windows laptop gps lock

Jeff Wiegand

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I recently purchased a new dell laptop that has no GPS chip and relies on the your isp for location. will the ifly app for windows use this info to receive a gps lock?
 
I recently purchased a new dell laptop that has no GPS chip and relies on the your isp for location. will the ifly app for windows use this info to receive a gps lock?
Well, yes, with a caveat. It will work pretty well in most places you would normally use a laptop: Your home, your office, a hotel, a Starbucks, a library, etc. If you've ever used Google Maps in a browser on a laptop or desktop computer, you've probably seen it show your location pretty accurately.

However, if you stick the laptop in your car and go driving around town, you should not expect Google Maps or iFly to be able to continuously provide a good position the same way your phone with GPS capability can. The tricks your laptop uses to get a static location in "normal" places will not work while in motion like that.

Now if you take that laptop up in the plane and try to use it there just by itself, then that's not going to work. However, if you have an ADSB-in device that creates a wifi hotspot in the plane, you can have your laptop connect to that, and iFly will use the GPS location provided by the ADSB device.
 
Hi Jeff - welcome to iFly! As Cobra said above, your laptop won't use location services to auto locate your position in ifly. AFAIK, iFly uses a gps sensor, not location services (which uses info from your wifi/internet access provider). An external gps sensor is less than $20 online.

You might also try this trick, start a flight plan from wherever you'd like to be based - in my case KMRN. You don't have to have a second way point in your FP. Close and restart iFly, I bet it will place you at your FP's starting point.
 
I recently purchased a new dell laptop that has no GPS chip and relies on the your isp for location. will the ifly app for windows use this info to receive a gps lock?
Something that receives GPS signals from the GPS satellites is required to obtain a GPS lock. As mark.medic stated, a GPS receiving device that you connect via Bluetooth, WiFi or perhaps even via USB can be purchased for that function.

 
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