This week, we look at two such devices: Navman's latest in-car navigator, which doubles as a camera; and the latest version of LG's Shine series of upmarket mobile phones, which aim to provide multimedia entertainment on top of their communications features.
Navman S90i

HUMANS visualise when they think. Product developers at Navman recognised this when they created this top-of-the-line unit for its latest S-series.

It has a two-megapixel camera that embeds global positioning satellite co-ordinates in an image when it saves it. So next time you want to go to that place, you can look it up in the image library, click on it and the global positioning system will plot a route (as long as no ocean crossings are involved.

Doubters may ask: what is the advantage of having to go to a place to get the image in the first place? It's a fair question for leisure-seekers and it is why Navman's software people redesigned its NavDesk software to work with Flickr and Google Earth. Drag a GPS-encoded picture of your desired destination into the system and tap the navigate-to icon and you're on your way.

Navman engineers have kept the number of switches and buttons to a minimum. In this case, two - power and the camera's shutter release. The rest is done by touchscreen.

On the plus side, the cancel navigation function is on-screen. One tap and the disembodied voice is silenced. This is a good function, as most systems hide it in different places in the menu tree.

My co-pilot had no trouble punching in destinations. That earns this unit points, as she has a low tolerance for satnav systems that take longer to program than it would to look up a map.

On the negative side. A reset/reboot button would be handy. The review unit got stuck and would only display the splash page (the one it shows when starting up) or the picture-taking page. This glitch made the unit unusable until I asked it to navigate to a place nearby that I had taken an image of - the Akaroa lighthouse in New Zealand.

From then on it displayed the map and the menu and we were back in action, discovering the Banks Peninsula, which is about an hour's drive from Christchurch. I chose to test the S90i in New Zealand as I wanted to use a Navman in its spiritual homeland. The company's roots are in Peter Maire's Auckland garage in 1986.

An earlier test of Navman gear in New Zealand was disappointing. This time the user experience was much better (when the system was operational) although I could not use the Bluetooth hands-free function because it would not sync with the BlackBerry I was using. It's not the first time I've encountered this problem with a BlackBerry.

The 4.3in anti-glare touchscreen offers a lot of visual real estate, but it and most of its ilk have trouble cutting through the glare because they are positioned too far forward on the windscreen to get a good look at the sky. (They can be positioned on the far right on the driver's side, but in this case the power lead and the position of the power outlet did not allow that.)

If I had tested it in Melbourne, I would have been able to use its live traffic navigation system, which is being trialled there.

This system overlays live information from a third-party provider on the maps to indicate if the planned route is blocked, and shows a less congested route. It has been in use in Europe for more than a decade but is new here. Other reasons to look at this unit include a logging function that records trips to assist with filling out log books for tax purposes.

This unit would have scored better than the 7.5 stars it gets here if it had not been for the software hanging glitch.
- Vincent Blake

SPECIFICATIONS
Features: 2 megapixel camera,m 4.3in screen, NavDezsk navigation software
Price: $699

LG TU720

ONE way to sum up this phone might be look but don't touch.

The LG TU720 (that's TU for Titanium) sure is pretty, and it has to be one of the nicest-looking 3G phones on the market.

This version of the Shine series easily lives up to its name and it's very solid as well. There's no hint of flimsiness when the phone slides open to reveal the keypad, and it shuts with a reassuring thunk.

Unfortunately, that solidness carries over to the keyboard and the stumpy joystick used to prowl through the menus.

In short, they're both a bit stiff and aren't particularly comfortable unless you've got thick calluses on the tips of your thumbs.

The joystick is sharp-edged and feels a bit scratchy on the skin, while the keys are hard to press and the keypad is cramped.

The keys are so stiff that I found myself having to punch buttons twice sometimes to get a response, and my thumb was jammed up against the bottom lip of the phone every time I went for the 0/space key.

Aesthetics aside, the TU720 is a nifty phone and a lot of power is packed inside its fancy little case.

For a start, it's equipped to handle an upgrade last year to Telstra's Next G network that boosted HSPDA transmission speeds to 7.2Mbps. That's great for surfing the web or watching television on the numerous Foxtel channels pre-loaded on the phone.

It will also get you into Telstra BigPond's online music store, where you can download tunes to play back through the Shine's MP3 function.

140MB of built-in memory gives you space for storing a few songs but the Shine also has a MicroSD slot if you plan on taking your music library on the road.

There's nothing fancy about the set-up of the menus used to navigate the TU720's numerous functions, making the phone fairly intuitive to use.

It also has a full suite of personal information manager features, including calendar, contacts and notes, as well as the usual array of calculators, clocks and the like.

The two megapixel camera takes sharp photos that look good on the TU720's bright, 2.2in screen.
- Ben Woodhead

SPECIFICATIONS
Features: 2.2in screen, 2 megapixel camera, 140MB internal memory, MP3 player, Bluetooth, battery life 250 hours standby and 180 minutes talk time
Price: $829