Mitac's Mio169 GPS-enabled Pocket PC
By Peter Rojas 
posted May 22nd 2005 5:33PM
posted May 22nd 2005 5:33PM
Probably won't land over here for a few more months, but Mitac just introduced a new GPS-enabled Pocket PC in Taiwan
called the Mio169 that's a bit on the generic side when it comes to Pocket PCs with integrated GPS: a 300MHz processor
(we've also seen it listed as having a 400MHz processor), 3.5-inch touch screen, 32MB of ROM, 64MB of RAM, SDIO
expansion card slot, and Windows Mobile 2003 SE (note the lack of WiFi or Bluetooth).
[Via Pocket PC Thoughts
While this GPS isn't right for me, it does have me thinking that if Alpine made my next GPS built into my honda/acura with a Windows Mobile platform it might would make syncing my contacts to my GPS a little nicer. Of course I'd want them to make it easily upgradeable to Windows Mobile X since I'll probably have my next car for about 8 years. They could probably just make a $300 module that would essentially be a removable brain/memory for the unit since the DVD and the screen wouldn't require changing out.
I really wouldn't compare the Mitacs to normal Pocket PCs, since most of them completely remove the ability to use the device as a PDA, leaving it completely dedicated to GPS navigation. This is their first to include access to the PDA functions of the OS. My Navman iCN 510 is a rebranded and customized Mitac MIO 136, running Win Mobile 2003 and works great for navigation, but won't let me touch the underlying OS and features at all. I'll be very impressed if they managed to integrate Outlook contacts as another form of destination entry. Also a great price-point in comparison to the Tom-Toms.
When will someone make some decent GPS software that will run on a small screen PC? There is jack crap that will work on a regular 7" touchscreen in the car. Several packages come close, but they are all VERY lacking in some respect.
The closest to perfect is travroute's CoPilot; however, the program has an extremely small moving map display and does not let you change the size of the street labels or the general font size, making it impossible to use on 1) a 640x480 display or 2) on a small screen with a higher resolution.
Pocketpc OTOH has a million good packages. How about a real pocketpc emulator so you could run these things on a PC?!?
I have a Navman PIN aka rebranded Mitac Mio 168 pocket PC and it works fine. I don't quite understand what poster #2 means when they say that they can't touch the underlying OS. But my Navman PIN is a fully functional PDA with access to all the OS features and programs. The Navman SmartST navagation software leaves a bit to be desired, but it has been rated better than the Mitac navagation software.