Though it may be a fairly ordinary PDA, the M5 is an extraordinary GPS device. It offers a bounty of desirable navigation features, all wrapped in an easy-to-learn, icon-based interface. Just about every feature can be accessed by repeatedly pressing the Que button, which cycles through Garmin's QueMap, QueTrip, QueFind, and QueRoutes screens. (If you've already plotted a destination, a QueTurns screen is added to the mix, showing a MapQuest-like text description of the route.)
QueMap is the map itself, which includes a handy toolbar along the bottom for quick access to some of the aforementioned screens. By far, the best feature here is Where Am I, which displays your current latitude and longitude, the nearest address and major intersections, and an option to add the locale to your My Locations list. We also like the pop-up slider for adjusting map detail and adding/removing points of interest (POI). As for the actual maps, they're attractive and easy to read, though the relatively small size of the M5's screen could prove frustrating to those with less than perfect eyesight.
The M5 integrates with your address book much better than the iQue 3600. Just tap any entry, select Que from the fly-out menu, and click Route To It. Presto--you're on your way. The Garmin also features an excellent address lookup utility, and it's even better at finding categorical POI such as restaurants, gas stations, and the like. You can easily search by name, proximity to current location, proximity to the route destination, and other criteria.
Other GPS amenities include a route-to-home option; user-selectable avoidance features for staying off, say, unpaved roads; distance-based detour plotting for those times when you encounter a sign that says something to the effect of, "Road construction next 5 miles;" and a power-saving standby mode that dims the screen while keeping navigation active (nice for when you need to use your vehicle's cigarette lighter for other purposes).
In CNET Labs' tests, the Garmin iQue M5 offered very good performance. While we've seen faster systems overall, this was the quickest unit we've yet tested with Intel's 416MHz PXA272 XScale processor; to date, it's the fifth-speediest Pocket PC we've reviewed. Its performance was only a few points less than that of the HP iPaq hx4700, which sports a faster 624MHz Intel PXA270 processor. We noticed, however, that like many Pocket PCs, the M5 slowed down considerably when running multiple programs. We had to manually close some apps to restore the device's otherwise preppy operation.The Garmin iQue M5 offered decent battery life. While playing a looped video clip with wireless off and the backlight set to high, the system lasted 4.4 hours. This was nowhere near the best battery life we've seen, but it was still a respectable score. Plus, since our drain tests are designed to zap power as fast as possible, you'll get more mileage out of your handheld with normal use.
As a GPS device, the iQue M5 performed like a champ. It consistently gave us accurate driving directions and spot-on navigation. It also proved sufficiently speedy; in an informal test, we clocked its cold-start satellite lock at around 40 seconds, beating the company's claim of 45 seconds. It's quick to calculate routes, too, usually taking no more than about 10 seconds to compute a typical crosstown path. We found Garmin's map data reasonably current, though the POI database seemed out of date by at least a year.
CNET Labs assistant manager Eric Franklin contributed to the performance analysis.
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