The fact that my rescued cats are the first few furbabies to own a gps tracker in the Philippines satisfies me. Too egotistical, I know. But you can’t help a tech-obsessed mom to pass down her passion to her darlings, right?
So when I first heard about Trackr Bravo, I immediately placed my order online–even ordered in bulk and paid additional for personalization (yes, because I don’t like my cats carrying the same silver Trackr as everybody else). I did all that last February 2015.
TrackR is a small, coin-sized device that easily attaches to your valuable items. With the TrackR app, locate any lost or misplaced item in seconds by ringing your missing keys, using TrackR’s Distance Indicator or via Crowd GPS.
Sounds promising? I know. Having the thinnest GPS tracker with all these technologies (e.g. crowd gps, two-way separation monitoring, etc.) seems like a dream come true to pet owners with makulit kitties who loves to sneak out and come back after 24 hours.
I was so excited to have these Trackr Bravos and was looking forward to receive it after 2 months, right in time for Pepper’s birthday last May. But since the company’s a start-up, I acknowledge that there might be hiccups here and there. Needless to say, there was a delay in production for personalized units and I was given a silver Trackr Bravo for free to compensate the delay. This was last July 2015.
Better than nothing, I told myself. So I immediately attached it on Pepper’s collar to see if it works as promised.
It powers on when I press the button, check. Does it sync well and fast on my iPhone? Yes, check. It alerts my phone when Pepper is away for a certain length, check. My phone rings when I try to press the button on the Trackr to check the 2-way tracking thing, check. Looks good to me. How about its performance?
Man, this is when Trackr Bravo will drive you crazy.
In the countless times Pepper was able to run away, I never had a decent tracked location. I don’t know, maybe the Philippines doesn’t have enough GPS sites that my Trackr Bravo can’t capture a location accurately. In fact, in the two screenshots above, I was sitting in the same couch with Pepper yet it reflected a totally different tracked location. Screenshot 2 even shows Pepper is somewhere in the waters. Crazy, huh?
Aside from having poor accuracy in tracking your pet, the battery dies in just 1 to 2 days use instead of the promised 1 year. My silver Trackr Bravo’s battery was DOA–dead on arrival–that I’d have to look for its battery before I can test it out and make it work (and it wasn’t easy to look for CR1616 in this country!).
Still, I was excited to receive my order since I told myself that I have convinced myself that, maybe, my paid Trackr Bravo units would have software improvements or something. I mean, you don’t really expect much from a free unit, right?
So my order finally arrived last September 30–I swear, it was like Christmas day for me when I finally got it from the post office. I got 3 personalized Rose Gold Trackr Bravos with their waterproof casings.
Did the performance improve? No. The accuracy is still a phony. Luckily, this time the batteries were working. But I already have spare batteries that I bought from DIY Store Greenhills (Php123.75 for 5 pcs).
Do I feel I wasted my money? Not really. Since it works in other ways like (1) I can now find my phone when I have misplaced it lol; and (2) it annoys Pepper when his Trackr beeps like crazy when he is away from me. So, yes, there is still some use with my Trackr Bravo but I guess with the lack of GPS infrastructure in our country, it’s hard for these GPS devices to work in their fullest potential.
Get to know more about Trackr Bravo and get 5USD discount here.
PS, As of today, Oct 10, Trackr got in touch with me and wanted to send me an improved version to use. Now I’m excited all over again. 🙂
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