Magellan® Launches Next Generation of eXplorist® Outdoor Handheld GPS Devices

SANTA CLARA, Calif., July 14 /PRNewswire/ -- Magellan today unveiled the next generation of its award-winning, rugged eXplorist handheld GPS devices for the outdoor recreation market.

The new eXplorist 510, 610 and 710 devices allow adventurers to navigate to outdoor destinations worldwide, capture geotagged photos along the way, and share their experiences online when they return home. Each eXplorist model combines high-sensitivity GPS, an intuitive user interface, easy-to-read mapping and accurate navigation. The new series of handheld GPS units are being revealed at the OutDoor Trade Fair in Friedrichshafen, Germany, and will be available to consumers in North America, Europe, and many other countries worldwide in the 4th quarter, 2010.

"With the popularity of social networks, the GPS industry is shifting towards more online experience sharing," said Justin Doucette, Director, Outdoor Product Marketing, Magellan. "There are many sites that allow for geographic and multimedia data to be posted and shared with others. The eXplorist series allows users to bring their adventures home with them, catalog for future reference, and share online with family and friends."

All three new eXplorist handheld GPS units come equipped with a camera, microphone, and speaker to enable users to record and share their adventures with friends.

Each eXplorist device features a 3.0-inch color touch screen, a 3.2 mega-pixel camera with auto-focus, microphone and speaker to record geo-referenced images, videos, and voice notes. All products in the eXplorist series are waterproof (IPX-7) and come preloaded with the most detailed worldwide map in the industry. Magellan's World Edition map includes a complete road network for the U.S., Canada, Western Europe and Australia, as well as water features, urban and rural land use, and a realistic shaded relief background.  

The top-of-the-line eXplorist 710 combines the best of on-road and off-road navigation. Built-in maps get adventurers from doorstep to trailhead to summit and back. The eXplorist 710 includes both Magellan's highly detailed Summit Series topographic map and its City Series turn-by-turn map which allows users to navigate their vehicles through busy city streets on their way to their outdoor adventures.  The eXplorist 610 and 710 feature a 3-axis electronic compass and a barometric altimeter that provide precise orientation, accurate elevation information, and enables for weather pattern tracking.

Each model in the eXplorist series also includes several innovative features, such as Magellan's award-winning OneTouch™ favorites menu, enabling users to instantly access bookmarked locations, searches, and functions. The industrial design incorporates silent proximity alarms. And, to complement the 3.0-inch touch screen, each device has two customizable hard buttons to take a photograph, mark a waypoint, or provide quick access to a number of other preferred features.

The new eXplorist devices also include essential outdoor features such as expandable memory, paperless geocaching, GPX compatibility, 16 hours of battery life, high sensitivity GPS enabling 3-5 meters of accuracy, vertical profiling, a digital almanac, track summary statistics and area calculation.

The Magellan eXplorist 510 GPS device will be introduced at an M.S.R.P. of USD $349.99, the eXplorist 610 at an M.S.R.P. of USD $449.99, and the eXplorist 710 at an M.S.R.P. of USD $549.99. The units will ship with a standard mini USB cable and 2 lithium disposable AA batteries. With the purchase of a Magellan® eXplorist GPS device customers will receive a 30-day free premium membership to http://geocaching.com.

The new generation of eXplorist GPS handheld devices joins several other new introductions by Magellan this year in the outdoor navigation market.  The eXplorist GC, a device 100% dedicated to geocaching, and the ToughCase™, a device that transforms your iPhone or iPod Touch into a rugged, handheld GPS device, were launched earlier this year.

For more information, visit magellangps.com.

About MiTAC Digital Corporation

MiTAC Digital Corp. is a wholly-owned subsidiary of MiTAC International Corporation and promotes and sells products and services under the Magellan brand name. Magellan assists people to travel, work and play with leading portable navigation and positioning solutions across multiple consumer markets. Recognized as an industry innovator, the company is the producer of the award-winning Magellan RoadMate® portable car navigation, Outdoor and Mobile navigation devices. MiTAC Digital Corp. is headquartered in Santa Clara, Calif. For more information on Magellan visit magellangps.com.

2010 MiTAC International Corporation. Magellan, Roadmate and the Magellan logo are registered trademarks of MiTAC International Corporation and One Touch and ToughCase are Trademarks of MiTAC International Corporation and are used under license by MiTAC Digital Corp. All rights reserved. iPhone and iPod are trademarks, of Apple Inc, registered in the US and other countries. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

SOURCE Magellan