One of the biggest names is Skycaddie. Their SkyGolf SkyCaddie SG5 Handheld GPS Golf Assistant has a large color display and a rechargeable battery. The SG5 includes SkyGolf’s patented IntelliGreen technology, enabling golfers to measure the full depth and shape of the green from any angle of approach and shows distances for all targets and hazards on any of thousands of professionally mapped courses. Its color display

features automatic backlighting to ensure easy readability indoors and outdoors.

After reading more about it, I was beginning to see the light. Maybe this thing wasn’t just a toy for golfers with too much spendable cash. I think this thing might actually be useful to someone like me who has a hard time judging distances and clubs. Maybe have a GPS for golf wasn’t such a bad idea after all. If you like to golf and especially if you are a GPS gadget nut like me, you may want to check this thing out.

Earlier this month Rand McNally announced its first set of maps for the Kindle (press release). The cost of the maps is very reasonable at $1.99 each for California and Washington State.  Additional maps are slated to be available in 2009. The maps include a searchable index of every city on the map as well as National Parks and other federal areas. They also feature individual overview maps of major National Parks as well as major cities and towns.  Being able to search the maps is a big plus over conventional paper maps.

Being a big GPS fan I have to admit I was skeptical, until my wife reminded me of the Rand McNally atlas we keep in the truck.  Even though we use a GPS heavily, we still rely on conventional maps on occasion.  Having those maps in a digital format that’s easily searchable and compact makes sense to me.  Best of all, I don’t have to fold it up when I’m through.

If you’re a Kindle fan, or if you just like cool gadgets, you may want to check out these new maps from Rand McNally.  They’re downloadable from the Kindle store at Amazon’s website.

That’s not necessarily good news for those invested in oil stocks or futures, but it is great news for those of us that don’t like to let our RV’s set in one place for very long. That should translate to noticeably lower diesel and gasoline prices by spring if the trend continues.

We’re currently in Missouri at the moment and the local price for diesel has fallen to $2.15 per gallon. I know people are watching fuel prices very closely because the number of people logging onto CoolRVToyz.com and using the fuel prices widget to check the price in their local area has increased over 7 fold in the last 6 months. If you haven’t been on the web site lately, check out the fuel prices widget. It’ll keep you informed where to get the lowest fuel prices.

According to OPEC president Chakib Khelil, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) agreed that the group’s 11 members with quotas will trim current production by 2.46 million barrels a day to 24.845 million barrels a day OPEC has held four meetings in the last four months.

“It’s less than meets the eye,” said Lawrence Eagles, global head of commodities research at JPMorgan Chase & Co. in New York. “This may stem the bloating in stocks but isn’t enough to get rid of the surplus.”

“They are facing the distinct possibility of oil falling to $30 a barrel and even lower,” said Addison Armstrong, director of market research for Tradition Energy in Stamford, Connecticut. “They have to bring supply down further because they aren’t getting any help on the demand front until the second half of next year at the earliest.”

“There is nothing bullish in these numbers,” said Nauman Barakat, senior vice president of global energy futures at Macquarie Futures USA Inc. in New York. “The OPEC announcement looks big on first glance but really isn’t. They are playing with smoke and mirrors.”

Looks like “Happy RV’ing …” may actually be in store for us this summer.

Phil King

MiTAC is the parent company of Mio, who also makes consumer GPS devices. The future of the Magellan brands, including RoadMate, Maestro, and Triton product lines is unclear at this point.

The press release didn’t elaborate. Magellan has been struggling of late, losing ground to the product releases of Garmin and TomTom. The closing should happen in January. The entire press release follows:

“Magellan Enters into Definitive Agreement to Sell the Magellan Consumer Products Division to MiTAC International Corporation

SANTA CLARA, Calif., Dec. 15 — Magellan Navigation, Inc. today announced it has entered into a definitive agreement to sell the Magellan consumer products division to MiTAC International Corp. Closing of the transaction is anticipated in January of 2009. Financial terms are not disclosed.

Recognized as an industry innovator, the Magellan consumer products division is the creator of the award-winning Magellan(R) RoadMate(R) and Maestro(TM) series portable car navigation systems, and the Magellan Triton(R) outdoor handheld navigation devices. The company is recognized worldwide through its Magellan brand.

About Magellan

Magellan allows people to travel, work and play their way with leading portable navigation and positioning solutions across multiple consumer markets. Recognized as an industry innovator, the company is the creator of the award-winning Magellan RoadMate, and Maestro series portable car navigation systems, as well as the CrossoverGPS(TM) and Magellan Triton outdoor handheld navigation devices. Magellan is privately held and headquartered in Santa Clara, Calif. For more information on Magellan, visit http://www.magellangps.com.

About MiTAC International Corp.

MiTAC International is a global ITC (information technology & consumer electronics) company headquartered in Taiwan and publicly listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange. Its business spans three major areas — mobile communications (personal navigation devices, GPS smart phones and mobile Internet devices), enterprise systems (workstations, servers, and storage equipment) and client systems (personal computers and digital home entertainment products). MiTAC International has large vertically integrated manufacturing sites in China, as well as extensive R&D facilities in US, China, Taiwan and New Zealand. MiTAC International also has marketing operations in the U.S., West Europe, Central East Europe, APAC, China, Japan, Australia and rest of the world. The company is recognized by the industry for its innovative product design capability as well as its integrated design-and-delivery system. For more information about Mitac, please go to: http://www.mitac.com.”

Why does that matter? It’s not that the “lesser” brands are bad devices, some of them are impressive. The numbers matter because of companies like CoolRVToyz.com, who produce enhanced products for GPS units. Unfortunately, there is no “standard” for producing add-on information to GPS devices in the form of Points-of-Interest (POI) data and other enhancements. When companies develop these accessory products for GPS devices, they often can’t afford to focus their resources on the smaller segments of the market. It’s just good marketing strategy to put their resources into that 95% of the market.

So, as a consumer looking to purchase a new GPS, this is a big consideration. Sooner or later you may want additional POI’s for your GPS. Your selection will be much larger if your GPS is one of the brands with the larger market share.

As you all have probably figured out by now, I’m more of a Garmin junkie than a TomTom fan. Not that TomTom isn’t a great GPS device. I’m just used to hearing the interstate called a freeway instead of a motorway. Being primarily a European company, TomTom has been a bit slow to hire some native-born Americans to help them get the American terminology down. Having said that … TomTom continues to earn more of my respect every time I get a chance to play with a new GPS from them. They keep getting better.

I digress. What did I start out talking about? Oh yes, the new TomTom Online Route Planner Beta. Most of us who use a GPS also like to use some form of route planning software. Some of us have standalone programs like Microsoft Streets and Trips or DeLorme Street Atlas. Some prefer one of the online services like Google Maps or MapQuest. MapQuest has become so popular it’s not uncommon to hear someone say, “I’ll MapQuest It”. Are we going to start hearing people say, “I’ll TomTom it.” shortly? Well, maybe not anytime soon.

Putting the normal bugs of a beta application aside for a moment, my first impression of the TomTom Online Route Planner Beta was positive. The interface is simple and easy to follow, the map is detailed enough without being too busy, and the directions are easy to understand.

One positive point was I felt they succeeded in striking a good balance between enough information and not enough. Early versions of MapQuest pointed out every crack in the road and missing barn. Its directions were so detailed they became almost impossible to use. TomTom seems to be on the right track where that’s concerned. I saw just enough information to keep me on track, but no more. The driving directions reminded me of the voice instructions you’d receive from any TomTom GPS.

Another great feature is the traffic service. Check the box to “minimise traffic delays” and it will add that to your route calculations. No, I didn’t just accidently misspell “minimize”. There’s that European thingy again. I had to play with it a lot to get it to find some delays worth mentioning, but they too were easy to understand.

The rumor is that TomTom plans to make this a part of their HD Connected Service which would allow you to plan your route on the TomTom Online Route Planner, and then send it directly to your connected GPS. Between this and the traffic delays feature, that puts TomTom already ahead of many of the other online route planning services.

I’ll post again when I’ve played with it some more.

Well, let’s not get too excited. I started talking up my new toy on the forums and raised a firestorm. While the navigation features of my Blackberry are cool and fun, they aren’t quite up to the tasks performed daily for me by my Garmin. One forum junkie correctly pointed out many of the flaws in my logic that my phone was going to replace my trusted Garmin.

Danger, Will Robinson!

(That probably gives away more about my age than I’d like) The first issue is safety. Trying to communicate a destination to my Blackberry is a full attention task. Not something that’s very intelligent when barreling down the road at 65MPH in a 15 ton vehicle. My nüvi doesn’t have voice recognition, so I still have to set it manually. I usually relegate that task to my navigator (pronounced: spouse) while driving because it’s bad enough. We could be there before I got the destination set on the Blackberry.

What’d She Say?

The next problem was one of sheer volume. Between the diesel engine, the wind noise (little as that may be) and the satellite radio there was no way I could hear the phone giving directions unless I used the headset or held it next to my ear. By this time my wife is on the laptop with the air card looking up information on hearing aids. My nüvi doesn’t seem to have a problem shouting over all that. The older I get, the more it seems I need my GPS to shout at me too.

Where’s That Magnifying Glass?

Did I mention I’m getting old? I forget? Along with the memory and the hearing, the eyesight seems to be giving my age away too. The 4.3 inch screen on my nüvi gets smaller every time I use it. Trying to see the map on my Blackberry is out of the question.

One Satellite, Two Satellites, Three Satellites, Four.

The last issue we had was finding enough satellites to get a signal accurate enough to stay on course. If I set the Blackberry up on the dash that helped, but then there’s those pesky hearing and seeing problems again. It just wasn’t working for me way up there.

Conclusion.

I think next time I’m hiking in the woods and wonder if I’m getting lost, my Blackberry’s navigation features may come in very handy. I had given fleeting thought to buying a hand held GPS just for that purpose, but I wouldn’t use it very often. So, maybe I won’t need one now. I’ll just try using the Blackberry. For occasional hand held application, there may be some validity to my argument that this new toy in my phone can replace a real GPS. But, since most of my satellite navigation takes place going down the road in the RV, I think I’ll stick with my Garmin for now.

That’s not the cool part, that’s been around for a while. Products like the Sony GPS-CS1KASP GPS Receiver have been around for a while and can be used with any camera that marks the photos with the date and time. GPS satellites are used to calculate and record position data of captured digital photos and video. The supplied Image Tracker software matches GPS receiver time with digital camera time to write positioning data to photos. Additional capabilities are pretty cool too. It’ll work for up to 14 hours on NiMH batteries or about 10 hours with Alkaline batteries. You can store up to 1 month or 360 hours of data with 31MB internal memory. It’s compatible with all digital cameras and digital camcorders that have built-in time/date stamping. You can click the photo to go to TheNerds.net for more detailed information. They’re also the place I’d recommend buying one if you’re interested. If you’ve got a DSLR camera and want more capabilities, then the Jobo PhotoGPS unit may be your ticket. It’s more expensive and requires a compatible hot shoe, but it does mount on your camera.

The really cool part is the new digital cameras and attachments that capture your geolocation and store that in the EXIF data as well. Many and the major camera manufacturers like Canon and Kodak have announced plans to include GPS data in the EXIF photo information in upcoming models. They may already be out depending on when you’re reading this. Some Canon EOS system cameras can already be connected to an external handheld GPS to record GPS data in the EXIF. If you’re in the market for a new digital camera, you might want to do a little resaearch and see if you can find one with this capability built in. Never again would you go through your photos trying to remember exactly where each one was taken. The embedded EXIF GPS data would give you an exact location in addition to the traditional date and time.

Now, if they can just incorporate facial recognition so the camera even marks who’s in my photos.

Pre-Loaded Maps

The first factor to consider is what maps you need pre-loaded in your GPS. That, of course depends on where you plan to travel. Many systems come with road maps for the entire United States and Canada loaded into their main memory. Some come with all of North America and some come with Europe as well. This gives you the luxury to go anywhere without worrying about whether or not you loaded the proper maps; it also makes the device ready-to-roll, right out of the box. Pre-loaded maps occupy part of the main memory of the GPS; any excess main memory can be used for additional maps, MP3 music, or custom POI’s like the CoolRVToyz Ultimate RV Parks & Campgrounds List. This brings us to memory capacity.

Memory Capacity

How much memory your GPS can hold is very important as well. If you purchase a unit that has very little extra main memory, and can’t be expanded; you may find yourself unable to add features or points-of-interest (POI) when you want. Many GPS models only contain enough main memory to hold their pre-loaded maps, with very little left over. This is only a problem if they do not have a memory expansion slot. A memory expansion slot allows you to add memory to the GPS should you ever need it. Most take a Secure Digital (SD) card for memory expansion. SD cards are inexpensive and a great way to add memory to your unit when you need it. More expensive units typically have a considerable amount of their main memory free for your use, and also have a memory expansion slot. Less expensive units typically use most or all of their main memory for built-in features, but most of them still have a memory expansion slot.

Text To Speach

Another important feature to look for is “text-to-speech.” Most voice-prompting GPS units will give an audio notification such as “Turn left in 300 feet” or “Take next exit.” A unit with a text-to-speech function will speak not only the direction but the name of the street as well: “Turn left onto Mulberry Lane in 300 feet” or “Take Exit 23A.” This is a huge help for many people, especially RV’ers, as they won’t even have to glance at the screen to know where to go.

Live Traffic Service

A great new feature to consider is live traffic service. Available in larger cities, a subscription to a traffic service gives you real-time, up-to-the-minute updates on traffic and road conditions. Freeway’s blocked from Exit 23 to Exit 29? Your GPS will notify you and offer an alternative route. After a free trial period, traffic service typically costs about $7/month. Some Garmin units also offer XM Radio services, so that you can get not only live traffic but XM Satellite Radio as well.

Even beyond a typical traffic service is the new Enhanced MSN Direct service. Many of the upper-end Garmin units, like the Nuvi 780 come with this capability. With MSN Direct, you can check the weather, avoid traffic backups, compare local gas prices, get enhanced movie listings, stock information, news and local events when you travel with your unit. Even plan trips from the convenience of your computer, via Windows Live Local, and then wirelessly send locations to your GPS. Like a traffic service, MSN Direct carries a monthly charge after the free trial period.

Bluetooth Enabled

One of the newest additions to GPS systems is the integration of a Bluetooth chip. If both your cell phone and GPS unit are Bluetooth-enabled, you’ll be able to pair them up for hands-free calling, dial-a-POI features, and more, making your automotive electronics suite completely integrated. The CoolRVToyz Ultimate RV Parks & Campgrounds List takes advantage of this feature on the Garmin GPS units and allows you to dial a campground hands-free from a touch of your GPS screen.

MP3 Enabled

Another new addition to GPS systems is the ability to play MP3 music. By loading your favorite MP3 music or audio book into your GPS you can play it either through the GPS’ speakers or your in-dash radio. Many of the better GPS units also come with an FM transmitter to link them directly to your in-dash radio so the music comes out of your vehicle’s stereo system. This is particulary useful since the GPS will automatically lower the volume of the music to give you directions, or if you receive a phone call.

Travel Guides and TourGuide™

One of the most exciting new features is Garmin’s new TourGuide™ capability. With TourGuide™ you can purchase completely guided tours for your GPS. Start the TourGuide™ and simply follow the tour. Your GPS will guide you to points of interest, explain them and even show you photos. It’s like having your own tour guide right along for the ride. At CoolRVToyz, we’re very excited about this new technology. We’ve already begun a project to create a Garmin TourGuide™ product for RV’ers who want to tour Route 66 from end to end. In the spring of 2008 we will be travelling the Route ourselves to test the product and plan to make it available by Summer 2008.

Conclusion

Among the most popular GPS navigation systems for RV’ers are the Garmin nuvi 200, 360 and 680, the Lowrance iWAY 600C, the Garmin StreetPilot c550, the Magellan Maestro 4040 and CrossOver GPS, and the TomTom ONE 3rd Edition. All of these units (and many more) are compatible with the CoolRVToyz Ultimate RV Parks & Campgrounds List.

So which GPS is the “best?” That depends entirely on your needs, your preferences and your budget. At CoolRVToyz, we’ve partnered with Tiger GPS, one of the top GPS retailers in the world. Tiger GPS has enough models to choose from that we’re certain you’ll find exact what you need. To make your selection even easier, you can use their Automotive GPS Selector. It will let you select the features you want and show you the models that fit your needs.

The first GPS I bought was a Garmin Streetpilot C550. It turned out to be a great investment. It has plenty of memory, Text-to-Speach capabilities so it speaks street names, Bluetooth to attach to my cell phone, and the interface is simple and intuitive. It didn’t take me long to decide it was a good fit for what I needed a GPS for.

The first nice thing about the Streetpilot is its simple interface. When you turn it on you’re presented with 2 main choices … Where To? and View Map. You touch Where To? and you now have 9 choices. One feature I really like is the Go Home button. Each time we stopped, I simply programmed the GPS that this was now “home”. Then, as we traveled around town, all I had to do was tell the GPS I wanted to Go Home, and it took me right back to the RV. That’s a nice feature when you’ve wandered around a strange city all day and have no clue where you are in relation to the park you’re staying at.

Another great feature is the 6 million points-of-interest (POI) already programmed into the GPS. Want Mexican food tonight? Just touch the Food, Hotels… button and search for what you want by type of food, fuel, banks/ATM’s etc. These POI’s are great, but they were a bit lacking in the RV Parks & Campgrounds. Garmin lumps RV Parks and Campgrounds into the Lodging category and there aren’t that many of them. Unless you know the name of the park, they were difficult to find even if they were already in the GPS.

Fortunately, Garmin built the C550 with lots of memory and the ability to load custom POI’s. That was the primary reason I started compiling the Ultimate RV Parks & Campgrounds Directory. I was a bit frustrated with what was available in the GPS. I looked at other RV Parks Directories and didn’t find any that contained anywhere near all the RV Campgrounds in them. Many of them were good, they were just lacking in completeness. Others had more parks, but their accuracy was not all that great. So, I drew on my professional knowledge of GIS (Geographic Information Systems) and computer databases. The result was the largest RV Campgrounds Directory available anywhere - and it’s still growing. I was using it when we traveled, and giving it to a few friends at first, but my friends told me I was crazy not to sell it, so that’s When CoolRVToyz.com was born.

The other feature of the C550 I use a lot is the Recently Found list. Each time you use the GPS to navigate to a location, it stores that location in it’s Recently Found list. Then, all you need to do if you need to return to that location again is press the Recently Found button and there it is. The GPS keeps the 50 most recently found locations handy for you to return to.

Of course, no product is without its shortcomings. The things I found a bit lacking in the C550 were the lack of a coordinates display and its inability to reset its own time zones when travelling. The C550 doesn’t give you a display of the Latitude and Longitude of your current location. That’s a bit annoying. Fortunately, Garmin fixed that in the Nuvi line. If that’s important to you, you may want to look at the Nuvi instead of the Streetpilot. I’ll be reviewing a Nuvi later, so check back.

The other annoyance is the fact that the C550 can’t reset its own timezone. That seems a bit rediculous, especially since it is a GPS and always “knows” where it is. You’d think it would know when it crossed into a different time zone and would reset itself accordingly. Unfortunately, that’s not the case with the C550. You have to manually adjust the time zones as you travel.

That’s what I think. Feel free to ad your own comments.

Phil King
CoolRVToyz