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[Thomas Stromberg]

On 15 dec 2005, at 22.32, Christopher Fowler wrote:

> Its amazing how the price of good keeps coming down.  But why are GPS
> devices still so expensive?  I was in SAMs and that TomTom device is
> $800.00

(OT) It beats me. I always find GPS's extremely frustrating because  
the hardware is generally very weak, what you're paying for are the  
maps. The maps however, are all  in proprietary formats, so you have  
to buy a software package for each GPS. So, at the moment, I've got 3  
different GPS software packages because I've got three different GPS  
solutions. If you think about it, implementing a nice portable GPS on  
your own doesn't take much:

* Nokia 770 ($350), runs Debian Linux already.
* Bluetooth GPS ($150 for a really nice one, like a BT-338)
* RoadNav (http://roadnav.sourceforge.net) or similar software  
package (Free!)

So, that's still $500, but as the open source mapping software gets  
better, it's a plausible solution, especially if you want to browse  
the web while driving. <grin>. What TomTom doesn't advertise as well  
in the USA is that you can actually buy their software package for  
PDA's and cellphones, so long as you have a Bluetooth GPS to link it  
to. For whatever reason, they refuse to sell their smartphone  
software in the USA, but if you have a PocketPC it's available. When  
my Magellan GPS broke, I decided to take the cheap route and just buy  
a software package called Wayfinder for my Sony Ericsson P910  
cellphone and get a nice bluetooth GPS so that I could find my way  
around Atlanta. While it has it's bugs, for $250 (software+Bluetooth  
GPS), it gives me everything that I would get out of a $800 GPS,  
including voice synthesized instructions and downloading maps from  
the cellular network as required.

Just my $0.02

// Thomas Str?mberg
// http://toadstool.se/
// +1 678 773 9475