PDA GPS power issues (i.trek Mouse)

Mark Morissette wrote:

Hello everyone.. I've posted this question in a few different NG's
and forums, so appologies in advance for anyone reading it again.

Anyow..

I have a Sony Clie TJ25 Palm-OS PDA that I recently purchased an
i.trek mouse GPS receiver for from Semsons & Co. in the USA. I'm
located in Canada, myself...if that matters.

Anyhow, I plan on using the GPS mainly for general-aviation navigation
as well as the odd Geocaching adventure.

However, I have discovered a problem - The i.trek unit will *not* work
unless the cigarette lighter power plug (Which is part of the PDA to
GPS interface cable) is plugged in. I didn't know this ahead of
time.

Is the GPS you have the one described on:
http://www.semsons.com/itmousgpsrec.html

According to that page, it needs about 5V @ 90 mA. Rather than mess
with the PDA cable and also risk running down the PDA internal battery,
I'd just hook it up to a holder with 4 AA cells. If you'll use it quite
a bit then NiMH rechargeables would be the best bet and a set of 2300
mA-hr cells would power it for over 24 hours.