Harmon Kardon GPS-300 Review
A leader in the field of navigation, Harmon Kardon continues to impress with its unique, powerful line of GPS units. Offering a wide range of functions from the flashy to the necessary, most of the devices in Harmon’s lineup are a joy to use. However, we were slightly disappointed with the 310, a no-frills device geared towards the budget-conscious.
A Dull Window
The Harmon Karmon GPS 310 starts out with a 4-inch color WQVGA (480 x 272) resolution touch screen display. The color left a lot to be desired, as we found ourselves occasionally having to discern among reds, yellows, and oranges.
The unit enclosure is designed fairly well, roughly one-half inch thick, or slightly thicker than the average Smartphone or PDA. This discouraged us from carrying the device in a pocket, but any spills in the car were easily tolerated. There are no buttons on the device save for a recessed power switch on the top. We were impressed by the display brightness setting mounted as jog wheel on the top of the unit, rather than having to manipulate it via the menu interface.
Battery Life: Decent!
The 310 features a five-hour lithium-ion battery, and is in fact able to run for that amount of time at the lowest brightness setting. However, the 310 is geared towards multimedia which can cut down the time to a couple hours when playing music. In addition, the unit lacks a sleep or low power setting. In most cases though, the battery has little impact given the continual use of a car adaptor.
Ease of Use: Needs a Facelift
The interface may seem easy to use at first, given the main menu is divided into four quadrants. However, the uniform quadrant background color (gray) and small font did lead us to make a wrong decision every so often. Each menu was designed in a similar manner as well.
Another drawback was the main screen or home key. The Harmon Kardon 310 labels this button “Source,” causing unneeded confusion. It would have been better if “Home” had simply been used. However, we did find that the transitions between menus and map zoom were fast and reliable. On other units, the animation would hang, requiring a reboot of the device.
Performance: Not Bad
In any GPS navigation system, the goal is to get the user from point A to B as efficiently and quickly as possible. The Harmon Kardon 310 offers the option to navigate by point of interest (such as a gas station), address, postal code, or intersection. The 310 also offers the ability to avoid certain portions of a route, including borders, toll roads, ferries, and unpaved roads.
Once a destination has been selected, the unit offers a few options: shortest distance, maximum freeway use, etc. Should you miss a turn or exit the unit will automatically reroute and set you back on track. The rerouting algorithms worked well and so did the GPS chipset.
Features: Needs Improvement
The 310 uses a text-to-speech engine to relay the directions via voice, but we found that the tone was unnatural and difficult to understand at times. Besides acting as GPS, the 310 includes a multimedia player, but this was also disappointing. The software is only able to play MP3s and the device itself has no internal storage, just an SD card slot.
Few Benefits
- Fast rerouting system
- Smooth menu transitions
- Unit thickness enables it to withstand jolts and bumps
Disappointments
- Unnatural text-to-speech
- Limited multimedia player
- Difficult user interface
- “Source” rather than “Home” button
Want to compare this model to other H.K models? Click here to download Excel spreadsheet.
