Description
This high quality GPS breakout from Adafruit is built around the MTK3333 chipset, a no-nonsense, high-quality GNSS module that can track up to 33 satellites on 99 channels, has an excellent high-sensitivity receiver (-165 dBm tracking!), and a built-in antenna. It can do up to 10 location updates a second for high speed, high sensitivity logging, or tracking. Power usage is incredibly low, only ~29 mA during navigation.
Best of all, Adafruit have added all the extra goodies you could ever want: an ultra-low dropout 3.3V regulator so you can power it with 3.3-5VDC in, 5V level safe inputs, ENABLE pin so you can turn off the module using any microcontroller pin or switch, a footprint for optional CR1220 coin cell to keep the RTC running and allow warm starts and a tiny bright red LED. The LED blinks at about 1Hz while it’s searching for satellites and blinks once every 15 seconds when a fix is found to conserve power. If you want to have an LED on all the time, we also provide the FIX signal out on a pin so you can put an external LED on.
Two features that really stand out about the MTK3333-based module are the external antenna functionality and the built-in data-logging capability. The module has a standard ceramic patch antenna that gives it -165 dBm sensitivity, but when you want to have a bigger antenna, you can snap on any 3V active GPS antenna via the uFL connector. The module will automatically detect the active antenna and switch over!