Precise (±2cm) Indoor Positioning and Navigation

Yes, of course!

Here are a few demos:

– Precise (±2 cm) indoor tracking in XYZ without GPS/GLONASS

– Precise (±2 cm) drone tracking outdoor without GPS/GLONASS – horizontal flight on two echelons

– Demo: precise height tracking

The main requirement for the 3D tracking is a direct line of sight/hearing between the mobile beacon and 3 or more stationary beacons within 30 meters.

Yes, it can be done easily:

– Send us an email at info@marvelmind.com

– Describe your needs and requirements. If you have selected your products or sets – the links and the quantities

– Share your contact name, company name (if any), contact phone number and other details that you wish we mention, for example, VAT number, etc.

– We issue the invoice on the same day

– You pay via bank transfer (in USD, EUR or GBP)

– We wait for the payment to arrive (1-2 days usually) and ship

We have three main architectures:

1) Inverse Architecture (IA)

2) Non-Inverse Architecture (NIA)

3) Multi-Frequency MF NIA

1) IA is most of all suitable when you have multiple (~ >5 mobile objects) and when the location update rate is important. Also, IA should be your choice when you want to have mobile beacons noiseless, because regular ultrasonic transmitting beacons “tick”. You cannot hear the ultrasonic, but you can hear a quiet tick. Typical demos:

– Precise tracking of 90 swarming robots in real time

– Tracking four warehouse workers

2) NIA is designed when you have noisy mobile objects, but a few of them, for example, 1-2 inspection drones in a warehouse. Another great benefit of NIA is that it is very simple to deploy – significantly simpler than IA, particularly, for larger maps consisting of many submaps. Thus, if you are just starting with Marvelmind, you may choose NIA at the beginning, but it totally depends on your use case. For small maps of 1-3 submaps IA and NIA are equally simple. Typical demos:

– Precise (±2 cm) indoor tracking in XYZ without GPS/GLONASS

– Precise (±2 cm) Indoor Navigation in noisy environment

3) MF NIA combines the best from IA and NIA. You can have up to 5 times higher update rate for noisy objects than in NIA. Typical demo:

– Precise (±2cm) tracking for R/C racing boats

Find out more about the architectures in the Architectures Comparison.

We have 2 HW variants for some products:

1) 915/868MHz

2) 433MHz

Please, always check your local regulator as the best source of information. Ask about license-free bands or ISM bands or SRD bands.

We have significantly more products in the 915/868MHz variant than in the 433MHz band. For example, Mini-RX, Super-Beacons, Industrial beacons/modem and their derivatives (Helmets, Jackets, etc.) are currently available in 915/868MHz only. So, if you can choose between 915/868MHz and 433MHz, we recommend to choose 915/868MHz.

Notice, that 433MHz or 868MHz or 915MHz is a band name – not a frequency. For example, Marvelmind HW supporting 915/868MHz band supports frequencies ~860-930MHz. It means, for example, that for Japan we recommend the 915/868MHz HW, but the real frequencies that will be used are 920.5-923.5MHz.

Some seed links for self-study:

– License-free ISM band 915 MHz for the US and countries in Region 2 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITU_Region)

– License-free SRD 868 MHz band for the EU and other countries (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short-range_device#SRD860)

Recommendations for some countries based on our knowledge:

– Australia: 915MHz (SRD) or 433MHz (ISM)

– Brazil and South America: 915MHz

– Canada: 915MHz (ISM)

– China Mainland: 433MHz

– EU: 868MHz (SRD) or 433MHz (ISM)

– India: 868MHz

– Indonesia: 915MHz

– Japan: 915MHz

– Korea: 915MHz

– Russia: 868MHz (SRD) or 433MHz (ISM)

– Singapore: 915MHz

– Taiwan: 915MHz

– Turkey: 868MHz (SRD) or 433MHz (ISM)

– UAE: 868MHz (SRD) or 433MHz (ISM)

– UK: 868MHz (SRD) or 433MHz (ISM)

– US: 915MHz (ISM)

– Vietnam: 915MHz

Yes, the Paired Beacon feature is supported in both IA and NIA:

– IA: https://youtu.be/qxtj7zStqwU

– NIA: https://youtu.be/aBWUALT3WTQ?t=89

In general, we strongly recommend against using magnetometers indoors. There are nearly always magnetic materials (iron, alloys) or wires with current that would heavily distort the Earth magnetic field and ruin the magnetometer readings.

Yes, the Paired Beacon feature is supported in both IA and NIA:

– IA: https://youtu.be/qxtj7zStqwU

– NIA: https://youtu.be/aBWUALT3WTQ?t=89

In general, we strongly recommend against using magnetometers indoors. There are nearly always magnetic materials (iron, alloys) or wires with current that would heavily distort the Earth magnetic field and ruin the magnetometer readings.

Yes, it is possible by using using the Real-Time Player (RTP) with more filtering. You can quite easily get sub-cm. However, the latency will increase as well. For example, instead of regular latency of 1/8 sec for the 8Hz update rate, you shall expect 5-16 x 1/8 sec ~1-2 sec latency, which depends on the level of filtering selected in the RTP. Demo:

– Measuring iPhone by Marvelmind Indoor “GPS”. Who else can do so?! 🙂
– Precisely tracking 60 mobile robots: settings, hints and advises

Yes, please see Downloads page.

Yes, please see Downloads page.

Yes, we support all three. Please see Downloads page.

For more information, check the Drones page.

Yes, you can easily use your own GUI and integrate Marvelmind Indoor “GPS” into your system. We have API for both Windows and Linux. Download them here.

First of all, it is important to distinguish between the distance limitations due to ultrasonic and the distance limitations due to radio.

Using submaps of up to 30m each, the maps can be up to 1km (500m in each direction from the modem) with full-size antennas and open space with little or no radio interference.

Beacons measure distances using ultrasonic pulses. Thus, ultrasonic line of hearing/line of sight is a must inside a submap. Between submaps – not necessarily. It depends on the map. The regular recommended maximum distance between beacons on one submap is up to 30m. But you can have multiple submaps and to build large maps of a few hundred meters in length.

With Marvelmind Horn in 1D it is possible to have up to 120m maximum ultrasonic distance on one submap – it is a great option for tunnels or surveying, for example.

The modem communicates with beacons using radio in a license-free band (433MHz or 868MHz or 915MHz, depending on your beacon’s/modem’s HW). Line of sight is not required for radio communication. The maximum distance depends mostly on the antennas:

– For embedded antennas – ~50-100m

– For the default 50mm antennas – 100m+

– For the full-size antenna – up to 400m+

All in open space.

The maximum distance in radio through walls completely depends on the type of the walls and can be significantly shorter than the figures above. For example, it may be rather difficult to cover even several floors. But walls on the same floor can be less of a problem, because, they are often thin and radio transparent, particularly in the office environment. Much less so in industrial or warehouse environments.

Yes, nearly all Marvelmind beacons have IMU onboard. Only Beacons HW v4.9 are without IMU. Beacons HW v4.9 are mostly used as stationary beacons in NIA and don’t need IMU.

No, of course, it doesn’t rely on real GPS, because GPS doesn’t work indoor, because there is no visibility to the satellites, and because real GPS gives usually 5-10 m accuracy while our Indoor “GPS” gives ±2cm.

However, Marvelmind Indoor “GPS” or Marvelmind Indoor Positioning System or Marvelmind RTLS – whatever name you prefer – is very much like GPS for the end-users and this why:

– The system streams out location data in NMEA0183 – native GPS format. So, you just need to physically connect to your robot, drone or the system that is GPS-enabled and that has external GPS input and your robot/drone/system is already integrated with Marvelmind Indoor “GPS”. That is it. Everything is done. Your robot will believe that it is GPS connected, but to a marvelous GPS that works indoor and gives ±2cm precision instead of usual 5-10m

– Like GPS, the system requires line of sight of your mobile beacon (“the GPS terminal”) to the stationary beacons (“the GPS satellites”). The GPS needs at least 4 satellites. We ask 1 stationary for 1D tracking; 2 stationary beacons for 2D tracking; 3 stationary beacons for 3D tracking. And we always recommend redundancy for more resilience against obstructions – N+1 or 2N configurations of stationary beacons.