Windows Phone Thoughts: DeLorme Bluetooth Wireless Earthmate GPS PowerPack Reviewed: GPS, your way

Field trials
My family and I took a trip to Pittsburgh earlier this year and pitted the Earthmate GPS receiver against our Garmin eTrex Legend. Both kept us on the road and gave nearly identical readings along the way. When the battery started to go on my iPaq, we noticed the fatal flaw of Pocket PCs and Bluetooth GPS receivers: batteries are the bottleneck. The battery life of the Bluetooth PowerPack was excellent. We charged it up in the morning and it ran all day. The iPaq stayed on and plugged into the 12-volt car adapter the most of the trip. This defeated the whole wireless advantage of Bluetooth. On our way home, the Earthmate GPS and Pocket PC stayed in the trunk. The eTrex stayed on the dashboard guiding us back home.

I also tried Geocaching with the Earthmate GPS and Bluetooth PowerPack. The included software is not ideal for Geocaching. It doesn't have a compass/navigation mode like most handheld GPS receivers do. This is not a criticism of the software. A program called Street Atlas is probably not the best choice for hiking in the woods. I was able to find a cache or two using the longitude and latitude readouts of Street Atlas. It took a little work but that was actually just part of the fun. My real gripe with this unit for Geocaching was that I couldn't figure out how to hold both the PowerPack and my iPaq at the same time. It just didn't feel right.

Conclusions
The DeLorme Bluetooth Wireless Earthmate GPS PowerPack gives you plenty of options for powering and connecting a GPS receiver to your Pocket PC or laptop. The hardware is excellent but the software leaves much to be desired. Street Atlas 2004 Handheld for both the desktop and Pocket PC is difficult to use and not very intuitive. If you're looking at adding GPS to your Pocket PC, this device is worth a look. But in my opinion, the software is software is not up to par with the hardware.