 |
Appreciated by "mapaholic"
As a "Mapaholic" I was hesitant to surrender to a GPS. The Garmin has allowed me to be map-free! (Although I still keep them in the car.) I rely on "her" telling me where to turn - and if I miss the turn she will get me back on track immediately. What a relief.Great Unit with US & Euro Maps
Advantages are relatively cheap, has all US and most European maps built in, Also has an SD card slot for other optional area maps. It does NOT have all the fancy features which for me are fairly useless except to make you pay a lot of money, such as MP3 payers, bluetooth phone speakers, traffic reports for cities, etc. It also does NOT say which road to turn on. For example, much more expensive units might say "Turn right on Main Street", where this GPS only says "Turn right", and you have to read on the top of the display which street to turn on (but it's the one you are at!). This is not a big deal to me. It is fairly small, which is good and not so good. It is not "wide screen" so it shows less information. However, I think has very acceptable readability, and does not obscure the road while hanging on the suction cup mount. On the other hand, the small size it is easy to pack and take overseas traveling. It is even small enough to carry with you walking around a foreign city so you can get back to the hotel if you get lost. You can walk to restaurants you pick from the unit, and you can even set it to "walk mode" instead of "drive mode" so it ignores one-way streets, etc. when you are walking or bicycling around. Of course, it only has roads programmed in, and not park paths, etc. It has a built in battery that is charged through the included cigarette lighter plug. It lasts at least 8-10 hours I think? It has a USB charge connection on the GPS, but I think the voltage requirement is higher (1V?) than most laptop computers put out (0.5V), so it may not charge by plugging into a laptop?? I don't know yet..... It has lots of "Points of Interest" such as restaurants, gas stations, hotels, etc, although some of the POI's in Europe are sometimes sparse. For example I was looking for a ATM cash machine in a little town in Germany, and it said the closest one was 12 miles away. However, there were a few actually in the small town I was in, just not listed. Also, it has many languages built in for the voice commands. German, Spanish, English, French, Chinese, and many other obscure languages are included. The "British" vs. "American" english accents are entertaining. Out of the box, it is set up to NOT allow you to program it while moving (Safe Mode). However, this CAN BE SWITCHED OFF to allow a passenger (or a danger seeking driver) to fully program addresses or find Points of Interest when the vehicle is moving. In short, I would definitely buy it again.Even before I use it in Europe...
It's small, fits in a breast pocket. It's light weight, It doesn't have much of an instruction manual because if you work with it for a while, you learn all the things it can do. Sure, it might be nice to have the GPS say: "Turn right on Vine Street in .2 miles" instead of "turn right in .2 miles"... but the display shows the name of the street anyway. It does more than I thought it could because the Garmin site really doesn't elaborate on it's functions, such as multiple languages. It's fun just learning how to use it and I'm looking forward to using it in Italy soon. It comes with a suction cup mount and 12V car charger. I have purchased the leather case, a wall charger (for use in 110/220 volt) and a (off brand) 512mb memory chip. We already had two Garmin devices for sports, so the Garmin/USB cable we owned was compatible for downloading software updates and photo transfers on the Nuvi 270. I've already found and memorized my hotels in Italy on the map, but of course, it will not be able to plot out the driving routes until over there. I will add to this review after the trip. So far, I highly recommend the Nuvi 270 GPS. Seems like a good product and worth the money.Not for Pedestrians in France and Switzerland
I retired a couple years ago as a commercial pilot who dealt with GPS's on a daily basis and have a factory installed unit in my Acura TL. I bought this unit to use as a pedestrian sight-seeing in France and Switzerland. This review is only my experience trying to use the Garmin Nuvi 270 as a pedestrian in European cities. I make no supposition how it would work in a car in the USA nor in a car through the narrow streets of Europe or as a pedestrian in US cities.. The Garmin Nuvi 270 has a pedestrian mode and is pre-loaded with maps of Europe. At slightly over $300 the unit was very appealing so I bought one for my trip in May 2008. The Good: 1. The touch screen is very responsive 2. The screen is very clear and bright. 3. 3.5 inch screen, in my view, is the perfect pedestrian size. 4. The database used is good by today's standards. 5. Physically the 270, in my opinion, is the correct size for walking. The Bad: 1. The first bad feature and by far the overriding issue is the Nuvi 270's inability to acquire satellites in European cities . (Without Satlilite communication the Nuvi 270 is not able to navigate.) I read all the reviews posted on Amazon and elsewhere, although many mentioned this issue, none seemed to adequately drive this point home enough for me not to buy it. On our day trip to Strasbourg, France, I held the unit out at ½ arms length for 1 1/2 hours while walking and saw only two screens, `Acquiring satellites' or `unable to acquire Satellites do you want to continue'. The unit never ever acquired enough Satellites in Strasburg to even show where we were, let alone navigate. I even stood on a round-about in the middle of a busy intersection for 20 minutes hoping it would acquire enough Satellites to be functional....it did not! I cannot over stress this enough....it was useless in Paris, where it would acquire for a short time and then lose them during the walk, in Geneva where it acquired them on the lake, but lost them in town. In Marseilles where it acquired them going to an island but quickly lost them in town. 2. Once acquired, satellite retention is very poor. Sometimes aircraft GPS', as well as my Acura will take a couple minutes to acquire satellites, particularly if the unit has been moved while turned off, but once satellites are acquired they seldom lose reception, if ever unless you drive through a tunnel. The Garmin Nuvi 270, on the other hand, readily loses reception. 3. There is no Operating manual available for the Garmin Nuvi 270 either in the box or on the web. Only 11 quick start booklets in 11 languages. 4. Once you have looked for a destination it now resides in Recently found places, but cannot be deleted unless all destinations are deleted. If there is a way I couldn't figure it out as there is no manual. 5. When charging, the unit says it is charging but never tells you when it is fully charged. I let it charge for over 24 hours and it continued to display, `charging'.. 6. The unit has a segmented bar that let's you know how much battery charge is left, but Garmin obviously hasn't figure out how to correlate that to time. A total of 5 bars, one would think 2 bars would indicate 40% left. WRONG, 2 bars generally meant less than 20 minutes left of usage. 7. Does not use changeable batteries, so if you're away from your hotel, walking, you can't put fresh batteries in; coupled with not having any real clue how much charge you have left on the permanently installed battery, leads to a problem. (How much do I conserve, how much charge is left in real time, etc.) 8. You can't plan your trip unless you are there. For example: If I'm in the USA and I want to see what attractions are located around the hotel I plan to stay in in Paris, the unit will not do it. It will only show me the attractions located close to where the unit physically is at that point. (Assuming you can get reception). 9. The current satellite reception strength indicator is not visible on the map screen. 10. When walking, in pedestrian mode, you have two choices for screen orientation. One allows the map to orient in the direction you are walking, the other North remains at the top of the screen. For the short time my 270 was able to retain satellites, I tried both. The unit's computing speed coupled with current satellite available accuracy makes the mode where the screen orients in the direction you are walking near useless. The screen near continually `hunts' for correct orientation. (Perhaps when the next generation satellites are all up and SA has been removed completely, this mode will work) Best to leave it on North at the top although I could not fully evaluate this in Paris because I never had constant satellite reception long enough. 11. The screen is easily washed out by bright sunlight. 12. No place exists on the unit to attach a lanyard; this is a problem in that the unit's case is very smooth and can slide out of your hand easily. All in all the unit is the right size for a pedestrian with a nice touch screen, but falls unacceptably short in Satellite reception capabilities and battery longevity (3-4 hours) given the batteries can't be changed. Assuming it found a few satellites where are you going to charge it during a 10 hour walking tour, or a hike, or a bike ride?Smoothly through Europe
I am an Idiot. 1) I get lost going out of my bathroom 2 I only speak english My brother and I decided to rent a car and tour Germany. The 270 took us on our trip without problems. It made it most enjoyable. We even drove at 131 MPH the the Autobahn.When we needed to eat we just let the GPS find a resturant for us This GPS does US, Canada & Europe without having to buy extra maps. Cheers!Keyword : nuvi
No comments:
Post a Comment