Clarion named its latest car entertainment center the N.I.
C.E. P200, with that acronym standing for Navigation In Car Entertainment system, and entertain it does with its 7-inch touchscreen LCD and 20GB of storage, 10GB of which is reserved for entertainment media storage.
It's Sirius satellite-ready and can store tons of MP3s, WMAs and WMV files for playback. Plus, there's an input for a backup camera, one of the most practical uses for such a system.
It's hard to believe this unit has a 7-inch screen and is still portable, where most other portable navi systems have a smaller screen and form factor.
Looks like a highly versatile system, but you'll pay dearly for its myriad features mdash;it's retailing for $1300. Seems like for that much money you'd get more than 2 million points of interest (POI), for instance, the costs half that and gives you 7 million POIs.
[Clarion USA, via ]
The Nissan intelligent transportation system is currently being testing in Japan, and works by letting vehicles talk to other vehicles as well as infrastructure to reduce traffic and accidents. The information exchanged between cars and infrastructure let vehicles have a visual representation of what other vehicles are coming, how fast they're going, and how many cars are in which direction.
The technology also lets cars access "fastest-route" information, calculated by organizing all the data reported from mobile phones, taxi services, and vehicles using this system.
How much traffic is on a road is shown via the real time map by thin or thick lines, which then helps your GPS system take the fastest route. Pretty great for when you have to commute back and forth to work mdash;something we're glad to have given up.
The communications portion should be in testing until the end of fiscal '07, and the dynamic route finding will be tested 'til end of fiscal '08.
After that, it'll probably be a few years before it's deployed in Japan, and a bunch more before we get them here mdash;if we get them at all.
This in-dash entertainment center from Hong Kong has a 6.5-inch screen and 800x480 resolution.
Front-and-center on its feature list is a GPS navigator and the ability to connect to the Internet via GPRS networks. And you know what that means mdash;you can also use it as a GSM cellphone. It's an actual PC, too, with a 20GB hard disk and 128MB of RAM, presided over by a 400MHz AMD AU1200 chip.
Not sure how all that would react to the 150 temperature inside a hot car on the Fourth of July.
It has everything else you might need in a car radio, too, such as AM/FM radio along with CD, DVD, and MP3 players, and there's even a USB and headset port in front. Unfortunately, it's probably just as clumsy to control as its UMPC cousins, because you navigate around its Windows CE 5.
0 interface with a stylus pen.
For the benefit of the rest of us, just don't be watching that Mad Max DVD while you're barreling down the highway, please.
[Alibaba.
com, via ]
RAM Mounts think you do, and is offering this mount for $7.63 (weird price) that holds brands like Garmin, Magellan, TomTom, and others.
Is this what would want?
No, he would ride his bike down that damn mountain, kick ass and chew gum, and he's all out of sugar-free gum (he's diabetic so he has to watch his intake).
(We have no idea whether he's diabetic or not.)
This thing's probably not legal in the UK, or many states in the US, like California, but Polaroid has combined a GPS Nav system with a DVD Player.
The navigation itself isn't anything out of the ordinary. It uses the Sirf Star III GPS Processor and has a touchscreen interface. But, the 5.
6" screen allows you to watch The Fast and The Furious while you're barreling down the 101 at 5 miles an hour.
Also, the system has a built-in FM transmitter, so that means you can listen to the audio from your movie through your car's speakers. However, you can't listen to music and this at the same time, unlike in-dash navigation systems.
Available at Target.
If you're looking for car stoked with technology, the has more techno-goodness inside than any other vehicle offered for sale in North America, says the Telematics Research Group (TRG).
What's the big deal?
There's a 30GB hard drive for both music and navigation, and enough cameras to produce a TV talk show mdash;three of 'em mdash;to help you to park the thing as well as keep you in your lane. There's also the obligatory touchscreen voice-activated navigation system, Bluetooth for your phone, live traffic reports and a rockin' 19-speaker Mark Levinson sound system that can play back MP3s. And then there's that eight-speed automatic transmission.
You'll see the LS 460 rolling out this fall, replacing the Lexus LS 430. We're hearing there's even a hybrid LS model on the way. Too bad it costs upwards of $60,000 or we'd be blogging from one right now.
[Telematics Research Group, via ]
In addition to giving you turn-by-turn directions, it doubles as an MP3 player, too, where you can fill up an SD card with your favorite tunes and rock on.
Sounds like it's time for a road trip. Available now for $750, it's also equipped to receive Radio Data System traffic info starting this summer, but that will cost you a $60 annual fee.
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