrow It's tomorrow now Sorry for the teaser, I really was tired. Any how!!!

I went down to Las Vegas and took my spot to try it out. First the signal it sends out is referred to as a message.

It has 4 messages, Track or SPOTcasting, I'm OK, Help, Emergency. Hopefully, we'll never need Help or Emergency, so I haven't played with it.

What I learned is: 1. pushing the on button only turn it on and makes the light blink so you can find it in the dark. ( I thought it started the track mode - WRONG ) 2. Push the OK button and it'll send an OK message. (Duh!) I called spot for help and was told to wait 20 minutes or turn it off and back on before I start Tracking. 3. To Track, push and hold the OK button for 5+ seconds, Simple, if you know it. Help and Emergency override Tracking.

4. If you want someone to be able to follow your progress, You need to send them a link to use before you go make tracks or create one for yourself that you can send out later. To create this link, login into your account, go to share and create your link. The link you create only shows messages that are created after the link is created. When you send the link to someone, advise them to save or bookmark the link for later use, save it yourself too.

I went down to Vegas via the road next to Lake Mead and stopped at Valley of Fire and thought I had it all tracked, I didn't, BUMMER!

Did some more playing, if while in track mode, push the OK button for 5+ sec. and it blinks red, goes solid red and off, then you can push OK again to get an OK message.

Jeff

[flatbed]

Sounds like a teaser on the news channel, i hate those.

SORRY,

jeff

[rocmoc]

I have a friend who is a sales distributor for SPOT. Interesting piece of equipment but you have an on-going subscription charge after the purchase of the device. Kinda of like a Sirius Radio. They can be used anywhere in the world. He tried to get us to take one with us to Mexico. They are a position location device via satellite for emergencies, I believe from Motorola.

rocmoc n AZ/Mexico

[Kinarfi]

Spot idea

Went for a ride in my truck yesterday, turned the Spot tracker on and it worked good, but on the the way home, I got to thinking about how to pass on the link easily, it can be in the "I'm OK" message. Now when I hit the I'm OK button, I send the following message to those I have on my list.

Out Riding, follow @ http://share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots.jsp?glId= plus appropriate info

ESN:0-781

Latitude:.3626

Longitude:-11.7349

Nearest Location:not known

Distance:not known

Time:02/08/2009 22:59:29 (US/Mountain)

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&...p;z=12&om=1

FYI, I modified the message

[Gumball]

SPOT on -

I too have a Spot unit. I never go riding without it. It has couple quirks a new user should know about.

1. It works best with the Spot emblem facing the sky. It has to have a clear sky view to work consistently.

2. To put it in the track mode the easiest way is to turn it on, then hold the OK button down until the green light goes out.

In the track mode it sends a message to the satellite every 10 minutes. Occasionally it doesn't catch a satellite flying over and your next track point will be 20 minutes or more out.

You can down load your track to your computer as a GPX file and use is with Garmins Map Scource. You can also load your data to ExpertGPS to see where you've been. There are probably other software programs that you can also use.

Many of the racers in the BAJA race use the Spot to know where there competitors are.

Considering it cost about $158.00 a YEAR for full coverage I consider that a small cost for piece of mind.

Gumball