One gripe: The nüvi 755T comes with advertisements. My evaluation unit arrived with three preloaded vendors (BP, Walgreens, and Wells Fargo). When you access the traffic menu, one of these advertiser's names always appears at the bottom of the screen. Also, from time to time, one of these ads will pop up on the map view screen (they won't appear when you are in motion). A single tap of the advertisers' name will perform a POI search for nearby retail locations. Unfortunately, you can't disable these ads, but it's likely that they help Garmin offset the cost of the live traffic information that it offers free.

I, for one, would rather lose live traffic updates than gain ads—or at least have the option to turn them both off. But that's just me. [PCMag via GPS Tracklog]

While a bit smaller than the average map, when the driver exceeded the map's limitations, they could simply swap it out for another and continue on their journey. Coming with 20 maps, the Wristlet Route Indicator ran £5 in 1927. With inflation, that number is the equivalent to about £50. Compared to the average cost of a GPS receiver today, that price doesn't sound all that bad, especially because the device is about 100 times more charming than the "turn LEFT in FIFTY feet" lady. [DailyMail via GizmoWatch]

A telescopic pole beneath the vehicle enables the car on a stick to be raised when not in use, keeping it off the road and transforming it into a street light. Sat-nav equipped, the bubble cars respond to voice commands and gather energy via a solar canopy on the roof.

There is about as much chance of this becoming reality, sadly, as there is of me editing Engadget. Yeah, I keep turning down their desperate advances. [Dezeen]

When you think about what a cabbie has to endure—an average of 34 months spent learning the Knowledge, as it is referred to, when you take to the streets of London on a moped, with nothing but a kagoule and an A to Z for company, when you phut-phut your way round the capital's roads until you know the city like the back of your hand, and can prove it to a bunch of bolshie examiners—then it is not surprising that the human element triumphed over technology.

Says Spencer Kelly, presenter of the technology programme Click:

We chose waypoints that took us through extremely busy parts of London. We would need to go from Box Hill in Surrey to Wembley Stadium, then the Houses of Parliament and finish at Greenwich Observatory. In fact, if we had just followed the shortest route to our first waypoint - the new Wembley Stadium - we would have gone right through some of the worst traffic blackspots in the area.

The rules were simple. Andy the cabbie could choose whichever route he wanted, listen to traffic reports on the radio, and change route at any time. But so he did not get an unfair advantage, he was not allowed to use bus/taxi lanes to avoid any jams. I had to do what the sat-nav said. No exceptions.

Spencer, who was using the TomTom, and alternated between the voice of Yoda and John Cleese, won the first leg, choosing to use the M25, a mahoosive freeway that circumnavigates London. He managed to get to Wembley Stadium, in the northwest of the city, five minutes ahead of Andy. When it came to the streets of the city center, however, Andy's experience was at a clear advantage, and he was already celebrating with a cuppa beside the Greenwich Observatory by the time Spencer had arrived at the Houses of Parliament. [BBC Online]

There's a DMB receiver with Picture-in-Picture capability so you can watch TV, a media player that supports all sorts of formats and, while there's no HDD, there's an SD memory slot and USB host. Add photo album, several games and something called a Car Diary for you to keep an eye on various vehicle-related things (no, I don't care either).

And Karaoke. Yes, people, that little microphone icon you see on the screen lets you belt out versions of whatever song keeps the pedal to the metal in your car. Karaoke. What a GENIUS idea. If anyone from iNavi is reading this, then the G1 needs to go global. Send one over to me at Giz and I'll spend my summer test-driving it in a stolen car.

iNavi G1 from Korea does karaoke [NaviGadget]

Fujitsu has teamed up with TomTom for its first joint foray into the US Sat-Nav market. The AVN2210p is a car audio unit complete with detachable PND that includes GPS antenna, rechargable battery and speaker, so that you can use it separately from the base unit. Maps of the US and Canada are on a separate SD memory card and It also benefits from TomTom Plus.

The audio unit has a satellite broadcasting digital radio with optional tuner, plays MP3 and WMA files on its CD and CD-R/RW player, supports iPods and other DAPs. There's 5V of preamp outputs and a 50W x 4-channel power amp with three-band equalizer and a low-pass filter, and will support your cellphone via Bluetooth. Cost is around $900 and it will be available next month. – Ad Dugdale

Press Release [Fujitsu Ten via PC Watch]

Following on from yesterday's Garmin Nüvi 200, here come a trio of Nüvis (Nüvee? Nüvilots?): the 600, 650 and 660FM. The 600 and 660FM are aimed at the European market, the former being a regional version of the 650, the latter bringing an FM transmitter to the 660.

So, let's concentrate on the 650. It's available from next month onwards, expect to part with $749.99, which is waaaaaay more 'spensivo than the 20GB-hard drive equipped TomTom GO 910 ($499) and the specs are after the jump.

Receiver: high-sensitivity WAAS-enabled GPS receiver
Display: 3.81"W x 2.25"H (9.7 x 5.7 cm); 4.3" diag (10.9 cm), 480 x 272 pixels; WQVGA color TFT with white backlight
Unit dimensions: 4.9"W x 2.9"H x .9"D (12.4 x 7.4 x 2.3 cm)
Weight: 6.2 ounces (190 g)
Battery: Rechargeable lithium-ion battery, up to 7 hours of battery life depending on use
Includes Garmin Lock™, an anti-theft feature
Fingertip touchscreen interface
Look up addresses and points of interest
Choose 2D or 3D maps
Upload custom POIs, including alerts for speed zones and safety cameras with POI Loader
Built in Travel Kit includes MP3 player with sample MP3s, audio books, picture viewer, world clock, currency and measurement converters, calculator and more
Add optional software such as Travel and Language Guides to personalize nüvi
SD card slot
USB interface for loading data

– Ad Dugdale

Product Page [Garmin via InfoSync World]

Mio Technology A201 Sat-Nav PDA [Bios Magazine]

Specs and pricing for Mio GPS devices [Amazon]