I'm very excited about this. GPS was the final piece of the puzzle.

I love(d) my bangle.js. Such a true hacker device. Really fun to use WebUSB and push JavaScript files as apps.

But the GPS on that device was a mess, honestly. I know this is a complicated problem but having to synchronize to satellites and recalibrate all the time was beyond me.

I really wanted it to work because I built my own toy run tracker visualization tool.

I am curious about this new lilygo device because it sounds like it has an alternative location sensor: "A u-blox MIA-M10Q GNSS module provides accurate location tracking..."

I'll need to look that up. Anyone have a summary on what's the difference between that and regular GPS?

Oh nice, didn't realize they were doing a second one. Loved the original but I took mine rock climbing and cracked it :(

The underlying Garmin platform is so old that it predates iPhone/Android. I think you can plug in many Garmins via USB without any special software and simply copy activities and data off the watch.

They had a segment of customers who wouldn't have or be allowed to connect a phone - triathletes, long-distance hikers, military. But it's been slowly changing as users want more modern features and the company wants to increase sales.

not sure if this will help you but there is a neat website that allows you to build free maps for older Garmin models that didn't have them at first like Fenix5

https://garmin.bbbike.org/

1990s is going way back though, they didn't even have mass-storage mode then, it was their proprietary "garmin mode" for usb which only things like BaseCamp can talk to