2210 - Mount & GPS Receiver Advice Sought

Pessable

Right, so I've decided to get TTN3 and a 2210. Why? Well...

- TTN3 seems to be the only sensible option, especially since I'm looking to supercede my Trafficmaster YQ2 and want only one device on the dash (i.e. the GPRS 'traffic' option on TTN3).

- I don't need Wi-Fi in the short term and want a lighter/cheaper PDA rather than the dogs nuts/loads of wonga option. I want to be able to use the PDA for MP3 in the car as well as GPS so the SD and CF will give me more storage options. I also like the Nevo CIR facility which will give me something else to play with, and some of the other Ipaq's don't seem to have the IR receiver well positioned for that application.

Now the biggest decision I have to make is about the GPS receiver and the mount. It strikes me that the in-car ergonomic detail of any satnav system are critical to its success. If it's a pain to use, I'll end up not bothering and especially when the traffic option is live that will defeat the object as I'll want to use it even if I know where I'm going so that I get stuck in less jams.

My instinct is to go for an "all-TomTom" BT solution on the basis that it should be tried and tested as a set. But I've read in these forums that the TomTom carkit has recently been downgraded although I don't really understand how. My ideal solution would be where I can drop the 2210 into a cradle and the PDA is automatically hooked into power and GPS without any two-handed fiddling to connect cables and the like. Is this an unrealistic expectation?

BT would be nice because I would like to have the facility to use the GPS on foot, but prefer it being powered when in-car to save the worry of running out of battery power. But if a wired GPS is much more reliable than BT then I'd forego the on-foot capability for in-car reliability.

Are there any real advantages to 3rd party (i.e. non-TomTom) GPS receivers (wired or BT)? Darren Griffin mentioned a logging facility, which sounds cool as long as its not too much more. Is configuration and support much easier with a TomTom receiver?

What about mounts? Ideally I'd like something which is purpose-built for the 2210 rather than just sprung-loaded arms gripping the side. But I want to be able to permamanently wire in the mount rather than connecting the cigarette lighter. I already have a hard-wired 12V jack-plug which has supplied my YQ2 to date.

Should I buy all this from one supplier? From a support perspective I'd prefer to as long as there's not too much of a premium. I have £500 to burn on a 2210, TTN3 Software, GPS Receiver, Mount and 256Mb+ SD or CF card.

All advice gratefully received!! Thanks for listening.

Pessable.

Darren · Posted: Mon May 24, 2004 7:38 am Post subject:

The BT Datalogger is the Royaltek RBT-3000. As for mounts, go for Brodit, I use one of their Active mounts that is designed to be hardwired to 12v and it's a great professional looking solution.
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Darren Griffin

BitchMonkey · Occasional Visitor Joined: May 12, 2004 Posts: 4

I have a 2210 which I wired to the back of the cigarette lighter. All I have is 1 cable that comes from behind the dash to the right of the steering wheel. I bought a cradle from www.totalPDA.co.uk that was specifically designed for the 2210. To begin with I would say avoid it as it was very poorly made. Two of the pieces were held together with double sided tape and broke very soon and another piece also came unstuck. I glued all back together with superglue and I now think it is a very good cradle.

BM

Darren · Posted: Mon May 24, 2004 5:41 pm Post subject:

I'll stand by Brodit (www.brodit.com), you will not have any qaulity issues with these, they are OEM quality and made to last Thumbs Up

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Darren Griffin

DavidW · Posted: Mon May 24, 2004 8:23 pm Post subject:

I'd just like to amplify Darren's praise of Brodit - I've got no problems with the Brodit products I use, nor those I've recommended to others.

David

Pessable · Posted: Tue May 25, 2004 1:30 am Post subject: Brodit Range

Thanks for the recommendations guys...

...but as far as I can see, Brodit don't do a mount which will charge the PDA and supply power to a bluetooth GPS receiver or power/signal to a non-BT GPS receiver as well. Their range appears to be (prices including a proclip):

- Active Holder with transformer in ciggy adapter at £50
Am I right in thinking that I couldn't hard wire this as there are electronics in the ciggy adapter bit?

- Active holder with transformer in-line on a wire at £70 (why so much?)
Isn't much to look at for the money. No way to feed power to a BT GPS or power/signal to a non-BT GPS.

- Passive holder which can take a 2210 input connector at £70.
Looks better but still no feed for the GPS receiver, unless...

...am I right in thinking you can get a cable which could be hardwired that would feed both a GPS (power for a BT model or power/signal for a non-BT model) and the PDA at the same time? So the power cable would go into the 2210 connector and also going into the 2210 connector would be a cable from a GPS receiver.

The Brodit seems an expensive option compared to £50 all in for a Seidio "multimedia" mount with a built-in speaker and GPS signal/power feed for either BT or non-BT. Is the Brodit really that much better, enough to make up for all the flexibility of the Seidio unit?

If so I might have to lose the BT capability to squeeze the Brodit mount and a means of getting sound from the PDA coming via my car radio into my £500 budget. And I can't see an obvious way of connecting a GPS receiver with the Brodit.

I seem to be going around in circles again!! I really, really want to splash the cash now but I realise that the mounting is probably as important a "living with it" decision as the software and PDA/GPS hardware. And I want to get the decision right.

Pessable.

ReP0 · Occasional Visitor Joined: Mar 02, 2004 Posts: 11

I hope I'm not too late but I have one thing to say about Seidio. Stay the hell away from them. I got the g2500 swayed by the neat looking online pics and the promise of charging bt and PDA at once. Let me say the first unit that arrived had screws missing and didn't function at all. The second arrived and seemed fine for a bit until their suction cup mechanism failed miserably (reading various problem this is a wide spread occurrence). The speaker in it a awful. I initially bought it for use with Destinator 3 thinking that the speaker on the 2200 would no be loud enough to hear in the car while driving. Lets just say the builtin speaker is way above and beyond what comes with this unit in both clarity and dB level.

All in all a very pathetic piece of hardware. I'm now on the look out for another unit and going to cut my losses with this one. I'l have a look at the brodit that people are talking about or just get a in car wired solution if I can find one.

Cheers!

Darren · Posted: Wed Jun 02, 2004 4:46 pm Post subject: Re: Brodit Range

Pessable · Posted: Thu Jun 03, 2004 8:32 am Post subject:

Pessable · Posted: Thu Jun 03, 2004 8:58 am Post subject: Re: Brodit Range

Darren · Posted: Thu Jun 03, 2004 6:29 pm Post subject: Re: Brodit Range

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