Updates on Lightning-based iOS device compatability
Happy New Year! We have a few quick updates...
Bad Elf GPS Pro (BE-GPS-2200)
We received word from Apple earlier today that the Bad Elf GPS Pro is officially compatible (over Bluetooth) with all of the new Lightning-based iOS devices released last fall. No firmware or hardware changes were necessary, so don't worry if you purchase a GPS Pro in the old packaging -- it will work out of the box.
The new official list of supported devices is:
- iPod touch (2nd, 3rd, 4th, & 5th generations)
- iPhone 5, iPhone 4S, iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, & iPhone 3G
- iPad mini, iPad 4, iPad (3rd generation), iPad 2, iPad
Basically, every iOS device on the market today that has Bluetooth support for external accessories.
Bad Elf GPS dongle (BE-GPS-1000)
Although the Bad Elf GPS dongle with the 30-pin dock connector is not directly or officially compatible with any of the new Lightning-based iOS devices, we're happy to report that it works with ALL of them using either of Apple's Lightning-to-30pin adapters.
We've done extensive testing and the only issues we've heard about (and resolved) with customers were actually related to the known iOS 6 bug affecting external GPS receivers. As far as we know this has been fixed in the upcoming iOS 6.1 release. Please see our troubleshooting page if you have any issues.
Sorry for the delay in responding, the Bad Elf team is on the road this week. We’ve done extensive testing with Apple’s Lightning-to-30pin adapters, but it doesn’t surprise me that a 3rd party adapter doesn’t work. It’s doing some pretty complicated stuff and Apple hasn’t approved (AFAIK) any 3rd party developers to build similar products. If you can get access to a genuine Apple converter and run into any issues, please let us know!
Best regards,
Brett
I’d like to know if there was any resolution for this question. Was this Lightning adapter genuine Apple, or was it a 3rd party adapter?
I bought a third party Lightning adapter for my iPad 4, and it doesn’t work with the GPS-1000. I can charge through it, download photos, sync iTunes, but Bad Elf doesn’t work. So for the time being at least, beware of third party adapters, no matter how well they seem to work with other things.
Hi Chris,
You’re seeing a known bug in iOS that can affect external GPS receivers (not just ours). We thought this was fixed in 6.1 but apparently not. I’ve asked our support team to follow up with you via email for the workaround instructions. We’ll also follow up with Apple to see if this can be fixed once and for all.
Best regards,
Brett
I have flown twice with bad elf dongle (with 30pin to lightning adapter) on an iPad mini. The bad elf dongle works, and the bad elf app shows locking on to satellites, position, speed, heading, etc. However it will not provide a position or flight data for Foreflight. Very frustrated as I bought the iPad mini to use in the airplane with Foreflight.
Can anyone help? I am running ios6.1 and Foreflight 4.8.