Mio c310x

Mio made what I consider a typical mistake of placing the power connector (in this case the mini USB plug) at the bottom of the device. This makes it harder to have the GPS sit low on the dash. With the device higher it is more prone to vibration and may obstruct your forward view a tiny bit more than if it could rest on the dash completely like the Nuvi can.

The process of routing to an address works very well. You click ‘Menu’ –> ‘Address’ then select from either your current city, a list of recent cities you navigated to, or another city. As you enter in the city name, a number to the right side of the display indicates how many cities match what you have typed in so far. This gives you great instant feedback and will let you know when you have typed enough so that you can select the city from a list based on what you have typed in so far. A similar search function is provided for the street name.

There are a couple of other issues I have with the interface. The preferences are located in various locations all over the device and can be difficult to find. For example I couldn’t remember how to force day/night modes. At first i went to the settings button on the side, then hit the ‘Tools’ button and looked in ‘General’ with the gear icon. Not there. Then I went back to the settings button on the side, hit ‘Tools’ again, and this time clicked on ‘Advanced’ with the tools icon. Not in there either. Finally I went back to the ‘Cockpit’, clicked on ‘Menu’, then clicked on the tiny gear icon, and clicked the icon with the sun/moon on it. It would be much easier if all of the preferences for the Map mode were in one place.

Like other devices at this price point, there is no Bluetooth hands-free calling, no traffic receiver, no text-to-speech, and no option to add a traffic receiver later. However at this price those features are not expected. There is an MP3 player, however. It works like most other GPS MP3 players and if you are not going to use it with headphones like an iPod then the quality of the speaker isn’t good enough to replace your car stereo anytime soon. The Mio c310x also comes with the SiRFstarIII chipset which makes signal acquisition fast and reliable.