Hertz vehicle rental has offered its NeverLost GPS rental service since the late 1990s. The first few generations were a bit clunky; now in its fifth generation, the NeverLost system has evolved into a much more usable device with features such as a touch-screen interface and Internet-connectivity. But as the NeverLost system has been evolving, so has the world of standalone portable navigation devices. We were tossed the keys to a Hertz rental vehicle equipped with NeverLost and given the task of seeing if the system meets our expectations for a modern GPS device.

The NeverLost Gen 5 system consists of a touch-screen navigation device that is mounted to the rental vehicle's dashboard. The unit features a 4-inch color touch screen with a resolution of 320 by 240 pixels. Just below the screen is a bank of rubber buttons for power, view, back, enter, info, and volume, along with a small directional pad. The inclusion of the directional pad and the enter button seem a bit redundant considering the screen's touch sensitivity, but we can accept that some users may prefer physical controls. Between the smallish screen size, thick rubber buttons, and chunky design (about 1.5 inches thick), the NeverLost's aesthetic feels like a holdover from an era past, more DynaTAC than Droid. Everything about the NeverLost screams, "I'm a useful tool, not a sexy gadget."

The NeverLost system didn't really make a good first impression with its chunky design, but over a few days use, it won us over with its utility and functionality.… Read more

Does an Android device with a 3.2-inch screen still qualify as a "tablet"? That was the first question that popped into my head when I saw images of the Archos 32 Android tablet that were published Tuesday by the FCC.

Maybe I'm still feeling the effects of my time with the Dell Streak, but aren't tablets supposed to stretch beyond the confines of the pocket? Maybe not. It seems manufacturers have decided anything with a smartphone OS and a touch screen is a tablet--a tactic that may come back to bite them if Apple starts … Read more

Yesterday, we took a look at Bracketron's MobileDock universal smartphone dock; today we get our hands on its Nav-Mat II, a dashboard-mounting solution for GPS devices that uses the same Temporbond technology to add a semipermanent attachment point for your existing GPS or smartphone suction cup mount to any vehicle's dashboard.

As you've probably guessed, we're big fans of dashboard mounting our GPS devices. Though nearly every device ships with a suction cup windshield mount, we'd rather attach to the dash. Dashboard mounting has the benefits of keeping your device closer for easier access and clear of the windshield for better visibility. Most GPS devices also ship with a dashboard-mounting disk, but this is often an adhesive-backed permanent mounting solution that isn't transportable from vehicle-to-vehicle and can potentially mar sensitive dashboard materials, such as leather, when the time comes to remove this puck.

That's where the Nav-Mat II comes in.… Read more

A wallpaper app that steals your personal info, piracy controls coming to the Android Marketplace, and a look into the world of Android gaming. Plus, Jeff Bakalar shares an awesome tip on creating itineraries for Google Maps Navigation, and Jessica Dolcourt helps us pronounce the death of the Android phone that started it all.

Updated: The wallpaper app discussed in this episode has since been cleared of any wrong-doing by Google itself. More details on that here.

We're back with another installment of our How to update your GPS maps series. This week, we're taking on TomTom's Ease, One, XL, and XXL models. The process is the same for any model in TomTom's line up, and  thankfully, it is much simpler than our last update was.

The relative ease with which you can update a  TomTom's software can be attributed to the TomTom Home software, a one-stop shop for updating map data, grabbing new firmware, downloading custom voices, and syncing Map Share, and IQ Routes data. Garmin could stand to … Read more

Circling a crowded neighborhood for 45 minutes looking for a parking spot is easily my least favorite part of driving. Google's latest experimental app from its Labs aims to make finding street parking just a bit easier. Appropriately dubbed Open Spot, this free app for Android phones provides a user-generated map of available parking spaces near the user's current position.

Open Spot uses the GPS positioning function present in most smartphones to track your position, displaying the surrounding area using Google Maps. At the beginning of a trip, you use Open Spot to mark the parking space you … Read more

U.S. Cellular is teaming with TeleNav to bring turn-by-turn navigation to the carrier's smartphones.

On Friday, the carrier announced its Your Navigator Deluxe service that offers such features as voice-guided directions, 3D maps, speech recognition, more than 12 million business listings, and traffic and weather information. Even better, there isn't an additional fee to use TeleNav as it's all included in U.S. Cellular's new smartphone data plan, which costs $30 per month.

Supported smartphones include the recently announced Samsung Acclaim, as well as the HTC Touch Pro2, HTC Snap, the RIM BlackBerry Tour 9630, … Read more

With more than a few "Star Wars" nerds in-house here at CNET, our collective interest was piqued when TomTom made Darth Vader available as a celebrity VoiceSkin for its GPS navigators. When protocol droid C-3PO was announced as the second voice, we thought, "Come on, nobody likes Threepio!" Today, TomTom announced the VoiceSkin that we've all been waiting for. (No, not Chewbacca or R2-D2; those guys don't even speak English.) We're talking about Jedi Master Yoda.

That's right; you can now get your turn-by-turn directions read to you in the most confusing … Read more

The RoadMate 3065 Commuter is the flagship model of Magellan's 2010 line of GPS navigators. With its RDS traffic receiver with free lifetime traffic updates and Bluetooth hands-free speakerphone, it's already one of the most fully featured units in Magellan's current lineup.

However, the 3065 truly distinguishes itself from the rest of the line--and from any other GPS device we've tested--with its Traffic Wakeup feature. Once set, the RoadMate 3065 will attempt to capture a more complete snapshot of the traffic on your morning and afternoon commutes by booting itself ahead of time to download its … Read more