When will GPS receivers be ready to use Galileo?

[The Wombles]

There was an announcement this week that the European GPS system Galileo has finally gone live - it has taken 15 years to get the Galileo project to this point. It offers a stronger signal in Northern Europe (and better accuracy for the paid service).

Apparently GPS receivers need new hardware to use the signal (it can't be upgraded with a software update). Given the veeeery long timescales for this project, I was disappointed to see that the latest GPS receivers such as the new Garmin oregon 700 don't use Galileo. They do use (obviously) NavStar (the original US GPS system) and (perhaps more surprisingly) GLONASS (the Russian equivalent).

Does anyone know when Garmin will launch a GPS receiver with Galileo compatibility?

[Sharon - Sharant]

The Galileo European satellites will be a big step forward. The Galileo system will be about 5 times more accurate than GPS and 5-10 times more accurate than GLONASS.
The signals will also be much stronger so accuracy should definitely increase in difficult situations like tree cover, mountain sides, etc.

I've had a look to see if Garmin are going to use the Galileo satellites in their new GPS units or issue a software update if possible.

STMicroelectronics has introduced Teseo a chipset which uses all 3, GPS, GLONASS and Galileo. It looks like the new garmin etrex has this Teseo chip but I cannot confirm it and I'm not sure if the garmin software is utilising the Galileo satellites even if it does have hardware that can receive the Galileo satellites information.

There is an interesting article here http://gpsworld.com/40-of-gnss-receivers-are-galileo-ready/ that suggests that 40% of GPS units could use the Galileo satellites system.


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