Portable Gps Navigation Units

[XtRmn8]

Never really looked into the portable GPS units out there such as Tomtom, etc.

I got a few questions for those of you who use them and know the ins and outs.

We are going to Europe in a few months and I am leasing a car over there for 40 days and will do around 8000km of driving all up. I was going to lease a car with GPS but by the time you pay extra fr the GPS system and then the maps etc it is not cheap. So I may as well bu a portale GPS unit here and take it with me.

I been doing some fishing around on the net and there are a lot of maps you can get for Europe etc. Are these maps specific to the brand of GPS unit? or can they be loaded onto any brand unit?

For example are these units any good? Click here

Would I be able to get maps for them? will the accept Tomtom maps??

Cheers

[Guest newl]

From what I can gather from the limited research I did last weekend was that you can purchase other map sets for the TomTom units either from their site or by using their software on your PC which is used to interface to the unit.

I've not heard of the manufacturer of the model that you've linked to and am not fully convinced of the portability of map data between units.

[Lord Cyric]

Maps are specific to the GPS software... ie. TomTom maps only work with TomTom software.

I've played with TomTom and Navman, but not the Mio units. My experience is that your decision will come down to "do you like the interface" since most of the map data for each country comes from only one or two sources (eg. in Oz it all comes from Sensis). Most units are quite mature these days with automatic re-routing and a wide selection of POI files to choose from.

FYI - I use TomTom v6 on my HP iPAQ rw6828, while my Dad just bought a TomTom Go710.

Enjoy your European vacation... I'm sure you'll find lots of twisty roads to go nuts on. I certainly did when I was in France last December...

[ZAP]

You may be better to just get a car with GPS built in as portable units are a huge theft target.

Theives even look for the round ring mark or mounting bracket and then just do a smash and grab.

I have a Garmin Street pilot C320 for interstate trips and it is a great unit, but I am always cautious of where I park and also ensure it is all in the glovebox.

If you decide to get a portable unit, I advise you to get one with a bluetooth interface as it can double as a mobile phone carkit.

[XtRmn8]

Maps are specific to the GPS software... ie. TomTom maps only work with TomTom software.

I've played with TomTom and Navman, but not the Mio units. My experience is that your decision will come down to "do you like the interface" since most of the map data for each country comes from only one or two sources (eg. in Oz it all comes from Sensis). Most units are quite mature these days with automatic re-routing and a wide selection of POI files to choose from.

FYI - I use TomTom v6 on my HP iPAQ rw6828, while my Dad just bought a TomTom Go710.

Enjoy your European vacation... I'm sure you'll find lots of twisty roads to go nuts on. I certainly did when I was in France last December...

You say you loaded TomTom v6 on you PDA. I assume this is just an application that runs on Windows Mobile? I would not be able to load this on say a Mio GPS unit?

Yea I am looking forward to the trip, but not sure about going nuts as I will have a whole 1600cc of Turbo Diesel power to play with haha. Getting a Citroen C4 diesel for the trip.

ZAP_F6: I can see you point about theft, but I guess it comes down to us an making sure not leave the car with valuable all over the place. It will cost me $800 to get a car with GPS and get maps for all of Europe, thought for that money might as well but one to keep. I also like the idea that they double up as a little media unit and can play video, vie pictures and play music etc.

[K-FleX]

If you get a TomTom go910 from Europe or the US they have the maps for both the US and Europe installed. The aussie go910 only contain Aussie maps. However, I saw the tomtom Aussie maps go for $80 on eBay last week. The 910 has a 20 gig hard drive so there is plenty of room for more maps. So maybe your best bet is to either buy one while you are there or get one off eBay from Europe.

[Flukey]

I have the same GPS as Zap and find its a great unit. You can get any maps for Europe, NA etc but agree you need to be careful not to leave them on display when away from the car.