sat nav

Tomtom 5

It is easy, also free if you look around ;)

I use mine mostly for reading books, I'm an avid reader and my PDA always has 50 or more books on, and gets at least 1-2 hours use a day.

What kind of PDA is suitable for such use ?

That is more attractive to me than a dedicated sat nav unit that only does that.

i want the tomtom one only £280 i think maybe cheaper and it has the latest version that lets you use a full postcode i think too. they did a test of a few of them on fith gear a while back.

Yeah, probably. But Destinator 3 is pretty good and has features that are much better than TomTom 5, even though the look and feel isn't reckoned as good.

Start off with D3 and see how you get on with it, before deciding to change things. In my opinion, it is second place in the list of PDA nav software. And if a Destinator 4 version aped the style of TT5 then I think it would be easily in first place.

This and that. Nothing you would go out and buy one to do, but plenty that having bought one, you can find it can do.

Often silly things, like loading a spreadsheet of information that you can then refer to with pocket Excel. You didn't know you needed to do this, but it's nice now that you can.

Almost any, I have an ASUS, but any that run the Microsoft software will do.

Bit of a pain in the arse if you were going to use it a lot, if you make a lot of trips using it it'll be a ball-ache setting it up, then turning both the PDA and receiver off etc, I'd go for a Tomtom1. But if, like me, you usually know where you're going, the PDA is great :)

Before Christmas I went shopping in Leeds (somewhere I don't go) Tomtom took me straight to the car park I wanted, then I stuck the receiver on my shoulder under my jacket and it even took me to the 2 shops I wanted, on foot :) I'd been on the 'net and found out the postcodes, but it was the most stress-free trip to Leeds I've ever made :)

Destinator 3 is one of the better software packages to have pre- installed.

not quite as good as TomTom, but as it is bundled, don't knock it. There is much of the CarPC/Laptop navigation crowd would kill to be able to buy a working full copy of Destinator 3, instead of having to hack together a front end, then pay for an SDK, then only find that they have been still supplied with the crippled SDL dll version, not the fully operative one, then after getting the new working one they have paid for, find out that within a year, the DLL expires and they can't buy a newer one, but can't have the older one re-activated.

With bluetooth or wifi you can surf the web (you may have a USB port). You might be able to get a 3g data cellphone card to make it faster online too if you don't mind the expense.

Forget the ONE, buy a Garmin i3

Garmin I3, compact but cheap and supposedly pretty decent. Available from as low as =A3150 at various supermarkets...

--=20 Lordy.UK

got a nice tungsten pda with sat nav software for what i want :) no windows nastys (palm os) and its the michelin satnav(although have already loaded tom tom onto sd ready to install

frst impressions are a very capable bit of kit that can be used for a lot more than just a sat nav system

well impressed

omfg pda 2 derv mobiles what have i become

you sicken me :)

No no no.

"Your 'type' sicken me" was the correct response here.

HTH ;-)

Nice piece of kit and Windows Mobile / PocketPC / whatever it's called in

2006 isn't too bad these days.

TomTom is reputed to be the best, but most is capable.

Bloody stacks. See my website. :)

I opted for a Fortuna Bluetooth GPS unit and a Bluetooth-equipped PDA, originally an Acer n30 then a Tungsten T2. Charlie's T3 works with it. Most Bluetooth-enabled PDAs too, so if I break / get bored / whatever my current device, I just buy another with Bluetooth and I'm away again...

Yup, I use mine to run Textmaker (a better than Word word processor,compatible with Word), I knock out books and training manuals while I'm on the move. I also run an IR remote control application so that I can run all the devices from one unit, it's way better than a "One for All". And there's Myst and Riven for amusement. Links the address book via Bluetooth to my phone as well as giving me GPRS net access for email and web.

Loads of reasonably priced applications around.

I also have a huge, and growing, library of eBooks. Hundreds of them FoC from the Gutenberg project via sites like Blackmask and Abaci, and nowadays I've got a hundred or so paid for books from eBook publishers as well. I find it handy that I can carry around a sizeable library on a CF card.

Got the same GPS unit and use it to navigate around Europe.

I have a Dell Axim X51V looks like this.

It has the new Windows Mobile 5. If you get a PDA I wouldn't recommend anything less than WM5 since WM2003 is now showing its age.

My X51v has 624 mhz intel cpu, VGA screen 480x640 intel 2700G graphics accelerator/video decoder, and has bluetooth, wifi, usb connection options.

It also has the same audio chip as the Apple Ipod, and I use it for playing internet radio through my hifi from my wireless lan, and very nice it sounds too. Another cool thing is if you know/use skype it turns your PDA into a skype phone where everyou have decent network connection.

As for NAV I use a (legit!!) version of tom tom nav5 with the tomtom gps. I also use my phone for tomtom + which updates and routes you round heavy traffic james and stuff.

the PDA rocks, wouldnt want to be without it now :) I just need to get my hands on a 4gig SD card lol

I have a MITAC Mio 168 - has built in sat-nav. I run tomtom3 for navigation, and Fugawi for OS maps when out walking/cycling.

Other uses: I use it for watching divx movies when I'm travelling - resampled for 320*240 means they take about 70MB/hour so you can fit a fair few on a 1 gig SD card. It's SDIO compatible, so I got an SD wifi card for wirelessing about the house, and it's got Irda, so you can use it as the most universal of remotes. You can fit a shedload of ebooks on the SD card, which is a boon for weight saving when travelling.

Only things missing are CF slot and built in bluetooth, but then you can pick 'em up on ebay for £140 or so now, which makes 'em a bargain I reckon.

Bollocks.

WM2003 'showing its age'? It's an operating system, not cheese.

WM5 is fundamentally WM2003SE with two or three architectural changes; specifically the changes in memory, whereby the full SRAM of the device is used as application RAM instead of storage.

I've got an HX4700; it will get a WM5 upgrade but is utterly functional under 2003SE, including rather better (at the moment) application support - many things have yet to be updated.

I run both TomTom Nav 5 and ALK CoPilot Live on it - personally I prefer the latter in many ways, but find myself using TomTom nearly all the time.

Richard

hahahaha! I knew that would get someone - didnt think it would take so long though. I reckon it is cheese, not as cheese as WM5 though (atm).

Stay with 2003 - it works, unlike WM5.. but I like embracing modern technology especially when its broken before you have had a play with it... Having said that my PDA is fine as I speak..

To be fair, that's a significant and rather essential change to the way the OS works. Memory management under WM2003SE is utter s**te - I often get 'out of memory' issues with mine.