Oh! Gizmo

By Luke Anderson

Geotagging pictures has become popular of late. Basically the idea is to tag your photos with information regarding the location that they were taken. This seems to be used a lot by people that do a large amount of traveling, and wish to remember exactly where each picture was taken. If you’re one of those people, but doesn’t want to hassle with going through all of your pics and manually adding tags (and trying to remember where each was taken) this little gadget might be of interest.

This little gizmo is basically a GPS receiver and card reader bundled into one. It keeps track of everywhere you’ve traveled via the GPS signal and logs exactly what time you were at each location. All you have to do is carry it with you when you’re out snapping pics. When you’re done at the end of the day, just pop in your SD card (or use it with a USB card reader if you don’t use an SD card) and it will automatically assign a geotag based on the time each photo was taken.

I’m sure that there will be a market for this device when it hits stores in the next couple of weeks. It’ll set you back $99, which seems pretty reasonable for all the hassle it will save you.

[ Photofinder ] VIA [ Crave ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Forget about LoJack or other stolen car retrieval services. If your vehicle gets swiped, odds are you wouldn’t mind having a few words with the person who’s responsible. And that’s just one of the many uses I can think of for the Portatrak vehicle tracker. (Please note: OhGizmo! does not endorse the use of vigilante justice, unless your car was actually really cool.)

The less than subtle device is basically a quad band GSM phone bundled with GPS hardware. When the vehicle being tracked is ‘on the move’ you automatically get an updated position via email every 15 minutes. While the message basically consists of longitude and latitude numbers, there’s also a link to a website that provides street level satellite views of the location, as well as a history of where it’s been. When it detects the vehicle is stationary, the Portatrak will go into a sleep mode to conserve power, but will automatically start back up when the car starts to move again. A set of 4 AA batteries will keep the tracker working for about 9 days of continuous monitoring, but that could be even longer depending on how often it goes into its sleep mode. And given its size, the device is probably more easily hidden on large objects like a vehicle, but there’s nothing stopping you from stashing it in someone’s bag or other places.

You can find the Portatrak at Spycatcher for just over $1,300.

[ Portatrak ]

By Luke Anderson

SD cards are becoming more and more useful every day. I loved them back in the day because I could swap out cards between my camera and PDA (yes, I carried a PDA). Later my phone used a miniSD card, which with an adapter also worked with my (newer) camera. Not too long ago we saw the release of the Eye-Fi, which was an SD card that gave your digital camera a wireless connection which you could use to transfer images. Now we have the miniSD Bluetooth GPS unit.

I never really thought that an SD card could pack in a Bluetooth and GPS chip, but Spectec has gone a step further and crammed it all into a miniSD card. This little adapter can plug into your handheld device, which will then use a certain set of drivers to communicate with the GPS. If your device doesn’t happen to have those drivers, you’re still in luck. The card will use its Bluetooth connection to talk to your device and transmit the GPS signal. No word yet on pricing or availability.

[ Spectec ] VIA [ Gearlog ]

By Evan Ackerman

If you need to keep track of something, PocketFinder is the way to do it. Keep track of what, you ask? Well, anything. How about your kids? Do you know where they are right now? Are you SURE? With PocketFinder, you can be sure, even if they’re inside, where conventional GPS devices don’t function. PocketFinder is unique in that it uses both GPS signals and GSM triangulation to figure out where it is. When it’s able to, it combines them both to determine its position within 5 feet, and worst case (no GPS) it can still locate itself within 500 feet.

PocketFinder is small and waterproof, since it’s charged inductively (no wires or plugs) on a custom charging base. The interface is completely web based, and will even run on an iPhone or something similar. Like most GPS tracking devices, you can set boundary alerts, but PocketFinder also incorporates (will incorporate, they just got the patent yesterday) an accelerometer that can tell if you get into an accident and notify the proper authorities.

The unit itself costs a bit over $100, which isn’t that bad… But you do have to pay a fee every month to receive location data over the GSM network. Yay PocketFinder, boo subscription fees.

[ PocketFinder ]

By Andrew Liszewski

While being marvels of electronic engineering, the first GPS equipped watches were ridiculously large units that were as good at being wrist weights as they were at pinpointing your location. But it was inevitable that the technology would eventually shrink to the point where a GPS watch looked no different than a regular one, and I believe the Forerunner 405 from Garmin has reached that point.

The watch is part of Garmin’s fitness line so it’s catered towards runners and other athletes who like to keep track of their performances while on the go. So instead of small hard to find buttons, the watch has a touch-sensitive bezel that can be used to scroll through menus and select options. The watch can also constantly monitor your time, distance, pace, burned calories and even heart rate when a coupled with a chest monitor. And that info can be wirelessly transferred to your PC or even another watch if you’re competing with a friend.

The Forerunner 405 should be available some time in the first quarter of 2008 and will retail for about $318.74. (That’s a pretty specific MSRP by the way. I think 74 cents was a good choice, since people would probably scoff if the price had gone up to 75 cents.)

[ Garmin Forerunner 405 ] VIA [ Uncrate ]

By Evan Ackerman

Being too poor to actually shell out the cash for a purpose built geotagging gadget (like this), on my last few trips I’ve taken along a regular GPS and synchronized my camera’s clock to it. I’d leave the GPS on while I was taking pics, and then when I got home, spend an unbelievably tedious evening matching the GPS info with my image timestamps. If you don’t have as many free evenings to spend doing unbelievably tedious things as I do, check out the ATP GPS Photo Finder. It does basically the same thing, except faster and better and without a PC. It takes a couple AA batts and works just like a normal GPS device, storing up to 550 hours of location data (updated every 5 seconds) on its 128mb of internal memory. Make sure your camera is synced to the GPS time the Photo Finder displays, and when you’re done shooting, just stick your camera’s SD/MMC/MS card into the Photo Finder and it’ll automatically geotag all your pics. So, it’s a card reader too, and comes with a USB cable to connect to your computer if you want. The current limitation (besides the memory card restriction) is that it only works with JPEGs, so if you’re into RAW, you’re out of luck. The geotagged pics integrate directly into Google Earth and Google Maps (with Picasa), and if you’ve never tried it before, it’s totally cool. Maybe not quite worth the $130 MSRP cool, but cool nonetheless.

[ ATP GPS Photo Finder ] VIA [ SlipperyBrick ]

By Luke Anderson

I have a tendency to talk a lot, especially in long car rides. I think it’s mostly because I just don’t like the silence, even if there is music playing. Other people seem to think it’s because I enjoy the sound of my own voice. This is actually far from the truth as I hate listening to recordings of myself. That’s exactly the reason why I wouldn’t ever use the YourPND service, which would have me being bossed around by myself every time I got in the car.

The service actually lets you replace the generic GPS voice with your own, thus you can give yourself directions around town. Seriously, am I the only one that’s just a little weirded out by this? Well if you aren’t then you can use this on your TomTom GPS, Garmin, Mio and MyGuide products are expected to be supported sometime in the future. It’ll only cost you around $10 to set up.

[ YourPND ] VIA [ GearFuse ]

By Andrew Liszewski

So far I’ve been particularly unimpressed with any of the in-car GPS systems I’ve used. They’re definitely accurate when it comes to pinpointing your location, but when it comes to providing driving directions they’re not so hot. I think the biggest issue I have is trying to figure out what street they’re telling me to turn on, without glancing at the display and taking my eyes off the road.

But that’s exactly where this Virtual Cable navigation system shines. Instead of looking at a small 6 inch screen, or listening to less than exact turn by turn directions, it provides you with a red ribbon projected on your windshield showing the exact path you should be taking. The ribbon actually appears to exist in 3D space outside your car thanks to a patent pending volumetric display system using lasers and mirrors. The system makes it a lot easier to know exactly where an upcoming turn is, allowing you to slow down and get in the proper lane ahead of time.

Now while the technology seems to only exist in video demos at this time, the inventor Tom Zamojdo hopes to see it available one day for about $400 as a factory-installed option.

[ Virtual Cable ] VIA [ Ubergizmo ]

By Evan Ackerman

As you may or may not know, the US Military has the ability to turn off GPS whenever they feel like it. It’s therefore unsurprising that Russia has its own satellite navigation system, called GLONASS (ГЛОбальная НАвигационная Спутниковая Система, for whatever it’s worth). It’s also unsurprising that the military-supported system fell into disrepair after the Russian economy crashed, but they’ve promised to restore global coverage (and expand high-precision signals to the civilian market) by 2009. In anticipation of this, hardware capable of decoding both US GPS and Russian GLONASS signals is starting to become available, for anywhere from $20 to $4200. This means faster and more accurate position fixes, or it will eventually, after Russia launches a few more satellites. Currently, unless you live in Chechnya, GLONASS isn’t going to be of much help. But still, the 2009 completion target is much earlier than the EU’s Galileo system for those of us who rely on high resolution GPS systems to tell us what lane to be in when trying to get from Oakland to San Francisco.

[ GlonassCentral ] VIA [ Navigadget ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Even with a confusing, upside-down product shot the Pyxis GPS watch is still a cool piece of tech. At the moment it’s only being marketed in Korea, but if you happen to live there you’ll be able to take advantage of its built-in database of places to jog, run or hike. The watch is definitely aimed at those who like to maintain a regular fitness regime, and will keep track of your elapsed time, speed, distance and burned calories.

Other applications include using the Pyxis as a golf guide since a database of different courses provides data on the distance to the green, or how far your last drive was. And even though the screen is particularly small since it’s designed to be worn on your wrist, it still appears to have more than enough resolution for displaying complex maps and trails. It can even be used in your car while driving, but that’s where I think that small screen might actually be a problem.

[ A wrist watch type GPS ‘Pyxis’ to help you enjoy in/outdoor exercises ] VIA [ Ubergizmo ]