Advice Please

[Commander]

First I have to say what a really useful site this is, I have learnt so much so quickly here about a subject, I knew so little about a short while ago.

For the record I don’t find the adverts distracting, I understand that a resource like this has to be funded some way. In fact I have found the adverts useful to check what is on offer, and will be buying from one of them when I make my final decision.

I am thinking of getting an IPAQ, the 2210 with TomTom Bluetooth Navigator 2 and to help with the decision making I wonder if someone could provide some answers to the following:-

1) I notice that CoPilot Live beat TomTom in the recent Pocket Pc Magazine awards, is it known on what grounds it won?, Do other PocketGPS people agree?

2) I gather that the EMTEC receiver is considered better than the TomTom, is there very much in it?

3) I am considering hardwiring the receiver into the car so the TomTom with it’s cradle seems more appropriate, but I am concerned about battery life. If the lithium ion batteries can only be charged about 500 times and the receiver is taken out of the car regularly, the battery could receive 500 “charges” in a year, or how is a charge defined? How easy and expensive would it be to replace a battery in the receiver?

4) Is there a portable battery booster/charger that could be used to charge both the IPAQ and the Bluetooth GPS (not necessarily at the same time, but with the right connectors) whilst out walking?

5) Are there any other accessories/utilities which people consider essential?

6) As the IPAQ takes both SD and CF memory cards, I wonder
A) Which card moves data fastest, is this an issue
B) Prices of cards seem to vary quite a bit with the likes of Sandisk & Lexar most expensive, do the cheaper cards run at lower speeds or something, or are all cards (of the same type, SD or CF) the same?
C) What are the Pros & Cons of each type of card?

Hope I haven’t gone OTT for a first post. All thoughts gratefully received.

Regards

Peter
UK

[lbendlin]

Peter,

1) If you are more the geeky person go for TomTom, if you just want to have a working solution, take CoPilot
2) they are pretty much on par. Slightly better battery life on the Emtac
3) This is about 500 complete discharge/charge cycles. I recon it will take you minimum 2 years to achieve that
4) yes, plenty of hardware around. Mostly 4 AA batteries daisy chained . Check Google
5) the Pocket PC holder should be good quality and secure. For the 2210 you may want to consider an external audio connector
6) a) CF is faster and cheaper
b) Don't use SD Sandisk, those are crap. Lexar Japan is good. Obviously the higher the card speed the bigger the geek factor
c) off topic


Lutz
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Lutz

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