I still haven't been able to recreate it, so I am wondering if it's something specific to the GPS you are using. IIRC, you are using a somewhat "cheap" USB GPS.
Anyway, I will take a crack at the sat/strength addition and also code in some "smarts" to prevent the map from jumping around. Should have a beta out sometime this week.
Thanks for the patience with this.
Regarding minimize, my Live Tracking dialog has a minimize button, and when I click on it, it goes into the task bar, just like many of the other dialog. Are you not seeing that?