The title of the “best GPS-phone” is still up for grabs, with no clear handset taking the cake, so far. Not that there’s any lack of competing units, though, with Nokia having a couple of models out there, HTC with the Cruise, Pharos and, of course, the Garmin-Asus partnership.
Garmin-Asus’ first phone, the Nuvifone G60, was a decent effort, although the Linux base (which they are abandoning) makes it very unattractive. Their second release, the Nuvifone M20, marries the same built-in navigation favors, along with Windows Mobile 6.1 at the helm.
In truth, the G60 is probably the better in-car GPS, with its larger display. While the M20 fits in the same GPS radio, software, maps and dashboard mounts, the device comes with a relatively small 2.8-inch screen, making excellent vision a primary requirement when used inside a vehicle. For what it’s worth, the navigation suite is excellent, with a powerful turn-by-turn navigation and a comprehensive POI database.
Physically, the M20 has a very attractive candybar form factor that’s compact and slim. The touchscreen display is sharp and bright, making for an excellent screen when performing regular phone functions. Fonts and icons are a tad too small, though, making the use of a stylus an absolute necessity.
Voice calls are topnotch, although the speakerphone adds a bit of noticeable echo. OS performance is decent, but not super fast, even with the installed 528MHz processor and 288MB of RAM. The 920mAh battery, if you keep the GPS radio turned on, should require frequent charging, at least once every day and a half.
Connectivity suite is quite complete, with HSDPA, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. Browsing, like much of the phone, is largely average, with quick page loads, but some delay with the set of functions (e.g. zoom). Being a Windows Mobile handset, it comes with one of the complete messaging capabilities around, along with being highly-extensible due to the wide number of available apps. The onscreen QWERTY is a problem, being too cramped for comfort. Other features include 4GB of onboard storage (no expansion options), a 3.0 megapixel camera (average quality, but unusable in poorly-lit settings) and decent multimedia capabilities.
Overall, the Garmin-Asus Nuvifone M20 is a decent phone that fails where it matters most: being a usable in-car GPS. While I love the phone design, the small screen is really quite the deal-breaker.
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