gps

GPS map “update”

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So I broke down last night and purchased the latest map update for my Garmin StreetPilot c340. After downloading the 2gb file and running into a few setup issues, I finally got it installed on the GPS.

This morning, I fired the unit up on my way to work, as I am wont to do (mainly to see my estimated arrival time). Imagine my surprise when, as I was driving on I-275 North over the Howard Frankland Bridge (which goes over the bay), the GPS display looked like I was driving over land instead of water:


Yes, this is a minor thing since it’s just a display issue (the routing and navigation is working fine), but it’s really annoying since this was an “update” (that cost me $60) which clearly has some sort of corruption in it. If I zoom out far enough, eventually the correct map is displayed:

But I shouldn’t have to deal with that. And who knows what else is messed up?

I tried re-installing the map update from scratch, resetting the GPS, changing map views (3D vs. overhead) and detail levels, etc. without any luck. I’ve opened a support ticket with Garmin and am waiting to see what they have to say.

Palm’s new handheld is Pre-tty cool

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Today at CES, Palm unveiled its new smartphone: the Pre, running webOS (formerly code-named Nova).

The Pre has a 320×480 high-resolution touchscreen display, built-in 3G/GPS/WiFi/Bluetooth, a 3 mega-pixel camera, 8gb of user storage (the most on any Palm handheld ever), an accelerometer (for screen rotation), and the Treo’s familiar keyboard (it slides down from under the screen, or rather, the screen slides up). Though I hate to say it, it’s basically Palm’s version of the iPhone. The market seemed to like what it saw … shares of PALM jumped 34% today!

webOS looks slick … and finally Palm has a multi-tasking operating system! I just hope it’s faster than Windows Mobile (my Treo might not have 3G or be able to run two applications at once, but the user-interface speed blows away any WM6 device).

So, any bad news? First, the Pre will initially be available only on Sprint (CDMA), in the first half of 2009. Hopefully other carriers (like AT&T) will follow. Next, and I couldn’t confirm this, it doesn’t look like there’s any backward compatibility with PalmOS. There is a huge library of third-party applications out there and none of them will run on the Pre. I’m sure developers will jump on the platform relatively quickly, though, and it’s probably better to leave the legacy of PalmOS behind (how about a PalmOS emulator for webOS? 😉 ). No Flash support either. I’ll bet it has cut-and-paste though!

There’s a lot more good information over on Engadget (except pricing, which hasn’t been announced yet) and some videos of the Pre in action from Gizmodo. For now I’ll have to wait and hope that my next smartphone is going to be a member of the Pre family.

Heh, there’s already a wiki page.

Santa’s gone Centro!

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I’m a long-time Palm user: I’ve owned four different Palm OS devices over the past 12 years from the original Pilot 1000 to my Treo 680.

Palm is finally starting to do some advertising, and the latest round of Santa’s Gone Centro videos are pretty funny.

I’m looking forward to CES next week as Palm will finally be unveiling it’s new Linux-based Nova OS and supposedly a new smartphone to run it. Nova will be the first new version of Palm OS since Garnet was originally released in 2002! I love my Treo but sometimes wish I had some of the cooler features that other phones have, like 3G, WiFi, GPS, etc. The new Nova devices might be the answer to that prayer.

Road Trip 2008: Day 10

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And so it ends …

We got up early and hit the road, driving through the morning fog in the northern Georgia hills.

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Driving through Georgia and Florida takes forever, but we finally made it home shortly before 6pm. Vacation is over!

vacation-756454Final wrap-up:

According to my Garmin StreetPilot c340, we covered about 3,000 miles, crossing 12 states, spending about 53 hours in the car (over 2 full days!) on our 10-day road trip. 😀

Looking at my receipts, the cheapest gas was $3.88/gal at a station in Virginia, and the most expensive was $4.19/gal at a fill-up in northern Ohio. My best tank averaged 27mpg (the stretch from Ohio to northern Tennessee) and the worst was 23mpg (Tennessee to Atlanta … going up and down all those mountains!).

Whew. Vacation was fun, but it’s good to be home …

Garmin StreetPilot c340 GPS receiver

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StreetPilot c340Another one of my new Christmas toys is the Garmin StreetPilot c340 GPS. Times have really changed since the days (i.e., 1999) when I would connect my Delorme Tripmate to the serial port on my laptop and drive around using Street Atlas. The c340 is the shape of a small tube television set and has a color touchscreen. It comes pre-loaded with maps of the entire United States and has an SD card slot for loading other maps (like Europe). It does text-to-speech recognition (a feature that separates it from the slightly cheaper c330) so it will actually read out the street names when speaking directions (instead of just “turn right in 500 feet”). You can download different voices as well. The c340 is very easy to use and view in the car and comes with a very sturdy windshield suction cup mount.

While it’s not flat and PDA-sized, and doesn’t have some of the fancier “kitchen sink” features of the higher priced units (like widescreen format, MP3 playback, photo viewing, Bluetooth, customizable icons, etc.) it’s the perfect device for me. I was looking for an in-car navigation system, not a portable navigation/entertainment/PDA system (check out Garmin’s Nuvi line if you’re looking for something like that).

Time to do more driving!

Delorme Tripmate GPS receiver

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TripmateNow this is cool. The TripMate from Delorme is an inexpensive GPS (global positioning system) device that uses the government’s network of GPS satellites to pinpoint your position on the globe. Paired with Delorme’s Street Atlas software in your laptop, you can plan a trip, attach the Tripmate to the serial port of your laptop, place the Tripmate on your dashboard, and then watch yourself move on the map as you drive. The GPS calculates your heading and speed and even speaks when your next turn is approaching. Very, very cool.