TomTom Europe Route Planner

TomTom Route Planner is a route-finding program that covers more than 40 European countries and is designed to work with Palm-based computers, those running the EPOC operating system (like Psion's Series 5) and Pocket PCs.

Installation is easy. You copy the program to your Windows-based PC along with any individual maps. Then, the next time you synchronise, the whole lot gets copied to your palmtop. Then for example, if you wanted to plan a route from Brighton to Falmouth in Cornwall on your Palm, you'd load the detailed UK map, search for Brighton, set it as your departure point, search for Falmouth, set that as your destination and then tap the Plan button. You can choose between the shortest or the quickest route and then elect to have the instructions displayed turn by turn on the screen or follow the map, with more concise instructions rolling along the bottom of the screen like a ticker tape. It works well for major roads, though smaller ones are simply listed as unnamed and navigation could prove tricky, especially in an unfamiliar country.

To speed up route planning, the program lets you select up to nine locations as favourites which subsequently you can just pick off a list. If you've got a Pocket or EPOC-based PC you'll enjoy more display options and you can also specify areas to avoid and include up to four specified stopovers on the journey. Overlays let you add your own locations, points of interest and so on. For those who simply must know exactly where they are all the time--and assuming you have the relevant hardware--it also supports GPS.

It's worth noting that if you've got a Pocket PC you can access more features than if you have a Palm because of limitations with the latter's 33MHz processor. For example, Pocket PC owners can plan a route from England to France (i.e., across two countries, using two maps) while Palm owners can't because they can only load one map at a time. This drawback aside, TomTom Route Planner Europe remains an extremely versatile, pocket-sized route finder. --Rob Beattie