TomTom have moved towards standardising their various platforms on a  core navigation engine and the pocket PC platform seems to have been one of the last to get moved over to the new code. The package has change a bit too, the UK maps are now supplied on a 128mb SD card and there is no cradle or car holder for your PDA, instead this vanilla pack has just a charging lead for the supplied Bluetooth GPS receiver.

Using pre installed maps on the SD card means set-up is a simple as sliding the card into a PDA, here we are testing with an Ipaq and seconds after putting the card in and authorising the software we are up and running. The only remaining step is to pair our Bluetooth enabled Ipaq with the TomTom 5 GPS receiver, again this is painless and the new BT receiver seems far better built than the outgoing model.

The TomTom 5 navigator GUI is a vast improvement on the version 3 software and very similar to the Go range of units, in general the new version makes the best use of the whole PDA screen and is capable of operation in landscape as well as portrait modes. Clearly more thought has gone into the screen layouts with the menus having just the right number of icons well spaced allowing operation by finger rather than stylus, the only downside is the fingerprint marks left on the PDA screen.

Having secured our Ipaq and also powered up the BT receiver it was time to set in a route, the interface is again improved with a multitude of options in entering your destination, there is the straightforward address input which is aided by a text message style system plus the ability to navigate to any POI or city centre. Oh and we nearly didn't mention you can now use those new fangled postcode thingies, of course they have been around for ages but it seems TomTom have at last discovered the 7 digit method of entering a destination.

Guidance is as efficient as we have come to expect from TomTom and while the volume of the spoken instructions depends on the capability of your PDA, the Ogg Vorbis encoded words are as loud as they can be and still without any sign of distortion. The on screen graphics provide an excellent map view, we prefer the overhead map but there is also a 3D view for the Playstation generation and a arrows only screen for those who want pure simplicity or any of us who exceed the user defined safety speed.

All too soon the calm voice of the TomTom 5 had guided us along the very tricky route to "the shops" and so we thought it best to pose it a bit more of a challenge and what better than a cross London rush hour journey. Our journey was via postcode and almost as soon as the route was finished we were warned of the London congestion charge and asked if we wanted to re route. Of course being firm believers in Mayor Ken's rip off tax we decided to choose a rote that skirted the zone and drive though many residential neighbourhoods instead.

Heading into darkest suburbia also brings the menace of speed cameras, but fear not TomTom 5 navigator has a built in POI warning system, so no need to download extra freeware bolts on's as with TomTom 3, instead we loaded the pocket GPS database and adjusted the preferences in TomTom to play a bugle when we neared a speed trap.

We set off and were quickly sat in traffic, now TomTom will say "wait there is no need to sit in the traffic" or perhaps you should imagine that in a typical Dutch tone "vait there iss no need to sit in traffik" for why not use TomTom traffic. The PDA version can easily use it's Bluetooth connection to work with a GPRS enabled mobile phone to hook up and get some traffic data, now we didn't get to try this but we've never yet made a PDA work with more than one Bluetooth device at a time. So please don't rely on being able to use this without having to disconnect from the BT GPS receiver, hardly ideal!

En route we managed to foul up a number of times and take the wrong turn, TomTom calmly managed to steer us back on rack without the "make a U turn where possible" of many lesser SatNav systems. We also forced the navigator software to re plot around a "roadblock" with remarkable ease, we know you shouldn't really touch the system while on the move but believe us its very easy.

Overall we cannot help but be impressed with this update to the TomTom PDA version, it's efficient, easy to use and reliable, its hard to fault and perhaps the only feature lacking from it is the supply of a good PDA cradle.

Priced at just under £200 the Bluetooth pack is good value for money and worth the slight premium over lesser systems, it's also available in the USA for $289 meaning PDA users worldwide can at last find a reason for owning a PDA.

Published - 24/07/2005

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