Gizmos Grabowski

Mio C310 GPS

Some readers are wondering if I've bought another GPS yet, and I finally did: the C310 from MIO, which was on sale last month at Staples (in Canada) for a jaw-dropping CDN$250 (about US$220 -- cheap!). It is exactly what I had been looking for, and is a joy to use.

The frustrations I have right now are: (1) not fully documented (like, what does the Lock soft button do?); and (2) no access to European maps from Canada, seemingly, even though Mio is European.

On the plus side, there are thriving forums for Mio users:

* ILoveMyMio
* GpsPasSion - Mio

Best of all, the unit is hackable. It takes a bit of practice, but here are the steps to get the Mio 310-series to start with its Windows CE operating system, instead of GPS/MP3 mode

1. Cradle the unit so that two fingers are over the Menu and Volume+ buttons.
2. Push a paper clip into the Reset button, and hold until the screen initializes (with some text).
3. As soon as the text appears, push the two buttons. Notice that Window CE starts, complete with desktop, taskbar, and Explorer.

This is known as the soft-hack or partial-hack. Once in Windows, you can add utility programs and skins written by users like this: (1) copy the files from the Internet onto an SD memory card, (2) insert the card in the Mio, and then (3) use Windows CE to copy the files into the appropriate folders on the Mio's internal memory.

No Bluetooth

For a while, I had considered a display-less GPS unit that would communicate with my PalmPilot through Bluetooth. But the more I thought about it, the less sense it made to me. Here's why:

1. The display-less GPS units are about $150 -- cheaper than the Mio. That's good.
2. But they don't include the map CDs -- that increases the price. That's bad.
3. I increasingly dislike the concept of multi-function devices, so I didn't fancy the thought of my PalmPilot having to do double- or triple-duty: PDA and MP3 and GPS.
4. I was uneasy over how well the mapping software and the Bluetooth GPS would work with my PalmPilot -- I didn't want to spend several hundred dollars experimenting, especially when I have two other GPS devices with serial connectors (they work with notebook computers).

Heh, speaking of double-duty, a friend replaced his Palm LifeDrive with Compaq's newest iPaq, the one that sports built-in GPS. (I gotta say, that rx5915's got one ugly design.) But the friend already has his first headache: he updated the iPaq software, and now the GPS no longer works. Oops.

TX - GPS Update 3

Thursday is the most exciting day of the week in our household, for that's the day the local paper arrives stuffed fat with weekly fliers from technology stores. This week I got particularly excited, for one of them seemed to contain a solution to my TX-GPS dilemma. But 'twas not to be.

The flier from The Source (the Canadian version of the old Radio Shack rebranded by Circuit City) listed Microsoft's Streets & Trips 06 (CDN$160) with the following description: Trip planning software and a GPS receiver plugs into pocket PC or Palm Pilot.

Wow! I thought. That was the cheapest GPS/software bundle I'd seen to date, $100 cheaper than a bluetooth GPS/TomTom software bundle from another source.

But 'twas not to be. The Source's caption writers got it wrong: the software works just with PocketPCs -- not PalmPilots -- according to the Microsoft Web page. The Source's Web page makes no mentions of PDAs at all: " Just plug into your laptop and go."

I don't think tha the GPS hardware plugs into the PocketPCs, let along PalmPilots, because (1) the GPS devices uses a USB plug, not BlueTooth; and (2) there is no direct mention at the Microsoft Web site of the hardware working with PocketPCs -- just this statement that a version of the software runs on PocketPCs:

Load Microsoft Pocket Streets (included with Streets & Trips) on your Pocket PC and you'll have your Streets & Trips maps close at hand when you’re lost on the street or looking for a place to eat.

I wonder if it would be worth a chuckle to go to the local The Source outlet and get the staff to show my how the GPS plugs into my Palm TX.

TX - GPS Update 2

I will probably get a Bluetooth GPS receiver before my next business trip. They're cheap; it's the mapping software that's twice as expensive.

With that in mind, I've found a "free" mapping package for portable devices (cell phones, Palms, etc). Earthcomber.com is like Avantgo, but provides location-based information.

You can download maps of counties, such as Whatcom (Sumas, Bellingham) or King (Seattle). The maps are somewhat crude in detail, especially when zoomed out. They don't take advantage of my Palm TX's high resolution. And they're not that useful for us non-USA residents, because the maps and info are limited to the USA.

But it is free. And I do make business trips to the USA.

(Go to the Earthcomber Web site, register, make an initial selection of county maps, download the software, synch-install on your Palm, and then try it out.)

Without a GPS, you can show on the map where you are, and then Earthcomber gets you information about local features from its built-in database -- things like the nearest electronics store or gas station. If you have wireless access, it can download a text-based route description between two points that you pick.

With a GPS attached to your Palm, Earthcomber will show where you are on the map.

TX - GPS Update 1

I had emailed three GPS vendors for help with my problems. After nearly a week, I've had no response from Nextar, so it's just as well I returned their GPS unit.

Over the weekend, I asked DeLorme: I have an Earthmate GPS. I am wondering if you have a way of connecting it to the Palm TX -- either through an adapter cable or via BlueTooth. Allen replied:

"Unfortunately not since it is designed to be used with a lap-top. Our Bluelogger receiver (link enclosed) will offer you a solution."

Well, that answer wasn't quite accurate, as I explained when I wrote back: I purchased the Earthmate GPS several years ago, because it worked with the Palm III. The package included an adapter cable for the Palm III, as well as Solus Pro software that ran GPS and mapping software on the Palm. The connector on the new Palm TX differs from the old Palm III, and I am wondering if you have the new adapter cable and/or software that supports the TX.

Allen replied immediately, "Unfortunately we no longer sell cables for this unit to adapt to a PDA. We no[w] only have a Bluetooth solution."

The advantage to Bluetooth is that it eliminates data cables and the need to purchase all kinds of adapter cables to handle differing connector types. (It still needs a power source, either through cables or batteries.) Heck, even the USB "standard" has six different connectors: rectangular, square, mini, and then male and female versions of each. The drawback is that Bluetooth makes non-Bluetooth devices obsolete, even those that still work perfectly well -- except for the lack of an adapter cable.

BTW, the DeLorme Earthmate uses a proprietary data stream, so you need to either purchase DeLorme-supported software and maps, or else purchase Yet Another Adapter that translate DeLorme-ese into standard GPS data coding.

I continue to hope to also hear from Garmin.

GPSing a Palm TX

Last week I bought -- and then returned -- a GPS from Canadian Tire. (Details here.)

For the same money, I bought a Palm TX from FutureShop. It was "on sale" because it was bundled with the keyboard (a CDN$99 value). I also got a 133x 2GB SD memory card for the TX, on sale for CDN$60.

I already have two GPS receivers, and so I'm thinking I should be able to connect either one to the TX, and then add mapping software that runs on the Palm (which seems to be limited to TomTom's expensive set of CDs for Canada and USA).

The one GPS I have is made by Garmin, the other by DeLorme. I've emailed both companies to see if they have serial-Palm TX adapters. Will they bother answering?

The alternative is to take advantage of the TX's Bluetooth capabilities. (My son and I tested it by writing an SMS message on the TX, Bluetoothing it to my son's cell phone, which then text-msg'ed it on to my daughter's cell phone.)

Right now, it seems to me that I have two solutions:

Sol'n 1: Get a serial-to-Bluetooth adapter. But those are expensive! They are priced in the range of US$80 - $160. Plus they need their own source of power, so another set of batteries is needed.
Sol'n 2: Get a Bluetooth GPS receiver, which is roughly the same price, is as little as CDN$128. But this seems a waste, considering I already have two GPS receivers and the serial cables for both.

There is a third solution. Somewhere I have a serial-Palm adapter cable, which I've been hunting down but not yet found. It connects the DeLorme GPS to my Palm III (I think) or maybe my Palm 1000 -- I still have both units n working order.

Review: Nextar P7 GPS

I own three GPS units. All of them are annoying.

The first was Delorme's Earthmate designed for use with PalmPilots. I thought the concept was brilliant; the execution was so flawed as to be fatal. When I first installed the GPS software on my Palm, Delorme also installed a huge map file that locked up the Palm and it took me three days to get it working again. The second fatal flaw was the connector: it did not lock onto the Palm, and so easily broke free; that meant losing all the collected data and restarting the GPS.

The second I acquired as the result of a corporate gift. The primary flaw of the Garmin eTrex is that it does not display maps. So, it can show where you've gone but not tell you where you are. I did buy the cable to hook it up to my notebook computer, but running that in a car is just too cumbersome.

The third I bought yesterday is the Nextar MN2707. (Or maybe P7. The sticker says MN2707, the firmware states P7; both models are displayed at the Nextar Web site. I'll call it the P7, since that's fewer characters to type.)

It has these benefits:

+ Large, 7-inch color LCD touchscreen with nighttime mode (dimmer reversed colors).
+ 40GB drive that acts as an external computer drive (20GB available for you).
+ Two USB2 connectors, mini and regular size.
+ MP3 playback that works at the same time as the navigation system.
+ Locking power plug (ie, it's hard to unplug the power from the unit, which is a good thing).
+ Hardware on/off switch, so it turns on when the car is turned on.
+ Zoom the map using on-screen soft buttons or the control wheel; pan the map by dragging your finger across the screen or pressing the arrow buttons.
+ The interface is easy enough that you can figure out most of it without the instruction booklet.
+ Includes detailed mapping for Canada and simple mapping for USA (on units sold in Canada).
+ Includes power supply, car adapter, USB cables, audio cable, and suction cup attachment.
+ Cheap at CDN$400 (currently on sale at Canadian Tire; regular CDN$500) -- equivalent to about US$350; list price is US$600.

Other tech specs: runs Linux on a Samsung 200 MHz CPU with 64MB SDRAM.

After some mulling, I decided to get it. For these reasons: it's my birthday; it's an external hard drive + MP3 player + okay navigation system + big touch screen.

Drawbacks

But it has plenty of drawbacks that might give you pause:

- The P7 is heavy and has no battery, so you cannot use it for walking about. A battery would be nice for keeping the unit alive when the car is off; keeping it on when moving between house and car; and using it as a portable MP3 player (along with external speakers).
- It takes about a minute to start up. This means you need to keep the car idling for that amount of time if you need to know your current position. It takes another minute or so to lock into a 3D signal. In contrast, the Garmin eTrex starts in under 10 seconds, and is locked into a 3D signal in another 20 seconds.
- Once started, a woman's voice keeps repeating "Acquiring GPS Signal" even though lots of satellites are already being tracked.
- It forgets the volume setting. I set it to mute, tap Save Setting, but the next time the P7 is turned on, the volume is up again.
- You have to pay US$50 for the CD with detailed USA maps. Maps of other countries not available.
- It does 3D satellite tracking, but does not report the altitude.
- it comes with the printed manual for another product, although the feature set seems similar.
- The 7-inch screen is a touch screen with soft buttons (buttons displayed on the screen). Problem is that the soft buttons disappear after a while; touching the screen brings them back, but also pans the map out of position.

Map

The map displays only streets and their names. Major roads are shown by another color. NOTHING ELSE. The map fails to display landmarks that would be useful while driving, such as:
- No rivers, shorelines, or railroad tracks.
- No tunnels, bridges, or over/under-passes.
- No major points of interest, such as hospitals and airports.
- No borders; no names of cities or states/provinces.

The unit claims to have two million points of interest, such as gas stations and hotels. However, they are listed in alphabetical order, instead of distance order -- I'd want to know where the nearest gas station is, not that there is an Arco station on Aberdeen Avenue.

Testing the Routing Software

I ran a test that mapping software usually fails. I ask it to map the route from my current residence to the town of my birth (in northern Canada). All mapping software usually makes the mistake of telling me to take the ferry along the coast, because distance-wise that is the shortest.

But cost-wise, it is the most expensive route, and time-wise takes the longest. Mapping software fails on this test because they usually assign a time of 0 hours and 0 minutes for the ferry trip, even though the trip takes about 12 hours and requires additional time for getting on and off the ferry (allow an extra 2 hours for that).

The Nextar P7 fails this test. Worse yet, it does not allow me to adjust the route to force it to use just roads.

Another failing is that the P7 does not allow me to peruse the proposed route. When I try to pan along the route, the P7 forces the screen to jump back to the current position.

The second test is from my residence to the international airport. There is no good route in real-life, so I am interested in technology that can tell me the shortest route, time-wise. I know it takes 1hr 15min (or so). In the P7, you would take these steps:

1. Press Find button.
2. Tap "Search POI [point of interest] by Name".
3. Tap "Transporation" or "All POI".
4. Use the on-screen keyboard to type the city. As you enter characters, the P7 anticipates which city it might be, a good feature that reduces the amount of typing.
5. Tap OK
6. Type in "AIRPORT." After mulling its database, the P7 says none exists.
I tried the airport code, such as YVR, and that worked.

You can then tap Drive To (calculates route), Zoom To (displays location on screen) or Save To (save to a named list of destinations). The result depends on the option selected:

Shortest [route by distance] - 46.9 miles and 2hr 5 min.
Mostly Highways - 52.0 miles and 2hrs 19 min.
Least Amount of Turns - 47.0 miles and 2 hr 6 min.

Since I cannot peruse the route (without the screen always jumping back to where I am now), I don't know which route the P7 plans to take me along. The workaround is to zoom out far enough to see the entire route on the screen, but then the P7 doesn't display sufficient detail for me to figure out the exact route out of the myriad of possibilities.

I suspect it does not adjust for highway speeds, because it seems to use 36km/hr (22 mph) for all roads, including 70mph (120kph) freeways. That means that its time estimates are useless.

GPS Data

Related to lack of altitude reporting (3D data), the unit provides only some of the data that can be gleaned from GPS data, just this:
- current time.
- speed.
- North direction (top of screen).
- The GPS Status screen shows latitude, longitude, satellite positions, and signal strengths.

It does not report:
- margin of error
- maximum speed
- average speed
- trip odometer
- duration of trip
- sunset and sunrise
- bearing and heading angles.

Of these, I'd really like to know the error, usually around 15-50 feet for most GPS units.

MP3

The MP3 player uses simple folder management, which is the system I prefer. You segregate songs in folders, and then play the entire folder or a single song file. The unit makes reference to "playlists" but that's just its term for folders.

The unit has a built-in speaker and audio out plug. The speaker is tinny, okay for spoken instructions, but no good for music, so you'll want to plug it into a FM broadcast module to play over your car's audio system. You can also hook it up to headphones or to your home music system to playback MP3 music.

There are no other music controls, other than volume. No tone controls, no random play, skip to next track. One workaround is to tap the touch screen and select the next song to play from the list displayed (it shows 7 tracks at a time).

Hard Drive

When connected to your computer with a USB cable, the P7 cannot act as a GPS device nor playback music; it becomes an external drive that can be accessed through Windows Explorer and all Windows software programs. I am guessing it would work with Linux and Mac, but haven't tested that.

Of the 40GB hard drive, 20GB is available for your own files. The other 20GB would be used for the Linux operating system and map files. Because the P7 acts as an external hard drive, you can store any files on there for backup purposes.

With such a large screen, it would be a natural for showing slideshows and movies, but no such luck.

Update

After a few days, I returned the unit for these reasons: the size and weight, the low level of GIS data, and the difficulty of controlling/previewing the route.