Mio DigiWalker C230 Portable GPS Unit - Features
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The Mio C230 is not jam-packed with features, but it does offer some good ones. It would be hard to find a GPS device, in this price range, that offers much more than the C230 does. So although you won't get Bluetooth, tons of POI, or a video player, you will still get a sufficient amount of features for the under $200 price tag.
Navigation Features
The C230 is equipped with a 20-channel SiRFstarIII chip set, which is WAAS-enabled. This allows for the best possible accuracy in a device of this kind. The maps are provided through TeleAtlas, and the U.S. version of the C230 will feature maps of the United States and Puerto Rico.
The navigation choices include the standard options such as shortest, fastest and most economical; you can type in an address, or point to a destination on the map and select "Route to." The internal keyboard is a little cramped because of the compact size of the C230. There is a nice built-in feature that minimizes accidentally hitting the wrong button on the keyboard. This feature will grey out any keys that the device sees as not an option as you are typing in an address or destination.
Points of Interest (POI) Database
This device does have a database of POIs built into it, but I have read conflicting reports of exactly how many POIs are in the database. CNET claims that the C230 has 3.5 million POIs, while both GPS Track Log and GPS Lodge claim it has 1.7 million POIs. I looked into this discrepancy, and I found that the C230 only has around 1 million POIs right out of the box. You can add your own POIs to the database when necessary.
I think that some people have confused the C220 with the C230, as the C220 contains a POI database of 3.5 million. Mio claims that the reason for the decline in POIs in the newer model was because of memory issues. The TTS feature probably sucks up a lot of memory, and therefore memory had to be cut from somewhere. To me, it's a good trade off.
Text to Speech (TTS)
I have already discussed this feature earlier in this review, so I will not cover it in depth here. This is probably the most important feature in the C230, and it's really surprising to see it in such an inexpensive device. Hopefully other GPS manufacturers will take notice, and start including this feature in their budget GPS devices.
The voice used by Mio for the TTS and voice-guided directions features does sound a bit robotic. It is still easy to hear and understand it though.
Map screen/Cockpit View
Users have their choice of either a map screen or a cockpit view screen while navigating. The map screen is just a basic navigation screen consisting of a map of your route. The cockpit view is much more intuitive. This view allows you to see your route in a 3D fashion, and it also gives you some important information alongside the map. This information is customizable and it includes:
You can choose three of the items listed above to be displayed in the cockpit view. The cockpit view also displays the distance to next turn, as well as the direction of the next turn.
I find the cockpit view in the C230 to be very informative and visually appealing. I think that first-timers especially will find the cockpit view to be very appealing and useful.
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