Quote:
Originally Posted by DixieGal
I went to their website, but it did not answer my main question: Does it give nice loud turn directions like with Tomtom?
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Skyhook? No. You misunderstand. Skyhook is not a direction application, it simply tells your iPad (or any computer) where you are located. Instead of using signals from a satellite (like GPS) it guesses your location based on the WiFi access point you are connected to. Typically useless when driving down the highway, but good when you're sitting at Starbucks.
The Wi-fi only version of the iPad does
not have GPS capabilities, that is it can not get its location from orbiting satellites.
If it is connected to a Wifi base station it can attempt to find its current location using the Skyhook service. It then feeds that location to whatever application asked for it (you know, when you start an App and get the box saying that it is asking for your current location, permit, deny).
The 3G iPad can use Skyhook (which is fast, free and doesn't consume a lot of resources), it can use cell tower triangulation (using Skyhook or a method called AGPS and requires a cell subscription), or it can get signals from orbiting satellites (traditional GPS, requires receiving a signal from space and can be very power hungry). It then feeds these coordinates into whatever application asked for it.
Blame the market for calling turn-by-turn navigation units "GPS" when they are really are "Turn-by-turn navigational units that use GPS for geolocation". It mixes what is a consumer product with what is a geolocating technology. Tomtom, Navigon, and all the other Apps for the iPhone/iPad that give you turn-by-turn directions really shouldn't be called "GPS" either.
Hope this clears things up a little.