GPS - the end of SA

At the beginning of May 2000 the US government announced that the "scrambling" of GPS signals available to civilian users would end. This scrambling, known as 'Selective Availability' or 'SA', meant that civilian GPS units were much less precise than the military equivalents.

What difference does the ending of SA make?

Below are the plots from a Garmin 12XL hand-held GPS receiver which was set to record a position every 10 seconds and then left in the same location with a good view of the sky for several hours. The receiver didn't move, so the apparent 'track' is due to errors in the recorded position. I think the difference is pretty clear! All we need now is GPS receivers that work under the forest canopy.