Gavin Schrock from xyHt gave a detailed and objective review of Sokkia’s GCX3, commonly known as ‘the Bullet’ for it’s compact form factor, speed and precision.

I’ll cut straight to the punchline: this little unit performed as well as many of the high-end (and pricier) GNSS rovers I’ve tried, both as a base-rover pair and as a network rover. And I had way too much fun test driving it.

Check out the full review here

My test drive was by no means a tightly controlled scientific study. But even that minimal data has me convinced that this is a serious and viable system, one that surveyors should consider and test drive themselves (as with any gear). So, that funny looking rover really is the real deal!

It may not have been a scientific study, but Gavin certainly put the unit through its paces and was impressed with it’s performance in a range of different conditions. As he says:

In subsequent multipath tests (I hold up a sheet of metal at different distances and put the tripod up next to a truck), all performed admirably. It was only when I put the sheet up at a ridiculously close two feet that any of them started to misbehave—a testament to modern antennas and multipath mitigation. Again, it was only in the extreme that the GCX3 began to show only slightly higher outliers. I tried to break it, but that is one tough and capable little device.