One of the most important events we attended during our recent visit at CeBIT 2010 was the worldwide launch of Mio's brand-new Moov V780 7-inch navigation, entertainment and Internet device, one that, if marketed properly, might become a very serious competitor on several market segments, not just that of connected PNDs, given the features and experience it delivers.

During the hands-on time following Mio's press conference, we've had the chance to take the V780 for a very quick tour of its features, and come up extremely impressed at the other end. I mean, the PND manufacturer has managed to come up with a complete, comprehensive solution, which offers a wide array of functions and features compared to basic PNDs. Actually, calling this thing a navigation device is an understatement, since the best description would be something around the lines of a “GPS-enabled portable multimedia/Internet tablet.”

Anyway, before moving on to the browsing experience, let's talk a bit about the hardware. So, according to Mio, the V780 is powered by a 600 Mhz CPU, accompanied by a u-blox GPS module, up to 8GB of NAND Flash memory and over 512MB of RAM. The gadget gets the necessary power from a 2,300 mAh battery, while the capacitive touch screen offers a very good level of responsiveness, besides the 800 x 480 pixel resolution. There are quite a lot of connectivity options as well, the most impressive probably being the HDMI connector, which enables users to play 720p movies from the device's memory onto an HDTV or projector directly.

One of the main selling points of the new Moov device is the integration of a DVB-T receiver, a feature that will certainly come in handy for those people who want to watch world-cup games while being on the go. Naturally, the quality of reception and the number of available programs depends largely on local conditions, but since the number of available DVB-T channels is increasing, it's likely that the market for the V780 will be a pretty serious one.

The Moov V780 offers quite a handful of surprises as far as the GUI is concerned, since the user interface has been thoroughly reworked and turned 3D. Yeah, this is a first for Mio products, and the results are pretty spectacular, since users will be able to easily scroll through available movies and music, or even TV channels, in a very fluid, fast and easy manner. Plus, the fresh Moov has an even better virtual keyboard than its predecessors, something praise-worthy.

As we've mentioned before, the V780 might become a serious competitor in some other fields as well, since it can easily and rapidly browse the web, send and receive email, as well as access YouTube and various social networking services. Plus, the manufacturers will deliver several Wireless connectivity options, namely Wi-Fi, 3G and Wimax (depending on local conditions, of course).

Another important issue worth talking about is the range of accessories provided by Mio for the Moov V780. Without a doubt, the most important are the keyboard and protective case, which turn the device into an impromptu notebook. The case has a very good build quality, and the same goes for the keyboard that, once connected, automatically replaces the virtual one. In fact, the keyboard is very cool to type on, its only serious flaw being the optical scrolling sensor (somewhat of a mousing button), which is a lot less responsive than we might have hoped for.

Other interesting accessories provided by Mio are an ultra-strong windshield mounting solution (whose suction cup can even be attached to a wall, something extremely unusual), as well as a special adapter for installing the V780 on the back of a car seat's headrest.

Although we haven't really gotten that much into the issue of hardware up until now, I can't help talking about a certain issue that... well, I found to be rather awkward. So, when asked by someone from the audience about the hardware powering the Moov V780, the company's exec in charge of the product's development kind of dodged the question, being clearly put in a difficult situation.

The official’s answer was that we're talking about an ARM-based 600 MHz processor, but that's a bit strange, simply because the V780 works too well and seamlessly to be talking just about a basic ARM solution. In fact, as far as the level of performance is concerned, the V780 reminded us of another very famous mobile platform, whose name we won't give here, but of which you've certainly heard of (since it's also made its way into a well-known Microsoft product).

Anyway, we're eagerly waiting to carry out an extensive review of the Moov V780, and we'll be back as soon as we get our hands on a sample.


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