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> a $20 Garmin handheld could navigate circles around it

Probably not, as it will refuse to work at both the altitude and speed of an airplane ;-)

EDIT: I stand corrected. Neither the speed nor the altitude will be a problem.

The GPS altitude limit is 18km which is 60,000ft. Normal cruising altitude is 35,000ft.

It's also trivial to obtain unrestricted GPS devices.

> Probably not, as it will refuse to work at both the altitude and speed of an airplane ;-)

Well sub in the garmin with one of the other low cost consumer units that work at those altitude and speeds then!