GPS magazine got the first look at LG’s new Portable Navigator unit, the LN740. The review is large so go here to read it.. but we’ll recap here with our rating.

Pluses:
- The best routing/re-routing engine on the market today!
- Slim, simply gorgeous 4-inch design
- 6 hour battery life
- The unit announces street names
- 7 million points of interest, which additional category/sorting support
- can be used with Navteq’s real time traffic data (* requries a minus- ugly antenna)

Minuses:
- screen could be brighter with better resolution
- text & icons could be bigger for readability & usability
- color scheme and “night vision” need to be improved
- mp3/photo cannot be used when navigating — um who made that decision??
- No quick access to “home”
- uses 2006 mapping data, rather than 2007 data.
- high price ($500+) with lacking bluetooth support.

Hit or Miss >> Must Have Rating (out of 5)
4 - Hit!. Even with the minuses this is a very good product from LG. It surpasses the current #1 devices on the market in a number of areas. If they improved the display this would be a can’t miss item.

Tags: Electronics, GPS, Hardware, Hit, LG