We’ve previously reviewed the Navman S50 before on this web site. Overall the S50 was a reasonable sat nav with a good navigation system, but let down by a poorly designed cradle.

So what does the new S50 3D from Navman offer? There is not a huge difference between the two systems. Major landmarks are now displayed in 3D, hence the 3D tag in the name, which supposedly makes it easier to see where you’re driving.

The other notable difference is Navman Connect which allows you to go online via Bluetooth and search for Points of Interest (POI) over the Internet.

Apart from that, both systems are pretty much the same. The S50 3D navigation performs exactly the same as the original S50, although the S50 3D maps installed are slightly more up-to-date.

This review will just cover the differences between the two systems rather than repeat what we’ve already said about the Navman S50.

S50 versus S50 3D

Visually, both systems look almost identical. The S50 3D is slighty smaller and lighter than the S50. The measurements stack up as follows:

		S50 3D	S50
Width (mm)		134.8	140
Height (mm)		77.6	80
Depth (mm)		19.4	20
Weight (g)		171	198

Box Contents

This is what you get in the box.

• Navman S50 3D
• Vehicle suction cup mount
• Vehicle power cable
• USB cable
• Drawstring soft cloth carry bag
• Documentation pack

First Looks

At first glance the S50 3D looks identical to the S50, but if you look closer you’ll notice some subtle differences. The main difference is that the S50 3D does not include an external antenna socket, microphone socket or earphone socket. Perhaps these features were not that popular with users but it seemed a strange omission, especially the lack of an external antenna socket.

The image below shows the Navman S50 with a rubber mount, which when pulled back reveals an external antenna socket, microphone socket and earphone socket. This same rubber mount is missing from the S50 3D.

Below are some further images of the Navman S50 3D.

Suction Cup and Cradle

The S50 3D uses exactly the same design as the S50. It’s a shame Navman haven’t tried to improve the design as it is fiddly to use and could be made more user friendly.

You can read more about this in our original Navman S50 review.

GPS Signal

The SiRFstarIII GPS receiver uses InstantFixII technology which enables it to pick up a satellite signal in a few seconds when switched on.

In our tests the S50 3D took a couple of minutes to get a satellite the very first time it was used. This is to be expected with any new sat nav system. Thereafter we were impressed how quick it picked up a signal, often around 10 seconds from switching on the unit.

Navigation

We experienced no problems on the navigation front. Everything is the same as you find it on the S50, but major landmarks are now displayed in 3D. We’re not convinced that people will find this useful though.

It might come in handy driving around a major city like London, but many people won’t be driving past major landmarks every day so we question the real benefit of such a feature, it could even be regarded as a distraction whilst driving.

Points of Interest (POI)

We found the POI search facility disappointing. The basics worked OK, such as finding local shops, restaurants and petrol stations, but in other areas it failed to deliver. It did not detect any car parks in our local town and claimed the nearest car park was 11.8 miles away. In addition it did not list any nearby cash point machines.

Navman Connect

We often hear from readers that sat nav systems don’t do a good job of searching for local Points of Interest (POI). We found that ourselves whilst testing the S50 3D.

The idea of Navman Connect is to overcome this limitation. Using a Bluetooth enabled mobile phone, you can pair your phone with the S50 3D and then go online and search business directories to find POI that otherwise a sat nav system might not find.

When you start up Navman Connect there are two options for downloading POI – InfoBel and NavDesk Locations. Infobel is a business directory service which you access over the internet and NavDesk Locations is an application for downloading POI onto your PC which you then transfer to the Navman.

There is one point to bear in mind before considering buying the S50 3D. Navman Connect doesn’t work if you use an O2 PAYG mobile phone. We believe this is due to O2 PAYG customers not being offered full internet access through their phones. If you try using an O2 PAYG phone the S50 3D will report this error:

“Could not establish a Dial Up Networking connection with your phone.”

It is worth checking your phone and mobile phone provider offer full Internet access otherwise you won’t be able to use the Navman Connect service.

We then tested Navman Connect on an O2 contract phone but still ran into problems. We tried connecting to the Infobel service but could never get a connection. We kept getting ‘Error connecting to the server (2000)’ error message, both in a 2G and 3G area.

We are not sure if this was just a problem with the Navman we were reviewing, the Infobel service provider, or whether it is indicative of a wider problem with the S50 3D, but the Navman Connect just didn’t work for us.

NavDesk Locations is another way for managing custom POI. This involves installing the NavDesk application onto your PC, and then transferring custom POI to your Navman via your computer. The ability to add custom POI via your computer is a useful feature, but many people will want to search for POI “on the road” whilst driving in an unfamiliar town or city. In these situations you need to be able to connect to the internet and search the Infobel directory service in real-time. We never got this to work so can’t really recommend this feature. We would be interested in hearing if any readers have had more success than us.

Settings

Anyone who has used the Navman S50 will be familiar with the settings, they are almost identical. The main difference being the Navman Connect option on page 2 of the main menu.

Summary

Overall the S50 3D is a competent navigator that will safely get you to your destination. We think the 3D feature is a bit of a gimmick and the Navman Connect just never worked in our tests. It’s therefore hard to recommend the S50 3D, especially when you consider the lack of an external antenna socket, microphone socket or earphone socket which you get on the Navman S50. The S50 3D does have more up-to-date maps, but we found overall there was nothing really to get excited about when comparing the S50 3D with the original Navman S50.

Where to buy

Buy the Navman S50 Widescreen Sat Nav from Lemon Digital. Quote “Technical Itch” when ordering for a special price promotion discount.

Buy the Navman S50 Widescreen Sat Nav from Amazon.

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