Entered CNET Catalog: 12/11/2005
SKU: 0610839843763
Manufacturer: ASUSTek Computer Inc.
Manufacturer description
The Mobile Navigator - ASUS MyPal A636 leads the way. Incorporated with the latest SiRF Star III GPS chipset and 25mm x 25 mm GPS Patch Antenna to enhance digital signal reception, improving sensitivity by 15%. With unique swivel antenna for easy angle adjustment, connection is more speedy and stable. You can choose to look deeper and see further down the road or get wide and realistic 3D dynamic directions by placing the A636 vertically or horizontally. The Screen Lock design prevents accidental activation of features. When you turn on lock function, not only screen but also the whole key pad will be locked, there is less power consumption and the usage time can be effectively prolonged.Product summary
The good: An excellent example of integrating GPS into a PDA, the Asus MyPal A636 includes North American maps, a loud speaker, and excellent battery life. It also has Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and Windows Mobile 5.
The bad: Thicker and heavier than competitors, the Asus MyPal A636 has a 3.5-inch screen that's too small for viewing driving directions, and the included 256MB SD card holds the bare minimum of maps. There are also no map updates available at this time.
The bottom line: The Asus MyPal A636 is a PDA with a built-in GPS receiver that puts maps and directions on an equal footing with appointments and e-mail. While it delivers accurate directions and long battery life, it's a bit sluggish.
Editors' review
- Editors' Choice: No
- Reviewed on: 03/10/2006
Like the Garmin Nüvi 350 and the Mio 168RS, the A636's 3.5-inch, 240x320-resolution color screen is a little too small for the car, so expect to squint a little to see details. We like the Lowrance iWay 500c's 5-inch display better, but the A636's spoken directions are right on the money, and the device's speaker (located beneath the screen) is surprisingly loud and clear.
Next to the speaker are two circular control pads. The keys are well marked and easy to use one-handed, but like other PDAs, the A636 comes with a thin plastic stylus for more exact work. In addition to volume up and down, the device has buttons for calendar, voice notes, and contacts, as well as for switching between landscape and portrait mode. Oddly, it doesn't come with a way to instantly launch the mapping app, but you can reprogram one of the shortcut buttons to do this. While the front scroll-up and -down buttons are acceptable, a jog-dial button on the side would have helped make this device even better for quickly going through Web pages or mapping choices. In addition to a headphone jack, the system has a SDIO/MMC expansion slot and a recessed reset button.
Asus includes a vinyl slipcase, AC and auto power adapters, a synchronization cable, a 256MB SanDisk Secure Digital card, a car cradle, and a gooseneck windshield-mounting arm that attaches to a car's windshield with a suction cup. We noticed that the car cradle has a tendency to shake loose of the windshield arm.
Inside the Asus MyPal A636 is an up-to-date PDA with Windows Mobile 5 software and programs. The device comes with the basic organization and planning software as well as the Destinator 5 Personal Navigation application and nine regional map sets, including data for Hawaii, Canada, and Alaska. Unfortunately, you'll need to tediously load three CDs, then select the maps to install on the SD card using Destinator. Plus, the 256MB card has barely enough room to hold the data for the Northeast. If you're planning a trip of any length, we recommend investing in a 1GB card, or you'll have to reload a new set of maps every thousand miles or so.
The maps themselves are accurate, with plenty of detail and thousands of preprogrammed points of interest; in addition, the interface's predictive entry streamlines adding addresses. Those who always seem to be going from one appointment to another will appreciate that any Outlook contact can be mapped in a matter of seconds. It might take a little getting used to, but for the geographically challenged, the interface is a powerful tool, with a compass needle, controls for zooming in and out, and a bird's-eye view of the road ahead. Our favorite is the optional banner that highlights the next turn. While it doesn't show speed or time, the interface displays current altitude if you've acquired a lock on four or more satellites. You can set it to avoid highways, but it lacks a GM-10 receiver for instant traffic updates. At the moment, neither Asus nor Destinator provides map updates to include new roads or take account of construction, but Asus says it's planning to start a free update service in the spring. Alternatively, you can use Microsoft's Streets & Trips maps instead of those provided.
Based on Intel's 416MHz XScale processor and 192MB of memory, the A636 has 128MB of built-in flash ROM and 64MB of RAM; about 85MB is available for use. The GPS mapping uses a SiRF Star III single-chip receiver and a 75mm patch antenna. With Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and infrared, the A636 can always be connected, although the IR windows can be blocked by the GPS antenna. The 1,300mAh battery has a little more capacity than the typical PDA, but Asus doesn't offer an extended-range battery pack. Because it's a Windows Mobile computer at heart, the A636 includes the latest mobile versions of Word, Excel, Internet Explorer, Outlook, Windows Media Player 10, and a basic PowerPoint presentation viewer. Its ActiveSync 4 software set up in a few minutes and worked like a charm for moving data, maps, and music. The Asus status screen consolidates key info about the PDA, but it isn't available when applications are running. Unlike some other PDAs, Asus doesn't include much in the way of extra utilities.
Performance on the Asus MyPal A636 was a mixed bag. In terms of its navigation abilities, we were impressed with the A636's ability to lock onto satellites in about 20 seconds and immediately plot our position with a large arrowhead. Whether we were walking through the concrete canyons of Manhattan or driving up and down the East Coast, it reliably plotted our position and direction. For the most part, its routes were efficient, and it reacts quickly to missed turns by calculating a new course, although on one occasion, it had us going in exactly the wrong direction on a roundabout route. It can be frustrating because every so often, the screen blanks out and takes a second to redraw the entire map.As a PDA, the Asus MyPal 636 is a midrange performer that delivered reliable service over a week of daily use, although it had a tendency to lock up when connected to a host PC that had gone in sleep mode; fortunately, both woke up together. In CNET Labs' performance tests, the A636's CPU index score fell midway between that of the HP iPaq hx2790, but its SPB benchmark score (239) was 20 percent less than either of them. The Wi-Fi radio's 95-foot range was acceptable for office or hot spot use but measured 50 percent less than its competitors. On the bright side, with nearly nine hours of battery life available, it can run for twice as long as the Mio 168RS or three hours longer than the Garmin Nüvi 350.
CNET Labs project leader Dong Van Ngo contributed to the performance analysis.
User opinions
Select a User Opinion to view: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11out of 11 user reviews
GPS works better than standalone Garmin and Tomtom
Pros: Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPS, Organizer, Multimedia, Expansion slot
Cons: People may find it thicker but it fits perfect in my hand
out of 11 user reviews
Not the prettiest PDA out there, but it does the job well!
Pros: Big, bright screen, Swivel antenna, Battery life
Cons: Not a looker
out of 11 user reviews
I agree with most of what Halfsheep had to say about this product.
Pros: ASUS makes great products and the battery life is fantastic. The only thing Halfsheep left out.
Cons: Big and bulky and no WIFI activesync. You have to love Microsoft. Just tell me how much it will cost for WIFI activesync.
out of 11 user reviews
Great product. Poor CNet Review
Pros: Excelent features for a great price. Move below
Cons: Unit's body tends to scratch a bit easier than average.
The A636 is a very good performing pocketPC, with a reasonable CPU performance, very good graphics capability and fantastic battery life.
The combination of features that you'll find on this unit are hard to find on others. Bluetooth (newer A636'N' model has bluetooth v2), Wifi (also updated on the 'N' model) and integrated foldable GPS are all there for a decent price.
For people on a tighter budget, the A632(N) is a worthy option. The 632 drops integrated WiFi support, but does add an extra MicroDS memory card slot in addition to the SDIO slot. This means that you could buy a Wifi (or other) module in the future, without losing the ability to use a storage card at the same time. There is no other difference between them. 60-80 Euro difference in price for the two different models here in Germany.
Oh... and where CNet's reviewer got the idea of the screen being too small for navigation I'll never know. How big is his PDA then?
For
out of 11 user reviews
CNET Harsh but not Spectacular either
Pros: Hardware design, Feature Rich - WiFi and GPS,
Cons: WinCE, Initial Firmware, Mapping UI, Syncing
In addition to CNET being harsh, I think they are incorrect or misleading about a couple of things:
1 - you CAN get to the mapping software with one button press (it's just not a labeled button but it's easy enough - in fact if anything you may launch it too often by mistake and have to wait a while (30 secs?) to cancel out of it.)
2 - It does show your speed and times on the map. You can toggle through the info bars that show up on your map. Pick the ones you like best. This was a nice feature. Turn them on, off, show times, next turn, compass, etc.
Good:
I really liked the design. Some say it's bland. I don't agree or I don't care. It's functionality and useability I want. This has great features. More than any competitor I've seen.
Not so Good:
Destinator mapping software has a very unintuitive interface. Wife instantly hated it. Another person said, "my God, this is the worst UI I've ever seen!" That's extreme . You do get used to it but...be aware.
I don't have a lot of GPS experience but the directions were incorrect more often than I would have liked. I think this may be because there is little or no preferential treatment given to highways really. And no option to change that. You can avoid tolls but you can't "prefer highways". I had it, send me off a highway and have me come right back on the same ramp, tell me to get off the highway 10 miles before the best exit which was 1 mile from my destination (several times), incorporate lots of minor roads when better highway options existed, stuff like that. Basically, the wife thought it was always wrong. That's a stretch but again, it was wrong enough that I had to admit she had a valid point in being upset at the thing.
Entering some destinations was really hard and sometimes impossible. I don't recall exactly what it was but there was some bug where you could get to a point where it would not let you enter the address. It kept you on the first letter only. I had to quit and start over to get past that. Most of the time it worked however. Generally though, it just took longer than I would have liked from - get in the car to get gps lock, address entered, directons calculated and get moving. (All that can take 2 minutes maybe? Never timed it but it seemed long.)
When you first start out you sometimes don't know which way to go (e.g. o.k. so out of this parking lot do I go left or right?) Similarly, when you get to destination, it just says you have arrived. It doesn't tell you which side of the street your destination is. I thought this was a stupid complaint at first but it can be quite bad, on significant or divided roads (picture shopping centers on both sides of the street - which one has you destination?)
Other comments:
Screen - it is hard to see in bright light and difficult to bump up in brightness when you can't see it. I assume this is normal problem. I've never seen otherwise although I have seen devices you can bump up without having to see the screen.
Initial Firmware - locked up alot after going to sleep mode. Turns out it's a firmware issue. Updated firmware, user support site is not good and not very helpful but, upgrade did correct that issue. However, new firmware was not compatible with shipped Sync Software. So...while it synced to Outlook server at work with the original firmware, it did not with new firmware. This is probably not a problem for most users but was for me at the time.
OS - A note that's not really a knock on ASUS - it's completely not their fault. If you already like Win CE then it may be ok for you but it was a problem for me and another factor in my return. I knew going in, it would be more clicks to do things than on a Palm and I was ok with that. I'm a 100% Windows guy - not THAT big a deal. Yes I wish it was better. However, I figured I'd at least get the benefit of the native windows pocket office applications and that would be a huge benefit for work. Way wrong. I was shocked at how bad the pocket office apps were. They are far less compatible with the desktop Office apps than the Palm counterparts I had many many years ago. Synching is bad, features are not supported on handheld - just terrible. MS should really be ashamed of that. I couldn't use any of my work spreadsheets (the same ones that worked very well on Palm OS.) - Really annoying. So much for productivity there.
Slip Case - makes the unit a little bulky in your pocket but it's workable.
All that said, I still think it's very good overall. I haven't bought a replacement because nothing is better yet as far as I can tell. Competitors either have the same issues, smaller screens, no WiFi, etc. So this is as good as it gets for now I think.
out of 11 user reviews
Value for money!
Pros: All connectivity options!
Cons: No GPRS/GSM
out of 11 user reviews
This PDA and GPS combo in my opinion is a good one and Im quite happy with my purchase.
Pros: PDA/GPS in one, strong satellite signal, great battery life
Cons: 256Mb SD card is rather small to store maps
out of 11 user reviews
Great "Bang For Your Buck" CNET Got it Wrong !!!
Pros: Excellent GPS, Extra Long Battery Life, Solid Construction.
Cons: No Desktop Cradle
out of 11 user reviews
Great product, Bad review
Pros: All in one package
Cons: Somewhat big
It has powerfull CPU as well.
With other products if you want to check mail you have to buy a WI-FI add-on and then you have to remove the memory card.
With all the add-ons other products cost the same.
I think this review makes injustice with this product since there are no better alternatives with the same features.
out of 11 user reviews
great product if you need a PDA and GPS unit in one
Pros: Very accurate GPS
Cons: none at all
out of 11 user reviews
Excellent PDA/Personal Navigator
Pros: Bright screen, solid construction, great battery life
Cons: No need to ever fold out the adjustable antenna because of great reception :-)
