Which Garmin GPS?

[Slickone]

I'm flying to California (Bay area) with someone in a few weeks, and am thinking about buying a Garmin Nuvi 350 to help us get around. I can't quite figure out all the differences in all the models. What's the difference in the Nuvi 350 and the Nuvi 650?
The Nuvi 660 has built in Traffic antenna. Is it worth the extra money (over the 350)? Do you have to pay for this service?

Why would anyone buy a Streetpilot c5x0 for the same or more money instead of a low end Nuvi? Aren't the Nuvi's better?

Also, do California cops give tickets for GPS's stuck to the windshield or dash?

 

[Kaido]

http://www.gpslodge.com/archives/009219.php

 

[ultimatebob]

Yes, you need to pay for the traffic service if you want to use it.

 

[HardWarrior]

I don't know if the Nuvi's are better. That you can probably find out for yourself. I can say that I've been perfectly satisfied with my C550. Also, and this statement is made without doing the research, I'd think that for a $350 difference you'll get a bit more than just the traffic antenna. Garmin tends to be a better company than that. BTW, the antenna is about $200 if you buy it alone.

 

[JoPh]

i got the nuvi 350. best little thing ever.

 

[Jarhead]

I recently used a Nuvi 350 up and down the west coast (+5,000 miles traveled), and it was a godsend on the sightseeing trip, and the voice prompting helped me navigate LA with ease, where I know I would have gotten as lost as a tumbleweed. It was also cool to not have to book hotels a day in advance and at the end of the day rush to get to them, but just to poke around, stopping to look at whatever, then in late afternoon, to have it list hotels by distance, guage how far I wanted to drive and where, based on hotels there, and call up and make reservations with phone numbers provided by the Garmin Nuvi. Another cool feature, once it came time to eat, I could food by Italian, Fast Food, or whatever, and it would show me distances and take me there. The Points of Interest function was really cool, I found many things I would have driven right on by.

Being able to mount it in the window by the rear view mirror was nice, plenty readable, and the voice prompts could be turned up to a level that I could drive with the windows down and still hear it just fine.

The GPS reception was stellar in many difficult situations that would have totally lost many other units (and I took it to several known places where lesser units couldn't cut the mustard).

Two Thumbs up!

 

[Siva]

I was thinking of saving for awhile and getting the 680. Are the bells and whistles just a waste of money?

 

[patentman]

Originally posted by: Siva
I was thinking of saving for awhile and getting the 680. Are the bells and whistles just a waste of money?

I just picked up the 660 and it is great. The only two things the 680 has that the 660 doesn't is MSN connect (to me, a useless feature) and a $400+ price premium.

Essential features for me were (660 has them all):

text to speech (i.e., the unit can read street names)
automatic re-routing
bluetooth phone capability
fm transmitter so i can listen to the directions through my car speakers instead of the crappy built in speaker
larger screen because I had trouble operating the touchscreen on 3" displays that I checked out (I have short stubby fingers that don;t play well with tiny buttons)

Also, OP, the garmin's that come with the live traffic services (the X60, X70, X80 models) give you a three month free demo to try out the service. After the demo, it is 5 dollars a month (60/year). If you ever think you might want the traffic service, you might as well sprin for an x60 model or higher, because the add-on traffic antennas are ~$200 and are not nearly as well integrated into the system. The nuvi 660 has the traffic antenna built into the power cord, so at least it is not in the way.

 

[imaroon]

The Nuvi 350 is the top car gps system today. Here is a list of the top 10 gps car navigation systems and hand held systems