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SKU: 693
Product Description: Garmin Mobile 10 (GPS10x BT GPS, DVD with North America Software for PC, Pocket PC, Palm, SmartPhone) (Free Phone/PDA Mount)
Source: http://www.buygpsnow.com/ProductReviewPopup.aspx?productID=693 Customer Reviews
Average Rating 
View All 7 Reviews  As a pilot, I have been using Garmin GPS aviation products for many years. They make great aviation stuff but is is the first non-aviation Garmin product I have ever used. As far as the GPS receiver is concerned, it seems to be an excellent device. It has good battery life, reasonable Blue Tooth range and acquires satellites quickly. Much to my surprise I can turn the unit on in my windowless work room in my basement and receive signals adequate for 3-D naviagation. That is better than a much more expensive aviation GPS in the same location. I also use the Garmin receiver for another aviation navigation application and it works very well. However, the Mobile XT software that comes with the package, is not all that exciting. It is adequate for help for short unfamiliar trips and around town. I frequently find myself in an unfamiliar town and have used Mobile XT to search for a restaruarnt, of find my way to my hotel. The accuracy of that facility is often poor, and contains non-existant places or incorrect address for places I'm looking for. So, it is helpful, but not 100% for sure. Even after upgrading the street and maps database to the 2008 version, a lot of local things are incorrect. Things that are 2, 3 or 4 years old are not included, or incorrect. It is plenty "clunky" when it comes to using the software. For example one can get deep into the multilevel menus, but the only way out is "back out" all the way. If there is a "quick return" back to the main page(s) I haven't found it. Buy GPS Now delivered the package quicly and at a good price. The only thing is that they delivered a unit that had an install CD for a Windows CE device. The PDA program installed on my SD card was "Install.exe." Of course everyone knows that an .exe program won't run on a Palm OS. It needed a .prc file. Anyway, I got beyond that by registering the product online with Garmin and then downloaded the latest updated software. Installation of this was a nightmare. Once I got the right version that was for the Palm OS I still could not get it to install on the Palm. I spent hours on the phone with Garmin over a 3-day period of time. I did 3 complete reboots of the Palm TX. That meant that I lost my applications and data three times and had to hot-sync it all back three times. I suppose that I spent a total of 30 hours trying to get it installed and running. That is unacceptable. In fact, I had already filled out the RMA request to send it back, when I decided to try it again. It is working now, but Garmin apparently doesn't fully understand how the Palm TX manages internal memory, and it will often fail to run, with the message that there is not enough memory to run the program. Well the Palm TX has plenty of internal RAM, but if another program had been running, I will get that message and will have to do a reset in order to get it to run. That is OK, except that it takes a couple of minutes for the reset to happen. In the hours I spent on the phone with Garmin they were patient, but mostly unable to resolve the install and insufficient memory problems. They finally told me to do the Complete Reset, and actually stayed on with me through the whole process - only to come up with the same install problems on a "clean" Palm. I went back and re-downloaded the software from the Garmin website and then re-installed the three parts of it in a "non-standard" sequence (a different sequence than the instructions and the phone customer service had told me I had to follow.) Anyway, I finally got it installed and except for the database inaccuracies and the frequent need to "reboot" the Palm TX, it works as advertised. I think that the receiver is an excellent performer, but I'd suspect that other software options might be better performers than the Garmin software.
by Gerry , on 12/26/2007 11:35:20 AM
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