The BT-368i is a small (2.75"x 1.57" x 0.36"), black device with an attractive silver trim. If you tilt it, you'll notice the dark/light checkerboard pattern on the front of the unit that gives it quite the distinctive look. My mother saw it when I stopped by on one of my trips driving to test the unit. She asked me if it was an MP3 player, LoL. It does resemble an MP3 player!
GlobalSat states the BT-368i's rechargeable Li-ion battery is capable of 10 hours of continuous use. I left it on for quite a bit longer than that and it was still charged and running when I checked back with it. The 10 hours can be extended, as when no Bluetooth connection is detected, the unit turns itself off. The BT-368i is a Bluetooth 2.0 device, so the range is roughly 10 meters or 32 feet.
Being as small as it is, the BT-368i is also very lightweight - weighing in at less than an ounce (.96ounce) according to the specifications!
After charging the BT-368i overnight using the included AC adapter and powering it on, I watched as the lights began to dance while it searched for satellites with which to connect. There are actually 3 status lights which indicate the unit is on, Bluetooth status and a GPS signal indicator.
The instructions said it may take up to 3 minutes, so I started tinkering with my Treo 750 in order to create some sort of connection between the 2 devices.
Having never worked with a GPS device, particularly with a mobile device, setting up and using the BT-368i was pretty frustrating! Try as I may, I could never get Google Maps to allow me to use GPS, as it would always give me a can't use GPS function error.
After 30 anger-filled minutes, I looked through the programs/settings on my Treo 750 and found the External GPS under Settings/System. Once I set the GPS program port to Com1 and the GPS hardware port to COM0, I was able to successfully enable the 'use GPS' setting in Google Maps and was immediately shown my current position. Whew, what a relief that was!!
The BT-368i is compatible with most NMEA compliant software, such as Google Maps and RouteBuddy, so I installed Google Maps, as I've actually worked with it before.
Once Google Maps was running and the 2 devices were communicating, I was presented with my location - represented by a blue dot. I chose 'Use GPS' from the options menu and the combined devices were soon connected to/communicating with 7 satellites. As a test, I drove around for about 10-15 minutes - noting that as my location changed, the blue dot would soon update to represent my new location.
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