Mio's C278 is the first of a new generation of GPS systems: its widescreen display measures 7'' from one corner to the other, offering four times as much display space as entry-level model like the TomTom One, and it makes good use of it thanks to its built-in digital tuner allowing it to work as a television as well.

Of course, such a big screen makes the C728 a fairly bulky GPS, measuring 18 x 12.2 x 2.1 cm and weighing in at 380 grams before you add the support or the TV tuner, which is part of a separate module which plugs into the main GPS.

TV Tuner

Being able to watch TV on your GPS makes this extra bulk worth it, but installation can be tricky.

You need to make no fewer than eight separate connections to connect the TV tuner module to the GPS system: two cables to transmit the signal from the tuner to the screen, two antennae, one infra-red sensor, one power cable and finally two more to send extra power to the GPS to show TV pictures.

The TV tuner needs some kind of external power supply--either from your cigarette lighter or from a regular power supply outside your car.

Once installed, getting going is very simple: you just need to set the C728 to 'AV In' mode to switch it over to the incoming source. 

In this case it's the TV tuner, but there's no reason why you couldn't connect a portable DVD player or a games console.

While watching TV, picture quality is perfectly acceptable, even if it lacks a little sharpness.

There's some very light ghosting, but it's largely kept under control.

Pictures don't suffer from reflections thanks to the matte screen, an improvement over many other portable video players which all use glossy screens.

There is, however, a problem with TV pictures in certain aspect ratios.

TV signals broadcast in 16:9 are shown correctly, but those in 4:3 are stretched across the screen.

Bizarrely, the settings only allow you to configure the 16:9 aspect ratio (which works fine) but not 4:3 (where there's a problem).

What's more, it took us a long time to ferret out this setting at the bottom of a whole series of menus, and it's impossible to access it using the remote control.

This remote is needed to control the video input, as the touch screen controls only work on the GPS, not TV pictures.

When it's running like this, the GPS' screen is effectively a simple external monitor--which is why it's also possible to add other input sources if you want.


Driving and Digital TV

Of course, watching the TV while driving is illegal, but that doesn't mean that passengers can't enjoy their favorite programs on the move.

This isn't really Mio's primary use for the tuner, though--they see it rather as a kind of portable TV to be used when you're away from home--and reception is often very poor when you're driving.

The picture regularly freezes up, and as soon as you leave the area covered by one transmitter, you need to re-program all of the channels to work with the new transmitter.

In part these problems are caused because the tuner picks up DVB-T signals, used for free-to-air digital terrestrial television for domestic use in most of Europe, rather than the DVB-H standard designed especially for mobile devices which is not yet universally available.

The tuner is a welcome addition, then, but works better for a little amusement upon arrival than it does during the journey itself.

Poor video decoding

Despite Mio's claims that the C728 is compatible with MPEG-4 and MPEG-2 video files, the device had a lot of trouble with our three test files, a DivX file, a HD DivX file and a DVD rip.

Neither of the last two worked at all, but with the first we could hear the soundtrack but there were no pictures--the subtitles then started to appear randomly all over the black screen.

Finding Your Destination

An intuitive graphical user interface makes programming the C728 easy, and even first-time GPS users found it simple enough.

In its most simple form, all you need to do is type in an address, giving as much or as little detail as you want--the name of a town will do.

There are a few teething problems with this system, though, of which the most annoying was its inability to handle punctuation.

It really struggles with addresses like O'Sullivan Street, and we found it best to leave out the part before the apostrophe, which causes plenty of confusion because there are a lot of Sullivan Streets out there, too.

In some cases, the C728's logic beat us and we were entirely unable to find certain streets.

Another irritation is the inability of the C728 to propose alternatives from its memory to complete a partially-complete town: you have to type the whole name, accurately, each time.

If you don't, you just get a 'Destination Not Found' error message, rather than the more intuitive system offering several alternatives that other GPS systems use.

The C728 does, however, provide a list of street addresses for you to choose from, but there are problems with this too.

Mio has attempted to use the same kind of scroll system as the iPhone, but hasn't really mastered it: you're supposed to be able to touch the screen and then flick your finger up and down at a different speed to scroll through the options.

Unfortunately, the C728 often 'loses' your finger, and we can't help but feel that two old-fashioned scroll buttons would have been better.

Finally, looking up a destination sometimes causes the system to crash, sending you straight back to the front screen after hanging for a few seconds. 

It doesn't happen often, but we still noticed it regularly during tests--once every ten to fifteen searches on average.

Navigation

Things get a lot better once you've found your destination, with the seven-inch screen showing plenty of information.

Specifically, it allows you to see a lot more than the next few hundred meters, and an extra frame at the top left of the screen give a preview of the next turning.

The rest of the display has been redesigned, with clearer, more straightforward maps, and the shaded zones to represent different terrain and pseudo-3D effects from earlier models have both disappeared.

A friendly, natural voice synthesizer is almost as convincing as having your passenger doing the navigation for you, although a text-to-speech convertor to read street names would have been a good addition rather than just reading the numbers of highways.

Both visual and audio alerts are given for fixed speed cameras, and you can configure how far in advance they are made.

If the GPS detects that you're travelling above the speed limit, a visual warning is given.

Conclusion

If you'll pardon the pardon, then Mio is definitely travelling in the right direction with this GPS.

After having bought up Navman (and its software), the manufacturer seems to be gradually stepping up its efforts to compete with market leader TomTom.

Things won't really kick off before the end of the year though, when TomTom's IQ Routes system can go head-to-head with InfoTraffic.

Note

The C728 we tested was an as-is sample, without any packaging, accessories or manuals.

We even had to install the map modules ourselves, with a little help from Mio.

It's very possible that further updates will be made to the software before the final version is released, and we certainly hope that some of the problems we've outlined here (poor handling of 4:3 pictures, problems with searching addresses …) will be ironed out.

The final version is set to go on sale in November.