Routeplanners: SatNav & GPS News

The X-930 is Via Michelin’s first step into the US market, and they entered over the holidays with a pretty good price online. The value end of the market is getting pretty full of brands you know and a whole bunch of brands you don’t. This unit comes from Via Michelin, yes the tyre company, that is also very much into travel help and travel guides. This philosophy of helping travelers is what’s behind the launch of GPS systems for Via Michelin.

The X-930 is small, and light: flat form factor and only 4.7 ounces, measuring only 4.8″L x 2.8″W x 0.7″D. The unit may be low priced, but it still comes equipped with the SiRF star III chipset, and a 3.5 inch touchscreen. This screen is a widescreen format, so its actual real estate is slightly different that other 3.5″ touchscreens that are in the regular format ratio. The unit has spoken turn cues (not text to speech found in higher end models), and an on board li-ion battery that is not user replaceable. It comes with maps of the continental US pre-loaded on a 1GB SD card that needs to stay in the unit. Via Michelin chose NAVTEQ maps which will make for a better experience as you can avoid the TeleAtlas upgrading that is going on for other units using TeleAtlas (Aside: The TeleAtlas map situation is in the middle of being resolved as they are rolling out much improved maps as we speak, and I believe that their map quality will be comparable to NAVTEQ in the near future.) The unit doesn’t have an MP3 player, but that is not a big concern of mine, as these players are often a nice addition but not always a great listening experience.

The Via Michelin X-930 comes with:

• The Via Michelin X-930 GPS
  Car mounting suction cup and adhesive disk to mount on dash
  Stylus
  Via Michelin DVD ROM - Includes Canadian Maps according to Via Michelin
  website.
  12V power adapter
  Mini-USB cable
  Wall charger
  Quick Start Guide

Garmin have announced two additions to their nuvi range of satellite navigation systems.

The nuvi 670 takes the best of the existing features of the nuvi range, and adds more functionality including an FM transmitter that allows you to hear navigation instructions, phone calls and music via your radio (now that this type of technology is legal in the UK).

Both the nuvi 670 and nuvi 370 come with pre-loaded detailed street maps of over 30 European countries plus the US, Canada and Puerto Rico.

The 370 features a 3.5-inch display, with the 670 sporting a larger widescreen 4.3-inch super-bright touchscreen display. The nüvi comes with 1.25GB of spare memory, enough to store a decent number of music tracks. Hands-free phone calls happen over Bluetooth with the audio output routable to your car stereo.

The nüvis come with an integrated traffic receiver that can notify drivers of traffic congestion, accidents, or delays. The Traffic Network service is free to use in the UK.  As is the norm, there are also millions of points of interest built into the device for easy reference.

The nüvi also incorporates the Garmin lock, a theft prevention system that provides added security.

Source: Tech Digest

Unlike other PDA’s offering the same functionality the LG N1 is super compact and has a horizontal screen for improved navigation and T-DMB functionality. It has a 3.5 inch display with a brightness of 340 c/d which makes it viewable even under bright sunlight. It has 192 MB of internal memory which can be further expanded via SD card slot for storing your favourite TV programs. Making the system run is Windows Mobile 5.0 OS. The N1 has a Lithium Polymer which is good for 3.5 hours of T-DMB viewing it comes complete with a 2GB SD card and GPS navigation software. The unit measures 92 x 86 x 16.5mm and weighs just 160 grams.

The LG N1 PDA is available in Korea only for 549,000 KRW (£ 290)

TomTom has admitted that it shipped TomTom GO 910 in-car GPS receivers
infected with two Trojans: Win32.Perlovga.A Trojan and TR/Drop.Small.qp.

“It has come to our attention that a small, isolated number of TomTom GO
910’s, produced between September and November 2006, may be infected with a
virus. The virus is qualified as low risk and can be removed safely with
virus scanning software. Appropriate actions have been taken to make sure
this is prevented from happening again in the future.

Affected devices
It has been confirmed that a small number of TomTom GO 910 devices,
produced between September and November 2006, and shipped with software
version 6.51, may be infected with a virus.

What to do when a virus is found
TomTom highly recommends that all TomTom GO 910 customers update their
virus scanning software, and if a virus is detected, allow the virus
scanning software to remove the “host.exe” file,  “copy.exe” file or any
other variants.”

These Trojans reside within files called host.exe and copy.exe. If you find
these on your device you can delete them - your GPS will continue to work
normally because neither of these files form part of the TomTom’s software.

You might feel happier scanning your TomTom with a virus scanner and letting
that fix any issues - hook it up to your PC and scan it as you would any
other drive. If you don’t have a virus scanner installed on your PC (you
should!), then you can use a free online scanner, such as Windows Live
Safety Center.

Garmin’s Nuvi 680 isn’t exactly a major upgrade, virtually identical in appearance and features to the company’s earlier Nuvi 660, with the notable exception of added MSN Direct support.

A review on GPS Lodge found the 680 to mostly deliver the goods, with MSN Direct features like weather information and petrol prices well-incorporated easily accessible. The MSN Direct Traffic feature, however, looks like it’ll prove to be more useful to some than others, largely dependent on the coverage in your area.

See petrol prices locally

As for the 680’s other functions, GPS Lodge found that the unit unsurprisingly performed identically to the Nuvi 660 — in other words, very well. You’ll still have to wait until March to get your hands on one, when it’ll retail for $999 (£ 499) (including a free year of MSN Direct). Until then, you’ll just have to make do with checking the weather on your coffee pot.

Source: Engadget

As you may already know, Asus make plenty of SmartPhones and PDA phones, and
today has announced the latest addition to their lineup, the P735 GPS phone.

It may not have a QWERTY keyboard, but it does support high-speed UMTS[HSDPA]. Like the P535 before it, the P735 is also designed to navigate you around less than familiar territory via its GPS functionality.

The rest of the specs are still a little murky at this point, but it’s probably safe to say that it will also boast GSM/GPRS radios, Bluetooth (although probably without stereo A2DP), and a miniSD expansion slot so that you can load up all those 3D maps. Based on the screenshots provided, we’ve got to assume that the P735 also has dual cameras: the front video telephony unit can be seen quite clearly, but the rear main camera has not been revealed.

Send your comments if you have seen one.

Source: Mobile Magazine

LG Electronics announces the LG-SB190 Satellite DMB TV phone with GPS based navigation in Korea.

The LG LG-SB190 sports a compact slider design and features a LCD screen with 170 degrees FOV, mobile XD engine, MP3 player, 1.3MP camera.