Maplin Does £100 GPS

Sat-nav systems don’t have to cost a fortune according to Maplin, which has just launched a budget sub-£100 offering.

The AO5GW boasts a decent 3.5in touch-screen display and a built-in MP3 player – something that’s becoming increasingly common in GPS devices. It uses the Sirf Star III antenna for its GPS tracking and offers full UK mapping with 7-digit post code on the bundled SD Card, with Tele Atlas maps. It supports 2D and 3D views in day/night mode.

The AO5GW comes with a useful remote so that anyone in the car can use it, or the MP3 player, without yet another driver ditching their car while concentrating on the sat-nav instead of the road.

The battery life is three hours and the unit has 64Mb of internal memory. Tunes can be added to the unit via SD Cards. At a penny under £100, this really is a pocket-friendly, entry level arrival on the sat-nav scene.-Martin Lynch