5 ms·

It's a pretty good point actually! Because Airplane Mode disables GPS on the iPhone.

• michaelmior 11y ago
  That's a little odd. Isn't GPS generally completely passive? That is, it should not be possible to cause any sort of interference.
  • gohnjanotis 11y ago
    I thought it was passive, too. I've googled a little in the past and some people say it's in the same chip as the cellular radios (and the whole chip gets knocked out in Airplane Mode). Others say the amplification of signals necessary could cause interference.
  • mcculley 11y ago
    A radio receiver often uses a signal of an intermediate frequency: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intermediate_frequency http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intermediate_frequency So a receiver that would appear functionally to be passive could still conceivably cause interference.
    • deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
    • michaelmior 11y ago
      Cool. Was not aware of the usage of intermediate frequencies in radio receivers. Thanks for the knowledge :)
  • icebraining 11y ago
    Phones often use A-GPS, which includes an active component: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assisted_GPS http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assisted_GPS
    • michaelmior 11y ago
      This is true, but it seems like it should not be hard to disable AGPS in airplane mode.