If you’re a GPS (navigation) user like me, you may agree  that even with this satellite technology, sometimes we may find difficulties in finding a specific place. I have encountered a number of situations where the information didn’t give an accurate route or at least gave me a longer way instead of the shortest distance to the destination.

Here are some guides for GPS users to avoid these scenarios and ensure you’ll be getting the correct routes:

1. Perform regular maps & POIs updates

If you’re living in a developing country, you’ll be seeing a lot of changes in the traffic flows and landmarks as it changed along with the development. If your GPS maps is not updated, you could easily misguided because the road might be different now. For instance, there’s a new expressway which is not reflects in your GPS, so it will still ask you to use the old road. Beside maps, it is also important to update the POIs or Point of Interests because you may need it one day. Imagine you’re out of gas and looking for the nearest gas station, but because you didn’t update the POIs, it gives you a farther one instead of the nearest stations as it is just newly opened a few months back.

2. GPS needs human justification too (sometimes!)

There are certain situations where your justification is required. How many times have you came across elevated highways but the GPS device keeps asking you to go straight. Problem is, which one should you take as both roads (the ground and elevated highways) are straight!. To be honest, I’m not technically good with GPS technology, but based on my observation, it couldn’t tell the difference when there are 2 parallel roads, in which one of it is elevated. So you need to have some basic idea of the destination you’re heading to or at least, look for the signboards to your destination.

3. Install an external antenna

If your GPS navigator supports an external antenna, it is best to install one to get a better satellite signals. Your GPS unit works by triangulating your distance from a number of satellites, in other words the better the signal your GPS unit gets, the better route and more accurate location it can provides. You can check with your GPS manual to see if your unit supports external antenna.

4. Use latest firmware

Firmware is just like an Operating System (OS) for a GPS unit. Manufacturers usually will release a new firmware after they have fixed certain bugs on the previous version. Regularly check you manufacturer’s website to ensure you’re using the latest firmware. To flash the unit with the latest firmware is quite easy. Just plug your GPS to your computer and follow the instruction accompanied with the installation files.

5. Create your own POIs

It will be much easier if you mark your POIs and then install it into your device. You can use software like POI Editor to create POIs for Garmin or TomTom navigation device. Google is always there to help you with the guides in case you aren’t sure how to do it.