The Nokia 5800 has a built-in GPS satellite navigation receiver,
which can tell you where you are anywhere on the planet. The 5800 also
has cell-tower-positioning technology, which finds your location using
the position of the nearest phone network mast if a satellite signal is
unavailable. GPS is more accurate but can take a while (from 10 seconds
to a few minutes, depending on how obstructed the sky is) to find your
position ('Assisted GPS' is also present, to download the expected GPS
satellite positions from the Internet and help speed up your fix.)
The 5800 also has a built-in mapping application called Nokia Maps,
which shows you your location on a street map, tells you exactly how to
get to another location by driving or walking, and can give details of
nearby amenities such as shops, fuel stations, museums, etc. Nokia Maps
uses both GPS and cell tower positioning to tell you where you are: the
latter gives an instant rough position, while GPS data is used after the
phone has locked onto enough satellite signals calculate its position.
You'll know the phone is locked onto a satelite as the lock indicator at
the bottom of the screen will turn green.
Other phone
applications can also use the GPS receiver if required. For example the
camera application can optionally "geotag" photos with your current
location using the GPS receiver to work out where you are (
click here to see our camera tutorial and find out more
about geotagging). If you switch to the standby or menu screens
while an application is using the GPS receiver, you'll see a little
satellite icon in the top right corner of the screen to indicate that
GPS is active.
How does the 5800's GPS work?
Like all satellite navigation systems, the 5800 receives signals from
many different GPS satellites in the sky, and calculates your position
based on those signals, using a combination of triangulation, signal
delay calculation and a lot of very heavy maths that you really don't
want to know about.
Important Note: Satellite
signals cannot penetrate buildings, so GPS satellite signals will be
difficult or impossible to receive if you are indoors and away from
windows. If you want to speed up the process of GPS showing your
location, take the phone outside or place the phone next to a large
window with a good view of the sky.
The 5800's GPS aerial is
inside the top left side of the phone. If you want to get a good GPS
lock make sure this part of the phone is uncovered
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