A comparison of autonomous GPS systems: 7 16/9 PND devices

The black and aluminium comes with a 4.3” screen, with Route66 Maxi Europe being very successful. This PND is ideal for a first purchase, as it will take you where you want to go, but you better not be hoping for much more.

Besides the on/off button, which isn’t the only button present, you have a touch screen that is 100% tactile. All European maps are grouped together, which means when you enter a city name, and it exists in multiply countries, these will be displayed as well. A map filter by country would be nice so that we didn’t waste so much time. You can navigate by favourites, history, POI, contacts and by entering the latitude/longitude (quickest and shortest modes for pedestrians, cars and trucks).

The navigation by GPS coordinates is being used more and more often by some makers as it is faster and more precise then inputting the address for the destination, especially when the number has only recently been added and it isn’t referenced in the map. The navigation menu is also quite good (icons, choice of colours) and extremely effective. The Route 66 Maxi Europe running on this 266 MHz processor is a lot better optimised then a lot of competitors on 400 MHz!

As extras, we can only mention the photo display functions. This product figures among the cheapest, but you shouldn’t forget that acquiring one of these will see you passing up real time traffic, BlueTooth and having to try and adapt a fixation foot that is rather useless.