Newbie reports on his choice - the Garmin iQue M5 PDA/GPS

revdarkwing · Occasional Visitor Joined: Feb 05, 2005 Posts: 9

Choosing which PDA/GPS to buy was a struggle for me. Here was my criteria
1. I wanted a PDA in addition to a GPS unit since I didn't own a PDA yet. I thought I might as well get both with one purchase. I also wanted a unit I could move from car to car when convenient.
2. Maximum European coverage as I want to travel a lot while living on this side of the Atlantic.
3. Ease of out-of-car use. Most city centers in Europe are pedestrian friendly and very much not car friendly so I thought having the GPS available to find Points of Interest, would be a plus.

This criteria narrowed my choices down the Garmin products. Although there are a few products with the attached flip up GPS receiver, the Garmin company stood out due to its cooperation with third party vendors. Although they may exist, I didn't find any other manufacturer with the complete range of map makers for the range of countries not included in all basic European Mapping systems. With the Garmin, I did get the Croatia - Slovenia map from AdriaRoute and can also get full maps of Poland, Czech, Slovakia and Hungary to name a few. I saw this value added as a big plus and really it is what made my decision for me as I think Garmin is unique in this area.

I chose the iQue M5 over the other models as it is a windows based product compared to the Palm OS systems utilized by the other Garmin models. Although I am no fan of Bill Gates or Microsoft, I was told that windows based PDA's are capturing more market than Palm equivilants and picking up speed plus my PC is windows so I figured it was the best choice. Besides, it is more powerful than the Palm models as well.

Bringing it home and setting it up was relatively easy and my XP based computer felt like it was welcoming a cousin into the family so no problem there.

My first trip was quite a learning experience. I was told, incorrectly, that I had the entire 64Mb of internal available for the maps. This is not true. With Windows installed, I only had around 30Mb left for maps. This meant I had to leave out some critical sectors as I didn't first pick up a memory chip to go with the unit. As a result, (I think) I got put into a loop wich included a very unpleasant Italian toll taker when I entered then left the freeway system at the same toll booth. So lesson #1, buy a memory chip with the PDA. I have since added a 1Gb chip and now can load hundreds of mp3 songs onto my system in addition to having room enough to load as much of Europe as I need.

Second lesson, learned at the same time is simple. ALWAYS know your route and carry an analog map as well to help just in case. By not bothering to even check the map route on my computer before loading it, I didn't have a clue as to the major cities I would travel past so I had no way to check the road signs against the GPS. Dumb, dumb, dumb. Anyway, these things are not 100% so, take the time to get the basics.

On the other hand, since we were driving from Ljubljana to Cannes, as a result of this oversight, I simply forced the unit to recompute the directions and as a result we got to see some very beautiful parts of the French and Italian Alps we otherwise would have missed. Still, despite my foolish oversight, the Garmin got us to our destination and with the exception of an extended drive time, all was fine.

As to customer service, I found the US reps far more helpful than the European ones but I did not try calling Europe support as my VOIP system favors US phone calls. Their email people are not that sharp.

The system itself is quite good and maps, although shown in 2D are readable as I drive and the instructions are with a pleasant British accent and quite legible. You can choose other languages but English is my mother tongue so I can't comment on the others.

The system moves flawlessly from one country to the other as borders are not relevant to the system. The routing it not without some minor flaws and in Koln I learned about vertical placement when the system told me I had arrived in the middle of a tunnel. It was correct, it was just that the hotel was above me.

When starting up the unit, it can take a minute and more to locate and lock onto the satellites. It works fine in the car and does not require a booster antenna although with tall buildings and lots of trees it can get a little tough.

As a PDA, the M5 works fine. I have nothing to compare it to but it appears to be a well laid out PDA with windows and all it offers.

Overall, I think I made the right choice for my needs. It certainly wasn't the least expensive choice but I have really come to appreciate the flip up GPS receiver and the third party mapping is essential to my personal travel. Hope this helps.

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