Routeplanners: SatNav & GPS News

Fujitsu Siemens Computers (FSC) and NAVIGON have unveiled the co-developed Pocket LOOX N100. The light, compact, industry redefines the personal navigation device (PND) product category by offering a navigation experience with new on-the-go features and functionality.

Measuring 0.6 in. thin and weighing 3.9 oz, the Pocket LOOX N100 is powered by 5 hr rechargeable lithium-ion battery and features 2.8 in. colour screen. One-click operation is directed by MobileNavigator Premium software, which delivers touch screen capabilities, multilingual user interface, and audio-guided navigation. In addition to POI searches, map display provides lane information, speed limit warnings, road signs, and GPS auto-follow in tunnels.

It will be available in Spring 2007 for an MSRP of around £249. The Pocket LOOX is sold with a Mini SD card (up to 2 GB), car holder, car charger, AC adapter, USB cable, headphones, two face plates, and a quick reference guide.

For more information go to Fujitsu Siemens Computers

TomTom, recently announced the launch of three new accessories for the TomTom ONE and TomTom GO range.

The TomTom FM Transmitter Mount is an enhanced windshield mount designed for the GO x10 series that allows navigation instructions, music and hands-free calling to be wirelessly transmitted to car speakers over an FM radio signal. Simply dock the TomTom GO 910 or TomTom GO 510 on the new TomTom FM Transmitter Mount, tune the car radio to an unused FM frequency and select the same frequency on the TomTom GO. Turn by turn instructions and hands-free phone calls can now be heard in HiFi through the car stereo as well as up to 3,000 stored MP3 music files. Users can also hear songs on their iPod over the car speakers if the iPod is connected to their TomTom GO 910/510 device. The seamless integration between the TomTom GO and the car stereo ensures that music is paused when voice instructions are needed or hands-free calls are made.

A Gooseneck mount for the TomTom ONE is now available as an alternative to the standard TomTom ONE windshield mount. The newly designed mounting bracket can be placed on the sturdy, yet flexible gooseneck mount to give customers closer and multi-angle viewing as well as easy positioning on the windshield. The alternate mounting kit also includes an air vent clip for yet another mounting option.

Leather TomTom device cases are also now available for the TomTom ONE and TomTom GO x10 devices. The high quality leather cases offer an attractive look and finish and a strong resistance to wear and tear. The cases come with a detachable wrist strap to carry the device when walking. Subtle TomTom branding and the sleek, stylish design offer an even more attractive alternative to the standard carry case delivered in the box.

Source: TomTom

O2 has launched the Xda Orbit, the first O2 Xda with built-in GPS, along with camera, MP3 player, radio and Wi-Fi connectivity. Sat nav comes courtesy of CoPilot Live - just type in your destination on the 2.8 inch colour TFT LCD touchscreen and you’ll have the directions, whether you’re in the car or on foot. There’s complete maps of UK and Ireland pre-loaded, with turn-by-turn directions on-screen and spoken, re-routing if you stray off-course, routes that avoid the London Congestion Charge or toll roads and tracking of your journey via the net (if you want others to know where you are).

TeleNav Inc., the first company to launch a GPS navigation system on mobile devices in the U.S., announced that TeleNav GPS Navigator is now available on the recently-launched Palm® Treo�„� 680 smartphone along with the other Treo smartphones currently available from Palm in the U.S. For just $9.99 per month, TeleNav GPS Navigator offers unlimited turn-by-turn voice and on-screen driving directions, pedestrian mode for use while walking, full-color moving maps, information and directions to more than 10 million business listings including frequently updated fuel prices.

Some of the features on the TeleNav GPS Navigator:

* Biz Finder �€“ Find businesses and services, including ATMs, restaurants, hotels, parking lots, shopping malls and more. Then easily navigate to them with the click of a button. Biz Finder also allows users to quickly look up and call the phone number for a business, saving money on unnecessary 411 directory calls.
* Fuel Finder �€“ Save money by finding the lowest gas prices within a five-mile or wider radius.
* Full color moving maps �€“ See colorful maps of specific GPS locations and pan and zoom the map to view the surrounding streets.
* Easy destination entry �€“ TeleNav GPS Navigator provides four methods for address entry �€“ preplan your trips on www.telenav.com, type in your destinations directly into your phone using the keypad, dictate your destination using TeleNav�€™s unique voice recognition address input system, or choose a business from the Biz Finder.

The TeleNav GPS Navigator has all the benefits of an expensive, in-car GPS navigation system, plus a lot more. How cool that you can find restaurants, coffee shops, and hotels, get turn-by-turn driving directions by voice and onscreen, and even find the lowest gas prices near you!

AA Navigator has released its latest unit, the Vive! This one’s strictly for the European market, pre-loaded with maps of the U.K. and Ireland (including over 50,000 POIs), with a pricier option also available that’ll add a 1GB SD card filled with maps for guiding you throughout all of Western Europe.
The unit’s specs look to be respectable enough given the price, including a 3.5-inch touch screen (apparently the only form of input), Centrality Atlas II 300MHz processor, 256MB ROM and 64MB SDRAM, an SD/MMC slot that’ll accommodate cards up to 2GB, and a promised three hours of juice from the internal rechargeable lithium ion battery. The one thing that’s not clear is the type of GPS chipset in the thing, although given the near-ubiquity of the SiRFstar III, we wouldn’t bet against it. You can snag this one now direct from AA Navigator for £150 (or $280), with the aforementioned upgrade tacking an extra hundred pounds on top of that.

It comes with 6 months of speed camera alerts, and information on all six types (did you know there were so many?) of cameras in use in the UK. A subscription for 3 years then costs £100. Battery life lasts just over 3 hours, but a car charger and AC power adapter are included.

Officially titled “Fujitsu’s Pocket LOOX, Directed by NAVIGON,” the cute little Pocket LOOX N100 runs Navigon’s fancy new MobileNavigator|6 Premium, and is based on a 300MHz Samsung processor and SiRF Star III chip. The 2.8-inch QVGA screen is bright and colourful, and there’s 64MB of RAM, along with a miniSD card slot to keep things interesting.

The main functionality outside of GPS is MP3, WMA, AAC playback and a couple of games — no PMP wares to see here — but the actual GPS software is pretty slick and feature-filled. The best news is that all of this takes place in a quite portable 3.5 ounce form factor, and while the £249 pricetag is pretty hard to justify, there’s no arguing with the sexy here.

We should be seeing more of this unit at CES, with a March ‘07 launch date to follow.

Thales Magellan is bringing its latest range of SatNavs to UK shores early next year. The devices in the RoadMate 2200T series are rugged, IP-4-waterproof SatNavs that can be upgraded to provide off-road navigation as well as real-time traffic updates.

The 2200T and the 2250T measure just 12.5 x 8.5 x 2.6cm, and give voice and visual turn-by-turn instructions on the 3.5-inch touchscreen. Not only are they compatible with off-road mapping, they can also display optional marine and topographic maps.

Maps are provided by NAVTEQ, and include almost a million points of interest. The devices come with SmartDetour software to help drivers reroute around motorway traffic, as well as SayWhere directions that can read out street names.

As expected of SatNavs these days, the devices can also play music tracks and display photos.

The optional upgrades for off road exploring include maps for hiking and marine activities. The CrossoverGPS kit makes the RoadMate 2200T compatible with Mapsend Topo maps, and Navionics-based Mapsend BlueNav XL3 marine charts, both of which are sold on SD cards. The devices can display a compass screen for manual navigation, and can save base camp locations so that you don�€™t get lost in the woods.

The RoadMate 2200T series will be available at the beginning of next year for under �‚�350.

T-Mobile has announced the launch of its MDA Compact III mobile device with a built-in GPS satellite receiver, and they claim it makes dedicated sat-nav systems redundant.It comes with CoPilot Live 6 satellite navigation software (as long as you sign up to particular Flext plans), and features turn-by-turn voice instructions, street mapping and powerful route calculation, for use both in-car and on foot.

Users with web’n'walk can get free real-time traffic alerts and avoidance, delivered directly to the CoPilot via the T-Mobile GPRS network.

Thales have introduced two new satellite navigation units in its Magellan range, the 3050T and 6000T which both feature Live Traffic updates from RAC Trafficmaster.

They continue to use the Magellan NavEnging routing technology, using the Intel XScale processor. It also features SmartDetour software that routes drivers around congestion using the RAC’s Trafficmaster Telematics information.