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Even more portable (and cheaper) are pocket models like Magellan's eXplorist and Garmin's GPSMAP series 60CX and 60CSX ($482 and $535), about the size of non-folding cellphones. They're the easiest to carry around when walking but their small maps (about 2 1/2in.) can be hard to read in the car.

Some pocket nav systems, such as the Mio 168RS ($350), Asus MyPal A632 ($550), Garmin iQue 3600 ($550–$600 with friction car mount and charger/speaker) are actually PDAs (personal digital assistants) that use the Palm or PocketPC (Windows CE) operating system. That means they can do a lot more than navigate: keep your calendar and address book, play games, check currency conversions, read audio books, spreadsheets and word-processing files, keep track of your calorie intake, view photos, watch movies, check restaurant reviews and more, depending on what software you load into them.

Using Your Own Computer
Navigation systems, like darn near everything more complex than a steam iron these days, are small computers. So if you already have a laptop computer, or a Palm or Windows PDA, you can use it for route guidance simply by adding a few navigation-specific bits: a GPS (Global Positioning System) receiver, digital maps and route-calculating software. Map and navigation software will usually run about $90 to $350 for laptops and $200 or so for PDAs, plus about $50 more for an add-on GPS receiver.

Laptop or notebook computers give you the biggest screens (12 to 17 in. or more) and the most elaborate software. Even without a GPS receiver, such programs as ALK Technologies' CoPilot, Microsoft's Streets & Trips or DeLorme's Street Atlas can be used to check out the lay of the land and plot routes. With GPS, your computer can tell you where you are even if you haven't a clue about it. These programs can also plan your trip in stages, suggesting stops by cross-referencing mealtimes, your car's fuel mileage and your preferences for rest stops with databases of gas-station, restaurant, rest-area and lodging locations.

Microsoft's Streets & Trips can sometimes find your location even without GPS: If your computer has a Wi-Fi wireless system, Streets & Trips can use it to scan for Wi-Fi hot spots near you, and check them against a database to figure your approximate location. Streets & Trips' two main competitors have tricks up their sleeves too. DeLorme offers not only Street Atlas, but a TopoUSA program that lets you "fly over" a 3-D map of the terrain. If you use it with DeLorme's Earthmate GPS receiver, it can cross-reference your digital travel pictures to a log of your travel, so you know where you took each shot. When you choose to get online, ALK Technologies' CoPilot Live can keep your relatives, friends and colleagues up to date on where you are.

Navigation by laptop calls for more than just the computer and GPS. For long trips, you'll probably need a power supply to keep your computer's battery charged from your car's lighter socket. If your laptop's speakers aren't loud enough for you to hear direction announcements at speed, you'll probably want an FM modulator (about $20 to $40) to send those directions through your car radio. And positioning a laptop so you can see its big screen can be a challenge. Brackets to position laptops in a car for easy use cost about $100 to $200, may require drilling holes, and crowd or block your front passenger seat.

With a PDA, on the other hand, mounting is a breeze. Common navigation kits, such as the one Dell sells for its Axim PDAs, include brackets that hold your PDA where you can see and hear it and connect it to your car's power socket and to a plug-in GPS receiver, for about $180. Brackets are also available separately, costing $30 to $50 for unpowered brackets from ProClip and Arkon, while models with GPS and power connections from Arkon and others go for $150 to $280. Some GPS receivers, such as DeLorme's Earthmate Blue Logger ($250 with Street Atlas software), connect wirelessly via Bluetooth

Navigation by Phone
A PDA is a fairly powerful computer that usually lacks routing software and GPS. A modern cellphone is likely to have GPS but not the computing power. But you can still navigate by it. The purpose of cellphone GPS is to tell emergency workers where to find you when you dial 911, but it can also pass your location data to an external computer, which in turn feeds your phone the maps and directions you need to get from here to there. Potentially, at least, those maps could be more up-to-date than the maps that come with navigation systems. Garmin, in fact, is launching a new service that will deliver traffic, weather and local fuel prices to smartphones. With the GPS hardware built into the phone, your only cost for cellphone navigation is $10 per month for the service — or, in some cases, $3 per day, perfect for people who don't need nav often.

The OnStar Option
Route directions have always been available from OnStar, as part of an extra-cost bundle of services, but the turn-by-turn directions available in some of the latest GM vehicles is a big improvement over the original version. As before, you tell an OnStar operator your destination, with no need to touch any controls aside from the button that initiates the call. The operator would check your current position from your car's GPS system, plot a route, and read it back to you. Previously, you'd have to remember or jot down the directions, and keep an eye on your route so you wouldn't miss your turns. With the new digital version, the route information is downloaded to your car, which then keeps track of your progress on the route and tells you when to turn. On some cars, directional arrows for the next turn will also show up on a small screen, but if you want a map screen you'll need to get a separate navigation system.

With all these choices, will everybody soon have a navigation system? Quite possibly — but even then, it will be cool.

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