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75.126.130.58-
Customer Reviews
Average Rating:
-
hardware works fine, software......thats another story
Pros:
compact unit, i like the car kit
i had no problem setting it up with my Palm m130
GPS was very accurate, acquiring took about 10-15 seconds, not bad at all, after that, it only acquired after losing the signal, which wasn't very often.
Cons:
the software! really awful when it comes to giving driving directions. for instance, it told me ways to go which were either impossible (like driving over water!), or using local streets when highways were more appropriate. too bad mapquest can't work with this. looking up the directions on the internet seems to be an unneccesary step, since the maps are already on the CD! highways that wind and curve were a problem, since it couldnt follow that accurately, and said 'off route'. also, a better piece of sotware would help with the refresh rate on the palm, which is ok if you dont load a big map (<100k) it's really a shame, since a better piece of software would make this useful
Rating: 
-
Poor
I ordered Navman GPS for Palm m130. I received it but the manual doesn't say anything about the compatibility with m130. I opened the item to see whether it works with my m130. It doesn't work. I am in San Jose and have put this in my car and I travel from San Jose to SFO on daily basis but this unit didn't take the signal a single day. I presume either it is not compatible with m130 or it was a faulty unit. I am a techie so I am good enough to figure out the technicalities of any product but this doesn't even seem to start. I am returning this product. The program on the Palm OS side is not easy to use. The other part which I didn't like about the product is that I have to download the map beforehand and then hunt for the place. I expect the product to be friendly enough to take the destination co-ordinates on the fly.
Rating: -
For what it is designed to do, it seems okay
I bought this attachment to my new Palm in an attempt to help out with road navigation while driving to geocaches in locales unknown to me. The software included really only gives directions from one street address to another. I can't get a) my Latitude/Longitude coordinates onto the map except manually (and then only to the minutes, not seconds) and b) the instructions to tell me how to get to a point on the map rather than an address (which I just wouldn't have). When I mounted the unit in the car, it really wasn't readable while driving due to glare and smallness of type on the map. It would work well with a navigator in the passenger seat, I suppose.
The GPS is working fine, near as I can tell, given the limited testing I've done. I need to find some other software that will be more suited to geocaching that will allow the Navman GPS attachment to interact with the Palm with point of map capabilities.
Rating: -
Bad design, bad software, bad idea
One note before I proceed with the review proper. It's tempting to think of this device as a pocket GPS, because the whole Navman-GPS combo is small enough to fit in your pocket. But it's not designed for that application: a Palm battery just doesn't have enough juice to power the combo for more than a couple of hours. You simply have to have an external source of power, such as the provided cigarette lighter adapter. This is a car GPS, and deserves to be evaluated in that context.
Unfortunately, it totally fails in that evaluation. That's because of one really nasty limitation: the device takes a long time to re-acquire its satellites. And that's assuming you have a really good view of the sky. (Which is why it comes with an attachment for mounting on a windshield.) So forget about driving around and just glancing at your Palm whenever you need to make a turn. There's no way this thing can keep with normal driving. It's actually more efficient just to pull over and consult a street map.
This gadget is so tempting because it's a fraction of the cost of other car GPS systems. I guess you can't make a device this cheap with fast satellite acquisition. But if you can't make the acquisition fast enough for the device to be useful, why make it at all?
I'd end the review here, but I also have some bones to pick with the bundled Rand McNally software. I can't believe such a prestigious map publisher would put their name on such a sloppy piece of software. The user interface is complicated and difficult to use. When you download a map or route to your PDA, you have to specify the download *twice* and it's easy to download the wrong one. Worst of all, you have to be connected to the internet to generate a new route! Forget about using the software on a laptop during a road trip. I'd think twice before buying any GPS that is bundled with this program.
Rating: 
-
No replacement for an in-car navigation system
2 stars for the hardware side, a generous 1 star for the software.
Hardware: Good=fairly compact, includes holder and car power cord which also acts as a charger for your rechargeable Palm.
Bad=slow to acquire satellite signals, sometimes 2-3 mins. despite a good view of the sky(moonroof); doesn't receive signals well from anywhere else in the car; if you don't use the car cord, will run the Palm's battery down quickly.
Software: Good=I'm still thinking... Can look up street names if you've downloaded the appropriate area to your Palm.
Bad=I'm not going to complain about the need to do trip planning on a PC(not a Mac) but it would be nice if it would let you plan your own route in addition to the take-it-or-leave-it Internet-sourced directions. The PC software has a kludgy pseudo-Windows interface that has crashed my Win98 system more than once. The Palm software also crashed my Palm m130 and forced a reset. The Palm software is slow on my Palm m130. In map view, the screen blanks out so much when redrawing (especially with large maps) that the utility of the device is limited (but this refers to maps stored on an SD card, if you can fit the map in internal memory, it's noticeably faster). This forces one to use the directions view which I could not feel in sync with. Indications for turns were not consistent enough to be trustworthy. When you go off course, you'll need map view to get back on course, the directions view is useless. Sometimes the map doesn't match the actual road, causing an "off route" message despite really being on the right road.
If you don't need a car, the unit works fine outside (until the battery runs down) with a full view of the sky.
If may be better than nothing, but reviewing a printed road atlas works faster and if you don't have a competent copilot, is less distracting.
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