A Medion rival for TomTom Go?

walpurgis · Occasional Visitor Joined: May 09, 2004 Posts: 32

From next Monday (11th), the German supermarket chain Real will be selling a new dedicated navigation system from Medion for 399 euros (just over £270). Like TomTom's Go, it appears to be based on the PocketPC operating system and uses a 300MHz Xscale processor with 320MB of memory. It comes with German maps ready installed and is supplied with maps for Western Europe, covering 5 million km and including 750,000 POIs.

The screen is in a landscape format. A GPS receiver appears to be built into the case. It is not clear from the image on the Real site whether it uses Navigon software as previous Medion GPS systems have done.

It will be interesting to see whether Aldi, Halfords and Tchibo which have sold previous Medion GPS products in the UK, will offer the new device.

To see an image of the new system visit the Real site www.real.de, and click on Angebote Vorschau on the left. (This will obviously only work while the offer is current.)

lbendlin · Posted: Tue Oct 05, 2004 2:09 pm Post subject:

The display looks like Destinator to me. ...Anyone else?
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StevenGourlay · Posted: Thu Oct 07, 2004 3:38 pm Post subject:

Looks like it could be destinator, does not look to hot, think the Navman will be a good seller for the Xmas period.
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Darren · Posted: Thu Oct 07, 2004 4:10 pm Post subject:

I quite like it! The hardware is almost certainly the same as Navman are using for their 510 i.e. The Mitac Digiwalker 136.

Compare

With

You can clearly see that the earphone port and jog dial on the right hand side are in the same position as are the speaker grille and other front panel buttons and power LED on the left.

Aside from obvious styling changes to the case and the use of a fixed antenna rather than the flip up one on the 510 it is very similar.

Much the same as the Mitac Mio 168 has appeared in different guises I think we can expect to see this unit branded by various companies. The big diffrence here is that this unit is a dediceted solution and you cannot change the software that is installed (at least not yet!) so the important buying decision here is the quality of that software.

I would prefer this form factor to the GO personally but I can't see TomTom launching a variant as it would be in direct competition. CoPilot might be one to look out for though!
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StevenGourlay · Posted: Thu Oct 07, 2004 4:18 pm Post subject:

You are right there about the shape, did not realise how similar until the two where together, Doh

The form factor of the Go is like a small tv, bit heavy and 2 wide for me I would prefer something more slim lined like the Navman above. But the Tom Tom Go really is the easiest GPS system to setup for customers that just want pure SatNav with no configuration of external devices.

Everyone seems to want to get into the Standalone GPS market, can only be a good thing, better SW/HW, cheaper prices and a wider choice for customers.
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walpurgis · Occasional Visitor Joined: May 09, 2004 Posts: 32

The German Web site PocketNavigation.de has set up a forum for the new Medion device, with more photographs and comments from initial users.

http://tinyurl.com/4k7y2

It appears (via the Google translator) that the system uses Destinator 3 software and Teleatlas data from the first quarter of 2004. There is 236MB of data for Germany, 222MB for France and 149MB for the UK and Ireland, plus several other countries.

The device (Medion model number MD95023) has an 8.8cm x 6cm display and comes with a gooseneck car mount, and a clamp for bicycle or motorbike mounting (seems like a good idea). It has a denim-like protective case. The battery cannot be replaced but appears to have a life of at least four hours.

One user compared the performance with a TomTom Go and found their navigation was similar, but the TTG instructions were slighly louder/clearer. GPS sensitivity is said to be good with one user reporting good reception indoors.

Dave · Posted: Sat Oct 09, 2004 1:53 pm Post subject:

The Medion is a re-tooled Mitac 136 with a Quadrifilar helix antenna in place of a flip-up patch antenna.

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