my initial thoughts mio a701 and copilot 6

[gsxr1000]

i took the plunge and it has been delivered.....

i will give my own views on both the hardware and software for others considering it as a package...not from a technical point of view - just from an everyday layman with basic skills and a need for reliabilty.

initial thoughts are that the a701 device is solid enough but with a poor design wand. the gsm reception on my o2 sim is very good and comparable to my k750i and much better than my treo 650, it does seem to hold onto its signal very well.

using it as a telephone has made me discover problems with it from the off - such as the inability to end a call with the hardware buttons (when it feels like it)- the phone seems to freeze and the only way to stop it is to reset or take the battery out. intermittent but definately not a faulty device as all the buttons become inoperable.

bleutooth strength with my jabra bt500 heaset is good and again better than my old treo 650 and slightly behind my k750i in terms of distance away from the device, the call quality is average to poor (over bt) with background hissing and annoyingly the headset doesnt wake up sometimes when calls are recieved. being self employed this is a pain in the but at the best of times but when driving also a distraction.

recording voice details for convenience while driving is also in my opinion just too dificult with the standard software at least and resulting recording quality is also low. compared to my k750i with the push of a button for transciption at a later time. obviously the implementation of this is down to microsoft - but the quality of the end result is down to hardware.

as a gps device it has proven so far to be reliable with good satelite fixes fast upon switching it on also being picked up by the copilot 6 immediately with no setup problems. it consistently manages to aquire 1 more satelite than my go 300, but in general useage this makes no operational difference to accuracy of road positioning.

the accompanying copilot 6 software - though i now i dont rate the software too highly after using it alongside my go300 on a recent drive because of design oversights -

such as the inability to find a list of poi,s in a different part of the country by searching on area (like my old copilot4 from memory)

along with the laughable post code search which clearly falls short of other apps like tom tom, and generally the map detail is low when approaching busy roundabouts with lots of exits etc (an autozoom would be nice)

it simply takes far to many key presses to enter a destination accurately wich is frustrating when the user is on a tachograph and every minute needs to be spent productively - where my go 300 is a few screen taps and off taking maybe 10 - 15 seconds as oposed to 1 minute to enter an address.

for those considering co pilot i really cant recommend it for serious use - i dont think it has moved on much at all from earlier versions - sure it does have some nice touches such as route optimisation and text to speech but to add poi's it to protracted and searching for them away from your current location is also poorly implemented / non existant. general stability of the app has been faultless with no gps crashes but overall simply to involved to enter a basic address or postcode coupled with innacuracy and some post codes not listed in newcastle upon tyne is unnaceptable.

which begs the question why did i buy it.....well like many other i am desperate for a reliable converged device to stop my having to carry a multitude of standalones. sure i have had my fingers burnt with xda and xda 2s each with their own characters and lots of bugs, but each time i am optimistic of new devices meeting my expectations - they do however always seem to fall short in more than one area. sure i probably will obtain tom tom pocket pc edition, but there again what is the point if the phone seems to unreliable.

as a phone i feel it is unreliable for everyday use let-alone business use, where every call counts.

so while i will hang onto this device for the time being and await fixes that hopefully will be released by the ever-caring mio ()......

.... i certainly wont be giving up my go 300 and se k750i

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