01-05-2005, 08:00 PM
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Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 15,171
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Garmin Announces GPS-Enabled Pocket PC
"The iQue M5 is perfect for today�s mobile professional who wants to get from the boardroom to the hotel without asking for directions. Featuring the latest Microsoft� Pocket PC software, Windows Mobile� 2003 Second Edition, the iQue M5 supports portrait/landscape screen orientation for easy viewing of documents, videos, and web content. It's powered by a 416-MHz Intel� PXA 272 microprocessor, and it also provides the user with 64 MB of RAM, 64 MB of ROM and data back-up protection...The GPS antenna on the iQue M5 folds flush with the back of the unit. Press the antenna release switch, and it simultaneously powers up the iQue M5, acquires satellites, and defaults to the QueMap� interface. Once the antenna switch is triggered, the M5 prepares to navigate. The antenna can be adjusted for optimal GPS signal reception in any vehicle or rental car. The unit comes with a sturdy windshield mount with integrated charger and speaker."
My only criticism is the price: for $750, I'd love to see a VGA-enabled GPS Pocket PC with more RAM. Looks like that's going to be some time away. In the meantime, this device looks very cool and is bundled with a windshield mount. 8)
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01-05-2005, 08:06 PM
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Thinker
Join Date: Mar 2004
Posts: 469
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I was wondering when this would happen. I woul dlike to see the price drop about $200 before I think it will sell. I would also expect these manufacturers to start making these gps enabled ppc's a little more rugged.
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01-05-2005, 08:10 PM
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Neophyte
Join Date: Oct 2004
Posts: 9
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No doubt the price point is pretty laughable, but it seems like you can justify overinflated prices like this to businesses. For $750 you could buy a Dell X50v, a Haicom BT/CF GPS, and a 1 GB SD card and still have $100 left for your GPS software of choice. Garmin's always seems to overprice their stuff, but you can probably get it through a reseller for $600.
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01-05-2005, 08:26 PM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Dec 2003
Posts: 242
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It has BlueTooth but no WiFi. It's not a phone and doesn't need to connect to a stand alone gps unit so BT is of limited use in my opinion. Seems to me they got it backwards. Despite that I am always happy to see more integrated devices on the market.
Give me an all-in-one phone, pda & integrated gps with BT & WiFi and I'm all over it. Oh, yeah, it also needs to fit in my pocket and get more than an hour of battery life, too. Is that asking so much :?
db
__________________
'It has been my experience that the more extreme the opinion, the less likely it is to be based on or altered by fact.'*- db
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01-05-2005, 08:46 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Jul 2002
Posts: 74
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The XV6600 is almost the perfect PDA. It's missing the VGA screen, WiFi, and GPS, but otherwise it's a winner.
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01-05-2005, 08:52 PM
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Philosopher
Join Date: Apr 2004
Posts: 545
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Your paying for the name....but it's SO worth it.
Garmin, in my humble opinion, makes the BEST GPS recievers. I have in the past has teh Garmin 12 and now have a eMap. They both were tanks. This PPC does not look like it's rugged, but knowing Garmin, this will still be in a stronger case then most Pocket PC's are. I only hope that thier software on this one is better then the Palm based Original iQue and from the specs and the story it sound like it is. The price is out there, but I think the real reason behind that is the Garmin Maps. Back when I got my eMap, I bought the model without the Mapsource disk. When I looked into buying the disk and the memory module needed...at the time, the 8MB module was 80 bucks! I could have gotten a much larger SD card at the time and it was aroung this timew Magellan released one that took a SD card. I went and looked at the unit and decided to stick with what I got. The Garmin's software was superior and the casing on the Magellan was not as good as the casnig on the eMap. In any case, Garmin DOES carry a higher price then alot of other GPS's, but ithey ARE the standard other GPS's are measured by. In fact, I would not be surprised to find out that some other GPS's use Garmin recievers. This is a very good thing.
I can see why they used Bluetooth. Your likely to not be near a Hotspot when your using this so it's logical to use a cell to establish net connectivity. It would be nice to have WiFi integrated, but the Battery life would definitely suffer. Time will tell if this new iQue will be good or not.
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01-05-2005, 09:44 PM
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Oracle
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 841
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Darren Behan
It has BlueTooth but no WiFi. It's not a phone and doesn't need to connect to a stand alone gps unit so BT is of limited use in my opinion. Seems to me they got it backwards. Despite that I am always happy to see more integrated devices on the market.
Give me an all-in-one phone, pda & integrated gps with BT & WiFi and I'm all over it. Oh, yeah, it also needs to fit in my pocket and get more than an hour of battery life, too. Is that asking so much :?
db
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Agreed with the all-in-one approach. But if you can only have the GPS + Bluetooth, or the Phone Edition + Bluetooth and add a BT GPS device to the mix?
Check this review of Navman GPS 4400. I've found that there's a company offering a service over-the-air for navigation, here in New Zealand. Instead of loading the maps on your device (which can be done, BTW), maps are downloaded automatically from the network. This is pretty much like a service using Mappoint - but not all operators support Mappoint, so an option is always welcome.
But you're right, if we had a GPS+Phone Edition device, then that would be nice 
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01-05-2005, 10:29 PM
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Mystic
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 1,734
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Notice the blurb on Garmin's website, the iQue M5 vs iQue 3200
http://www.garmin.com/mobile/
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iQue� M5 : Combining the popular Microsoft Windows Mobile� 2003 SE operating system with the dependability of Garmin GPS.
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VS
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iQue 3200: The combined portability of a PDA and the utility of an automotive navigation system in a sleek, lightweight design
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I guess Palm OS isnt popular any more. Shall we try and guess which one is being phased out?
Surur
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01-05-2005, 11:35 PM
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Swami
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 4,303
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by redleg
No doubt the price point is pretty laughable, but it seems like you can justify overinflated prices like this to businesses. For $750 you could buy a Dell X50v, a Haicom BT/CF GPS, and a 1 GB SD card and still have $100 left for your GPS software of choice. Garmin's always seems to overprice their stuff, but you can probably get it through a reseller for $600.
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Just my thoughts redleg. 
Not too inspired by the design or spec. What's the unique selling point of this device? Is it just Garmin's name? :?
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01-05-2005, 11:36 PM
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Pontificator
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 1,202
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At first I thought, "Wow, finally a PDA manufacturer who is building a PocketPC and Palm on the same hadware platform". However, even though it looks very similar to the Palm model, there are quite a few differences under the hood- 416 vs. 200 MHz, 320 x 240 vs. 480 x 320 resolution. They managed to get Bluetooth to work on the WM model and it was a late kill on the Palm.
Wonder why they decided not to go for VGA, I think GPS is an application that just screams for a higher resolution screen, and at this price point, what's another $50.00.
I agree it's expensive when compared to our PPCs, but not if you compare it to standalone GPS. I've always wondered why the standalone models are so much more expensive than a PPC, when I doubt the hardware or software are higher end that for our devices....
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