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GPS PDAs

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The only meaningful way to test GPS software is to use it in a car, on real roads. And that’s exactly what we do, clocking up a few hundred miles along the way. Our test route includes a starting point, several waypoints (stops along the route) and a destination specifically chosen to comprise a good mix of densely packed urban streets, suburban roads, busy motorways and hard-to-find country lanes, with many alternative routes for the software to choose from to get us there.

In every journey, we deliberately take some wrong turns (always at the same point) to see how quickly the software recalculates a route. Voice instructions are arguably the most crucial aspect – if these are clear and precise, there’s less of a need to take your eyes off the road and look at the screen for guidance. The onscreen display is still important, though, and we evaluate each application for map accuracy and how well journey information is conveyed. We also look at how easy it is to change settings using a finger, since it’s much more convenient than getting out the stylus. Lastly, we grapple with the in-car mounting systems to find out which ones are a breeze to use, and which are a nightmare.

Back in the Labs, we press every button, select every option and change every setting, to find out exactly what the systems are capable of and how responsive they are. We enter a variety of addresses, using different search methods, to check how easily and accurately the software finds the location we’re looking for.

We also assess the collection of POIs (points of interest), which identify places such as restaurants, hotels, airports and petrol stations. Plus, we check for any absent categories, such as cash machines or railway stations.
Then we turn our attention to the PDAs themselves. Screen quality is of particular importance – not just the brightness from the backlight, but also the clarity outside in bright sunlight. This isn’t only important if you use GPS on foot, but it can help in-car readability on sunny days too, especially when sun is shining on the screen.

Ratings
At the end of each review, you’ll see four ratings: GPS, PDA, Value for Money and Overall. As ever, we don’t simply pluck these figures out of the air: they’re calculated using a mixture of objective scores and subjective quality ratings.

The GPS score is a combination of the features of each software package, its accuracy when out on the road and ease of use. The rating also includes the responsiveness of the GPS receiver and the quality of the car mounting kit.

Although the GPS function is our primary concern, it’s also crucial that it’s backed by a high-quality PDA that will perform many other tasks. The PDA score takes into account a variety of aspects including the amount of memory, wireless technologies, expansion potential, battery life, size and weight, plus other aspects that can’t be measured objectively such as the quality of the screen.

Value for Money uses a weighted combination of the first two scores, with GPS receiving 60% and PDA 40%. We factor in the price (including delivery) for a bang-per-buck result.

Finally, the Overall score is a straight average of the other three ratings.

Products in this Lab

Rating

Dell Axim X51v Bluetooth GPS

Palm T|X

Asus MyPal A636

i-mate PDA-N + CoPilot 6

Navman PiN 570

Click a product name to see the full review

Winner
A product with no equal at the time.

Recommended
This should be on your shortlist.

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Lab winners

PDA/Phone

Iomega StorCenter 1TB

Thecus YES Box N2100

Buffalo TeraStation Pro TS-1.6TGL/R5

Nexsan SATABeast

Infrant Technologies ReadyNAS NV 2TB

GPS PDAs

Palm T|X

Lenovo ThinkPad X60

Lexmark C522n