Reviewed by: vleek on 08-May-08 Rating:

Strengths:light, fast, long battery life, TTS, value for money

Weaknesses:navigation s/w, cheap easy-scratchable plastic, mount

Summary:I bought this GPS as a gift to my in-law. Well, in my viewpoint, the main drawback is s/w. Routing is strange, maps are not up-to-date, and number of POI is not impressive. Some people reported installing better version of s/w like iGO, but you\'ll need to remove SD card, which is sealed by warranty label. While I don’t like its user interface, my wife and mother-in-law found somehow like it. So may be it’s personal choice.
Hardware and build quality is good – the screen, GPS chipset, CPU speed, battery life. So far I have not seen sat. signal reception problems. CPU is fast and responsive. Scrolling maps somehow is easier than other navigation devices that I tried. Impressive battery life (up to 6 hours) makes it suitable for walking, but in that case topo maps would be great. I would buy them, if it would be an option.

Reviewed by: whatuphomey on 04-Mar-08 Rating:

Strengths:TTS

Weaknesses:Slow to aquire signal

Summary:Once this GPS gets a signal (which takes mine at least 2 minutes when booting up), it works really well. The Maps and directions are accurate. I\'ve used it all over town where I know the best routes to go, and the GPS usually picks the same route. The text to speech works great.

Reviewed by: ranvijaychoudhary on 01-Feb-08 Rating:

Strengths:Low PriceText to speechslim design

Weaknesses:not found yet

Summary:5-stars as one of the best in this price range, since it does what it\'s supposed to do,Its Text to speech feature is very good at this price range...Now i\'m feeling confident in going at any new place.

Reviewed by: vivek007 on 18-Jan-08 Rating:

Strengths:Has all features compared to expensive GPS Navigators

Weaknesses:Text-to-Speech is not as it sounds and cannot take the SD card out w/0 voiding the warranty.

Summary:This GPS system is great when compared to the high-end models from Garmin and TomTom. The Text-to-Speech is good but it does not pronunce the \'Exit\' names off the highway. This is sort of confusing to me. Also, I cannot take SD card out w/o voiding the warranty. I purchased this at Fry\'s for $99(after rebate)..its a bargain and can\'t complain for what it does. The software is not intuitive and needs some practice for a novice. I hope Pharos releases a firmware ugrade to update the interface. Overall, its a good piece for the price.

Reviewed by: trishalishious on 11-Jan-08 Rating:

Strengths:Very Portable, very accurate!

Weaknesses:smaller screen, might be hard to see for people with bad eyesight.

Summary:For the price, this is a very good gps system. I would highly recommend it to other people. My co-worker is going to purchass the same product. My mother-in-law has the Garmin and she paid over twice the price. This system is of equal operation.

Reviewed by: dl97ag on 26-Dec-07 Rating:

Strengths:- Compact, light- Text-to-speech street name announcements- Includes car/AC/USB adaptors, windshield mount kit, case, stylus- Long battery life- Configurable map screen

Weaknesses:- Volume must be almost full before street announcements are audible in car- When compared side-by-side with comparable Garmin unit, the Pharos had slight update delay when making turns

Summary:This GPS unit does quite well, even outside mid-to-large citys\' limits. First used at inlaws who live outside Weatherford, TX, and it could navigate the smaller roads around their home. When used side-by-side a similar Garmin unit, both operated about the same except the Garmin had quicker screen refreshes when taking turns (windy roads or turning onto another street). Slight negative was requirement to crank up volume before text-to-speech feature was even audible inside the car; can\'t reduce volume of \"button\" clicks, so they\'re quite loud in this case. Would recommend this to others, especially if obtainable between $100-150 after applicable rebate(s).

Reviewed by: hmichail on 26-Dec-07 Rating:

Strengths:smallgood routingclear directions

Weaknesses:not so loud voicecontrols not always intuitive

Summary:very nice small unit that does its job well. Comes with nice travel case, as well as car, wall, and computer charger cables. Bought this as a gift, and it was very well received. Tried it several days now and it always was very accurate with getting you where you need to go.

Reviewed by: beavis72 on 22-Dec-07 Rating:

Strengths:Nice bright screen, quick satellite lock, quick route re-calculation, decent accuracy.

Weaknesses:Cradle does not have direct power hookup, brightness setting resets back to 100% after power up.

Summary:The screen is nice and bright, satellite usually locks on within a minute. Re-routing is very quick, and accuracy is decent so far. The TTS is a nice feature especially at this price range. User interface is not bad. Overall a great value for the price I paid.

The only negatives I\'ve found so far are 1) The cradle does not have a direct power hookup (you\'ll have to put the unit into the cradle then hook up the power cord to the side of the unit)-- a minor inconvenience, and 2) brightness resets back to 100% if you power down then power up again.

Reviewed by: orcan1 on 15-Dec-07 Rating:

Strengths:Very light & Portable, Nice interface, Inexpensive.

Weaknesses:Not many features compared to the high-end models.

Summary:I have used Magellan as well as TomTom GO 910. Compared to Magellan the processor is a little Slow and compared to TomTom it does Not have many features. But for the price it is more bang for my buck! I find it accurate and reliable although I was mislead once and rerouted but thats inevitable even with the expensive GPSs. The spoken words are very clear and loud. I was surprised to find that some of the addresses in my area are pretty new and they were present in its database. So the maps are also updated atleast where I live. Overall it is a keeper!

Reviewed by: zxp9 on 11-Dec-07 Rating:

Strengths:Good value, over my expectation; lots of options, easy to understand and choose; the reaction is quick, once you choose the destination, it gives you the direction within 10 seconds

Weaknesses:No, I haven\'t found any

Summary:This GPS does everything I want. I bought this for my best friend. I had a trial for a day. It seems fine for me. Plus there is a rebate. So good value. The software is pretty good, the process time is within 10 seconds.

Reviewed by: junjunxu on 09-Dec-07 Rating:

Strengths:Text-to-speech feature; quick re-route; low price

Weaknesses:no Canadian map available out of the box

Summary:I bought this device for $99 after $50 rebate from Fry\'s and tested it for a week, especially with a 355-mile round trip.
I had been using PDA running Tomtom with bluetooth GPS before I got this device. My experience is that this is a nice GPS, everything is comparable with PDA version of Tomtom plus text-to-speech feature that usually comes with more expansive GPS devices.

The only thing missing is Canadian map but it can work flawless with \"underground\" Canadian map, which saved me time and effort to hack it to run Tomtom just for the missing map.

Reviewed by: owl1979 on 29-Nov-07 Rating:

Strengths:- Destinator v7- clean interface- good options- quick to pick up GPS on cold start (took ~15 seconds while sitting indoors about 8 feet from window)- works as expected- TTS- HACKABLE!

Weaknesses:- no battery meter in Destinator v7- not sure if I\'ll get the advertised 5-6 hours battery

Summary:Price paid:
$83, after rebates/taxes/shipping (paypal 20% + manufacturer)
MSRP:
$200

Included in box:
- GPS unit, 3.5\" screen (with 1GB unlabelled SD card)
- carrying case (pretty good quality)
- home/wall charger
- car charger
- USB cable (charge with computer)
- window mount (_much_ better than the pdr135 mount I have)
- cd manual
- warranty card
- quick start poster

Software:
- Windows CE .NET 4.2 Core
- Destinator v7

Processor:
- Motorola i.MX21 @ 266Mhz

Memory:
- 64MB, about 45MB usable (guessed)

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My current/previous GPS devices:
- Belkin Bluetooth (rebaded Fortuna) with Belkin Navigator (forget which maps) + Compaq iPaq h1940 (or laptop with bluetooth) = I love this unit, still use it but it\'s not as convenient as a standalone unit
- Mio C220 - basic unit - does what it needs to do but sometimes not accurate
- Pharos PDR135 - Ostia software not great, but loaded with Tom Tom Navigator or other software this unit works well (hackable)

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The Pharos PDR150 does what it\'s supposed to do. I\'ve only been using this for a day so far but it seems fine. The Destinator v7 softare seems fine, the GPS processor works just like the other SiRFstarIII chipsets

The great thing is that this unit is _hackable_ - I\'ve loaded Tom Tom Navigator v6 and it works fine - I\'m switching between Destinator v7 and Tom Tom Navigator v6 to test out and play.

(perhaps I\'ll write more if pricegrabber starts offering a rebate for this review ;))

OVERALL:
5-stars as one of the best in this price range, since it does what it\'s supposed to do, has TTS, is hackable, and has an SD-card slot. For $80, how can I complain? This is the best bang-for-the-buck and beats out all the other BF2007 GPS deals (FYI I purchased this on \"Cyber Monday 2007\")