I hate to say it, but my personal experience with Nokia and GPS has been less than positive. I have an N95-3 and a N810, and both take quite a while to lock in. As both devices are fairly new, I am hoping that firmware updates can solve our problems.

Does anyone have any idea where the GPS chip is located on the N810? I know that the designers of the N95 laid the ultimate goose-egg by locating the GPS chip in such a position that the keyboard has to be open to get the best signal. Hopefully, there is no such nonsense with the N810.

On the other hand, the LD-1W and -3W are widely considered very good GPS mice - so Nokia do know how to build good GPS receivers, or have at the very least subcontractors that do.

I have found that built in GPS on most multi-purpose, portable devices that I have tried in the past 2 years leaves a lot to be desired...

Because of the recent lower price of BT GPS recievers that are at least SiRFstar III or MTK MT3318 chipsets, I have one installed in each of my vehicles. I now wish this was a new car option.

In fact it wasn't until I got the Navicore kit with an LD-3 did I even consider using my old iPAQ 4150 as a navigator. My experience previously with GPS devices had been so bad that the iPAQ sat for 2 years with no use. (Talk about spending $400 on something that was useless as a portable internet tool. ..and I did that 2 years ago AND, it was an HP device running Micro$oft WinMo. )

probably the internal gps uses the same chipset found in n95/n82

Now several weeks into owning an N810, I'm still not sure what to think of the GPS. If I put the Nokia N810, Garmin eTrex Legend, Magellan Sportrack, and a Garmin StreetPilot III all side-by-side, the N810 is always the last to acquire. For pure acquisition time and accuracy, the Garmin eTrex Legend and StreetPilot are always the fastest and most accurate.

If you had to stake your driving into a unknown area (cross-country drive?), would you trust an N810 to get you there? Currently, I'd have to answer with a resounding "no." The way the N810 is currently performing, I wouldn't put it on par with a consumer-grade Garmin or Tomtom.

Maybe once Nokia releases their "Wayfinder Navigation" licenses for the N810, things will get better? I'd really like to start at home, drive to some place I know, and see how well the N810 routes me there.

Currently, I wouldn't stake my life on it. If my plane was going down and I had to grab a GPS in a hurry, I'd be running for a Garmin before I would my N810.

I concur. I've gotten MaemoMapper 2.+ working on my N810, and it's a better than the built-in app (of course!) but acquiring the signal is the key failure. In order for this to be a functional part of the N810, the gps has to get a better, faster signal lock. Good think this isn't a 'must-have' app for me

N810: Satellite Acquisition Times and Locks

These are only my notes and observations so far. I've been using Nokia N810 with MaemoMapper and Nokia Map *very* heavily in Loudoun County (VA), Fairfax County (VA), Arlington County (VA), and Washington, DC. Aside from acquisition times when cold and some accuracy problems in "urban canyons", my opinion of the Nokia N810's GPS is improving.

I'm really looking forward to when Nokia Map allows for their free trial license, and I will seriously consider buying a Personal License.

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In other news, I'm working on RADIUS and OpenVPN on the Nokia N800 and N810, with documentation and packages to possibly be released "soon" (within 2 weeks?).