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Old Jun 2, 2006 | 2:32 pm
  #1  
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Which Vehicle Navigation System?

I am trying to figure out which vehicle navigation system I should get for my GF for her birthday...

Garmin
Magellan
TomTom
Lowrance

Anybody have any personal experiences....ease of use, etc.

- HF
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Old Jun 2, 2006 | 3:07 pm
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tomtom

of the three, I would get the latest tomtom.
it has a really nice new screen, wide screen, doubles as a bluetooth car kit, and interfaces with ones ipod.
the text to speach is the best I have heard in a portable unit.
and the mapping is very good.
real time traffic information enabeled it seems the one to beat right now.

all for about 700$
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Old Jun 2, 2006 | 3:32 pm
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Do you mean the 910 or the 700?

Also is it worth getting the PDA version of TomTom?

-HF

Last edited by HobokenFlyer; Jun 3, 2006 at 5:45 am
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Old Jun 2, 2006 | 4:52 pm
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910 all the way
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Old Jun 2, 2006 | 5:11 pm
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Take a look at the Navman. Some great deals on their website. www.navman.com
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Old Jun 2, 2006 | 5:33 pm
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We bought recently bought a Garmin Nuvi 350 for $650 on the Costco website (you have to pay $800 but get a $150 Costco shopping certificate, I believe to keep the manufacturer for getting angry at them for underselling).

It's great and it's tiny, about the size of a deck of cards in its little leather carrying case. NB we paid another $300 for a European map card and it worked very well for us in London, rural Denmark, and rural Norway. Thus far it has performed beautifully for us in Washington State and British Columbia.

If you search, you'll find Tom Tom and Nuvi discussed in another recent thread.

I'm sure your gf will appreciate either one!

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showt...ferrerid=16109

Last edited by Fredd; Jun 2, 2006 at 5:43 pm Reason: urls
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Old Jun 3, 2006 | 5:46 pm
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Originally Posted by Fredd
We bought recently bought a Garmin Nuvi 350 for $650 on the Costco website (you have to pay $800 but get a $150 Costco shopping certificate, I believe to keep the manufacturer for getting angry at them for underselling).

It's great and it's tiny, about the size of a deck of cards in its little leather carrying case. NB we paid another $300 for a European map card and it worked very well for us in London, rural Denmark, and rural Norway. Thus far it has performed beautifully for us in Washington State and British Columbia.

If you search, you'll find Tom Tom and Nuvi discussed in another recent thread.

I'm sure your gf will appreciate either one!

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showt...ferrerid=16109
Agreed, get the Nuvi. I believe the 360 is out or coming out soon.
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Old Jun 3, 2006 | 5:59 pm
  #8  
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100% TomTom 910. They are always miles ahead of anything Garmin has, no extra investment for maps, ipod interface, awesome screen etc...
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Old Jun 12, 2006 | 9:23 am
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I'm also psyched about the 910- no extra investment on maps- you get both the US and Europe maps (plus they're preloaded). I keep hearing great things about the maps from Tele Atlas.

A friend who's really into gadgets mentioned that the 910 just won the Editor's Choice award from GPS magazine.
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Old Jun 12, 2006 | 9:38 am
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I'm sure they're both great - at least our Nuvi is, ScottC

We were impressed by this review (as part of the research which led us to the Nuvi 350) which dubbed it a PC Magazine "Editors' Choice" winner:

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,1880576,00.asp

My brother-in-law's earlier model Tom Tom seemed to work well down in Florida a couple of months ago, so for us the fact that the Nuvi is so darned small is a factor. No question but what having European maps preloaded on the Tom Tom is more cost effective.

On this site some are complaining about 910 quality control issues, but I don't know if there's any validity to the complaints:

http://www.avforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=333989
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Old Jun 12, 2006 | 11:44 am
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Garmin is a big advertiser in the US, biased magazines like PC Rag will always prefer it over a low advertising European brand. In Europe the TomTom is always picked as "editors choice" over the Garmin so clearly the European magazines do exactly the same back...
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Old Jun 12, 2006 | 11:56 am
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I love TomTom I got the PDA version for my imate PDA2K. Works great, I really like the 3D map part of it. One downside for the PDA one is when you leave a state, you got to load a new map.
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Old Jun 12, 2006 | 11:56 am
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Ttg 300

I have used the TTG 300 for about 10 months now and I cannot say that I am happy with it. It does get me to where I want to get to eventually, but it has pointed me in wrong or non-existent directions many times. I live in Boston and the incorrect directions were for changes that have taken place a long time ago so I'm guessing it's not because the maps are old.

A couple of other irritating things: when approaching a turn onto a highway it will most times not tell you whether you should be going N or S (or E/W) so you have to look at the map. Also, when you approach your destination it doesnt tell you whether it's on the left or right. These are 2 basic issues that I would think are easy to fix.
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Old Jun 12, 2006 | 12:29 pm
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I used a Holux Bluetooth unit with my PocketPC as I wanted portability. I "cheaped out" and went with Mapopolis over TomTom, but would have rather gotten TomTom in retrospect. IIRC they both use Navtec for their maps.
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Old Jun 12, 2006 | 1:16 pm
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Originally Posted by jason8612
I love TomTom I got the PDA version for my imate PDA2K. Works great, I really like the 3D map part of it. One downside for the PDA one is when you leave a state, you got to load a new map.
That depends what map you have loaded on it; on my KJam I have a map with 12 states loaded...
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