I want to send information from my car to my desktop computer at home. Is there any way to transmit this information? I need a very good range as well. For example, if I am at home and say my car is at the supermarket, I want it to be able to transmit some information to my house....can this be done? Or is that range too far? I am assuming this will use the same principles of GPS, but GPS uses satelitte and what not.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

thank you
G

 

Unless the grocery is closeby your home this is probably too far to use "regular" transmission methods. For all intents and purposes, GPS is receive only -- in other words, the receivers you purchase at REI, etc. are only receivers, they have no transmit capability. Perhaps if you have an amateur radio license you can use some kind of packet radio to transmit data, but I am not familiar enough with it.

 

Would any technology from a cell phone work?

 

That was my original thought, but to do this you would need some type of cellular modem for your phone and then a modem attached to your PC. For instance, in my city, the taxi service has 2 way communication with the base stations using some type of commercial radio service. Amongst other data, each taxi transmits its GPS position so that the base office has a clue as to how much longer it is before they arrive at their destination. I have no idea what types of methods they use to communicate, but I suspect it is along the lines of one of the many motorola two way radio systems.

 

It is my understanding that laptops with cell-phone/modem are fairly common however the cost is high.

__________________
stevez

 

GSM modems are your best bet.Price is around $100-$150 and easy to work with(pop in a SIM card and you are ready to go).They send data via SMS, of course you'll need 2 and 2 GSM accounts(SIM cards)

 

I am curious of how these GSM Modems work. Do you know of a website that could tell me more information about this? Setting up an account?

thank you

 

See this....
http://www.mobiledata.com.au/SiemensM20.html

 

thank you for the reply, but that is way too expensive.

Does anybody know of anything cheaper?

thanks

 

any help would be greatly appreciated

 

Multitech has a GSM modem.

http://www.multitech.com/PRODUCTS/Fa...ocketModemGSM/
http://www.multitech.com/PRODUCTS/Fa...demModuleGPRS/

I have the developers kit for the socket modem, it cost me $250. The modem alone for the socket modem is $150. Don't remember the cost of the ModemModule.

If you get the dev kit for the socket modem, you'll get a big red circuit board, and it will connect to your computer through a serial port. It will work with the "Standard Modem" driver. If you wan't to connect to your home PC over a phone line, you'll need to get this modem set up on a GSM voice (NOT data) service. I have service through T-Mobile.

The modem operates off of a 5v source, 1.7 amp peak current draw. The data sheet says the highest input voltage on any pin is 5v, but most of the people I've talked to say that it is strange for RS-232 to be operable on a 0 to 5v swing. I have NOT verified that it will work on a 0 - 5v swing though.

That modem module is probably going to be your best bet though.

__________________
A rectangular bear is just a polar bear after a coordinate transform. -- I dunno who.
A recent study shows that research causes cancer in rats. -- I dunno who said that one either.

 

http://www.ece.msstate.edu/classes/d...TS%20board.jpg

The modem is 3.15" x 1.375" and if you go with the developers modem and you want to buy sockets for the pins on the bottom, Samtec makes them. The part numbers are SMM-110-01-S-S (quantity of 1) and SMM-104-01-S-S (quantity of 2).

__________________
A rectangular bear is just a polar bear after a coordinate transform. -- I dunno who.
A recent study shows that research causes cancer in rats. -- I dunno who said that one either.

 

hmm u can u se a cell phone to communicate if u have two. the idea is
if u have another cell phone then u can connect it to ur comps serial port and then
use it for communication. i don't know rate of a cel phone but i assume its cheaper than the modem option.
i had done this by using a nokia cell phone the 3110 series. u can get the
nokia sdk from there website and write code in visual basic to access
the commands coming sent from ur cell phone to the one coming to the
cell phone connected to ur comp
hope this was useful