Garmin's Mobile XT turns your phone into a GPS superstar
By Joshua Topolsky 
posted Oct 3rd 2007 10:58AM
posted Oct 3rd 2007 10:58AM
Garmin -- your favorite GPS team ever -- are about to drop some serious map-styles all over your mobile phone. The company today announced a new set of microSD cards preloaded with its navigation software and standard maps of the US or Europe. The cards will turn your average, boring, ugly phone into a bona fide GPS superstar. Dubbed the Garmin Mobile XT, the card will tout all of the features of a typical hardware Garmin GPS unit, like turn-by-turn directions, route planning, and voice prompts. Additionally, the card provides access to the GPS-maker's online service, which lets you get real-time fuel prices, traffic reports, and weather updates. We know, you're thinking all of this sweet and easy action is going to cost you an arm, leg and first-born... but you're wrong. The company is offering the card right now for the painfully affordable price of $99, with no monthly fees or other costs, thus making this purchase seem attractive even if you don't really need it.
I tried & tried to have a phone provide GPS routing for me, but in the end I just wasn't satisfied I went back to a standalone when I travel. Having a phone & a GPS receiver's a pain & my N95 is *painfully* slow in catching a signal & routing.
Plus having a microsd card is great & all, but what about the fact that you no longer have access to *your* microsd info (I like to listen to Audible books while I drive)? Jerry-rigging theirs to fit on another is a pain.
Might be good to mention the phone MUST have GPS already. This is pretty worthless.
Thats correct - These articles should mention that you need a MOBILE PHONE WHICH HAS GPS ON IT ALREADY. Otherwise this product cannot be used
The question is: what phones are supported, what moile OS's are supported, what are the hardware requirements, and how much is the service.... that would depend on the carrier, I am sure.
Also - the phone has to have a GPS, so that obviously beings down your list of qualified hardware choices. Thats fine, but dont make it sound like all I have to do it drop this into my SK3 or blackberry and I am good to go get lost.
Their "recognized" devices with GPS is either limited or wrong, and basically pushes you to buy their 10x external BT receiver (albeit with a nice SiRFIII and 22 hours battery life). i.e. HTC P3600 has working internal GPS, but Garmin Mobile says NOPE.
Their website hasn't change in months, and there's no indication that Mobile XT will work with anything else besides Garmin GPS hardware.
the newest n95 software supports A-gps which helps alot with the connection time.
Does the software work with the Blackberry 8310 with internal GPS? This is a Vodaphone international unlocked phone and not the AT&T one.
Can the MicroSD contents be copied to a much larger card so that you still have the multimedia?
Do you have to be able to browse to activate the software?