magiciansampras

We're thinking of jumping into the car GPS thing after being impressed with Hertz Neverlost and seeing the prices fall over the last couple of years.

Basically we don't need anything fancy, but the ability to bring it to Europe and use it there is very cool. We're in Europe at least twice a year and often rent cars.

Does anyone have good experiences with the TomTom Go 910? The alternative in our price range would be the Garmin nuvi 360. Thanks all!

RichMSN

I returned the 910. It was far too big for me.

I have the Nuvi 350 with Europe on a memory card. I recommend it highly. Fits into a shirt pocket. Buy the portable friction mount and it sits nicely on a dashboard. It speaks the road names, which was critical for me.

$369 for the Nuvi on Amazon. Another $200 or so for the European Maps.

magiciansampras

The small size of the Nuvi is appealing. You can literally bring it with you while walking around a European city and use it as a map?

But is it possible it's too small? You can see it well and everything while driving?

Thanks for the info!

knifeandfork

I bought a 910 in January. I'm a Londoner, but seem set to be spending 3-4 months a year in the US. I've used it a lot in CA, all over the UK and a bit in NY. I haven't taken it to Europe yet, (but Wingnut , vicar of the two parishes British Midland and London & Ireland, will be taking my unit on holiday to France later this month, so he can chip in then)

I bought it because at the time it was the one unit that came pre-loaded with all of N America and Europe. And Guam, but that was less of a deal maker. For all I know, it may still be the only one on the market that does. And 4 months rental of NeverLost would pay for a 910 twice over.

Good points: It is very good as a navigator. It's very fast, and if you deviate from the route it's planned it recalculates very, very quickly indeed. I mean it really is good, much slicker than NeverLost.

The maps are pretty much up to date if you update them off the website. It's been caught out twice so far, but only in the little tiny windy streets in East London. It's impressive.

The maps and direction giving are really clear, better than anything I've ever used. Very easy to follow. I hardly ever misunderstand what she's trying to tell me to do.

Bad points: The POI (points of interest) are rubbish. It doesn't know stores it really should, and, worse, if you tap in say "Barnes & Noble" it doesn't give you the street address, just a distance. So if you want a Barnes and Noble in one area it just say 7.9 miles away, and doesn't say "Burbank" or "Ventura Blvd". Most annoying.

London has two Ikeas (there maybe three now, I'm not sure). One in the North, one in the south, in Croydon. I live maybe 6 miles from that one. Plug in Ikea and it gives you two, one in Holland, one in Poland. Not helpful.

LA: Movie theatres. 65 of them. Just not the Arclight. The big cinema in Hollywood where everyone goes. Annoying.

It doesn't like synching with a Mac running 10.4. There's funny business with the USB drivers. You need to connect it through an unpowered USB 1.0 hub. Tedious. Oddly, it will do a set-up fine, just not a synch.

I bought it because it's the only one that ticked the boxes I needed. I'm happy with it in the main, but after the really very good POIs on NeverLost, the 910 is a let down.

But from reading other reviews of other machines, here and elsewhere, all of them seem to have drawbacks and advantages. No one seems to have put all the good things from all of the makes and put in one box, though I'm sure someone will be along in a minute to correct me on that.

cordelli

Pretty much everything Knife said. I got mine a the end of the year with the rebate offer, used it in Italy, use it in the US. I love it.

It recalculates fast (and quietly), I don't have to load maps into it anymore, etc. They have a new model, the 920 I believe, not a clue what the difference is.

A couple of downsides to it, though again not enough to get me to give it up

• It needs to be in a cradle to recharge, either on the windshield of the ac one
• Same for speaker socket
• Same for external antenna
• Internal only batteries, you can't swap them out if you can't charge it
• Sometimes it can take a while to pick up a signal. Sometimes it's lightening fast, others not

RichMSN

You can see it well, but I find that with the spoken street names, I look at it far less than I thought I would. Before buying the pressure mount (for the dashboard), I would routinely stick it in a cup holder.

I'm sure the 910 has its advantages, but my biggest requirement was flying with it in the briefcase taking up minimal room. The 910 would not fit this criteria, but the nuvi 350 does.

mcrt

I have been very happy with the TomTom One. It isn't anything fancy, no bluetooth speaker, no photo viewer or MP3 player, but it works great as a GPS and will fit comfortably in your shirt pocket.

You can find it for about $200 on sale in stores or cheaper online. It comes with US/Canada/Guam maps. Europe maps on the TomTom site are about $170 I'm sure they can be tracked down cheaper too.

alect

You mean the Garmin Nuvi 370 (that's the one that includes European maps). I considered the Tom Tom Go 910, but went with Garmin Nuvi because of the better form factor (we wanted it for walking too) and that Tom Tom maps don't cover Ireland. Have been very happy with it.

In fact got mentioned in a WSJ article - http://online.wsj.com/public/article...574617413.html

SanDiego1K

Does either the TomTom or the Garmin have maps of New Zealand?

futaris

You can put Open Source GPS maps on a Garmin, or a Pocket PC:

See NZ Open GPS Project or http://gwprojects.orcon.net.nz/gps/

Haven't actually used them yet, but they load fine on my Pocket PC running gpsVP.

SanDiego1K

I've gone thru several of the threads in this forum about GPS systems, and have pulled out a number of models. I've just priced them out. I'd like to buy a system for the car that we can throw in a carry on and use throughout the US and in Europe (and ideally New Zealand). I'd like to spend no more than $600 with full maps for Europe.

TomTom OneXL - $300 – wide screen version of One, 4.3” wide
TomTom Go 720 - $500
TomTom Go 910 - $450 – Europe maps are preloaded
TomTom Go 920 - $600 – preloaded with Europe

Magellan 4040 - $500, no Europe
Magellan 4050 - $600, no Europe

Garmin Nuvi 270 - $400 – preloaded with Europe
Garmin Nuvi 350 - $450 – no Europe
Garmin Nuvi 370 – $470 - preloaded with Europe
Garmin Street Pilot C550 - $450, must buy extra chip for Europe

Can you help me do a downselect? I'm clueless. The only thing that seems evident to me is that the Magellan systems are beyond my price point, since I'd have to buy European maps on top of their purchase.

Also, if I buy a Garmin without European maps, is this what I need to buy to get them?

alect

Yes that is what you need. But as you can see in the differential between Nuvi 350 and Nuvi 370, if you definitely know you need european maps the 370 is outstanding value.

as for recommendations - I bought the nuvi 370 - due to maps (tom tom maps for ireland are either v poor or non-existent), garmin reviews and reputation, and form factor - the nuvi is literally the size of a pack of cards, and we wanted to also use for walking (which we did with great success). YMMV

alect

For Garmin units, you can also purchase the Garmin maps - http://www8.garmin.com/cartography/m...NewZealand.jsp

cordelli

Hey I'll take back the takes a time to get a fix comment, it did a software update last week and on a trip to the west coast it fixed it's position in seconds, and it was the same when I got back here. Before it was five minutes or so.

Guess every now and then it pays to update the software

dtsm

Amazon.com sells 350 for $369 vs. 370 for $469 so differential is $100...but 370 still looks like the way to go.

Btw, can someone confirm that nuvi 350 is IDENTICAL to 370 except that latter has Europe pre-loaded?