 "4.5 stars rounded to 5" | 2008-10-06 |
| - Reviewed By User: AFZIJ9O6FK3CW |
| This is my first GPS I have ever purchased, and I was basically well pleased with all the features. It's not a perfect product....the garmin had to be turned off and on because it became strangely confused in the midst of a 500 mile drive between Casper, WY, and Bozeman, MT. Otherwise the unit performed almost flawlessly.br /br /The million points of interest is very useful on long drives in unfamiliar territory to determine if you need to exit for gas, or food. Another surprise, and very useful feature: the unit provides phone numbers as well as address/direction information. I made dinner reservations while on the road by looking up a restaurant, and viewing its phone number.br /br /The database and maps are almost up-to-date. The garmin can't find addresses that are less than 2 years old (new housing developments and street addresses that previously never existed). However, it is up-to-date otherwise, and maps track every back woods area I have driven.br /br /There is no subscription fee you have to pay for using this particular device, so it won't give you up to the minute traffic reports.br /br /Otherwise, the product met all my expectations, and then some....4.5 stars!! The garmin is a road warrior's best friend. |
| |
 "garmin has zero useful support" | 2008-10-04 |
| - Reviewed By User: A2AZ8GLL2AG23D |
| Others have denoted the long startup time to synchronize; I guess I'm patient enough to sit there and wait for it to "lock"; With that said, I've found the unit itself rather useful and I don't necessarily have any complaints, although the volume doesn't seem to go over loud rock and roll guitar solos;br /br /I give Garmin zero stars for support; IF YOU BUY THIS UNIT OR ANY UNIT FROM GARMIN, YOU ARE ON YOUR OWN!!!br /br /This ridiculous and non-functional Garmin communicator plugin is worthless and it makes purchasing a Garmin product worthless; You can't register your product, which means you can't get map updates; So, you've just purchased an obsolete unit from day one and you will never get maintenance nor support nor updates; Forget about e-mail/contact, and the 1-800 number is a waste of your time;br / |
| |
| "A Great GPS" | 2008-10-04 |
| - Reviewed By User: A16M8VNUOHAO6E |
| This is a great GPS without the extras (Bluetooth, Traffic Updates). My wife used it on a trip to Disneyland from Northern California. She got off track several times and the Garmin re-routed her right away. She was so happy. That's something coming from someone who doesn't care for electronic gadgets. I am very happy with it and recommend it for those not interested in Bluetooth and subscriptions to MSN for traffic updates. You can adjust the brightness or have it automatically adjust according to the time of day, adjust the volume, save addresses by typing them in or by being in a location and pressing the "car" on the screen which will prompt you to save the present location. |
| |
| "Great product!" | 2008-10-03 |
| - Reviewed By User: A25T2IDRPW518E |
| The Garmin 260W is excellent. I have not had any problem with satellite link up that others describe. By the time I get out of my neighborhood, it is ready to navigate. Sometimes it does give some roundabout directions that are inconvenient, but you still get there none the less. One complaint is that it gives too many audible directions. While driving on the interstate, it tells me to "stay right" after almost every exit - this has prompted me to mute the unit, making the text-to-speech feature that I wanted a lost cause. Overall, a great product! |
| |
| "wonderful GPS unit!" | 2008-09-25 |
| - Reviewed By brandicatanderson |
| I bought this product because of a recent vacation to Florida. I was very nervous about having to drive in a city I had never been before. I never got lost with the Nuvi. It is easy to use, and takes you anywhere you want to go. Don't leave your home town without one! |
| |
| "Excellent product" | 2008-09-24 |
| - Reviewed By User: A1QVCXUNYRBICM |
| The Garmin 260W is a great product for the price. I purchased mine after much research and reading over 300 reviews of the product. Definately shop around. Amazon had the best price that I found, but there were big differences in prices depending on where you looked. Many of the reviews are correct, the manual isn't worth a darn, but the unit is user friendly enough that a manual isn't necessary. Some points of interest may no longer exist and so on but that's the case regardless of what is purchased. I haven't had some of the problems I have read of others. Mine obtains a signal in a relatively quick manner considering GPS is not instant. The maps are fantastically accurate. I found that all the lanes of a local cemetary had been plotted which sort of shocked me. When I plug in where I want to go, it doesn't always go the way I would like, but it does recalculate quickly. I showed a buddy of mine some of the tricks I had read about and he had had his for a number of months. By touching the top green lable you will see all of the turns it plans to take you on. With that, I can decide if I want to go the way it has planned for me. Also, when you are at a specific location, touching your car will save the waypoint. These are a few of the little bonuses I have used repeatedly. I definately encourage others to purchase the USB cable for downloads. I didn't have to make room for downloads as others had complained |
| |
 "Garmin nuvi 260W is adequate" | 2008-09-20 |
| - Reviewed By User: A2O79F0FM82RNE |
| This is the first GPS device I've owned, so I wasn't sure what to expect. But after using it for a while, I'd like to offer some comments. First, the satellite acquisition can be pretty slow. One time it took over five minutes. Second, it does tend to get confused in the city. We were at a light, waiting to turn left as directed, when suddenly nuvi says 'recalculating' and tries to send me in another direction as if we were one block over. Finally, occasionally it gets very . . . strange. We were following directions to a nearby interstate when nuvi wanted us to turn down a pothole ridden one lane road that didn't look like it went anywhere. We declined. I checked it out later on Google maps and it kinda sorta maybe went the way we wanted to go, but it's not a road I would ever take. Overall, though, it does get you where you want to go, especially outside the city. In the city, it doesn't always take the most direct route.br /br /Larrybr / |
| |
| "Garmin is lost" | 2008-09-20 |
| - Reviewed By User: A34ME4IVS1IPIM |
| Only finds the location about 60% of the time. Keeps tellign me to make U-turns and tke routes which aren't even actually available. We tried it out going to places we know around town and I now feel I can't rely on it at all in a locaion that I wouldn't know better. This may have been a $260 mistake. |
| |
| "Great GPS after trying many others" | 2008-09-20 |
| - Reviewed By goldragn |
| The Garmin Nuvi 260W is a great little GPS:br /The text to speech is clear, the screen is more than bright enough, the maps are large on the 4.3 inch screen. Route calculation is fast. br /I regularly use it on battery power which is long, 4 or 5 hours, even more if you turn down the screen brightness. br /However, it seemed at first that satellite acquisition was very slow, sometimes as long as 12 minutes. br /I think I found a way around that. br /If I turned the GPS off at home, it located satellites within 30 seconds of being turned on again at the same location; if turned off before arriving home, which I was in the habit of doing, it took about 12 minutes to acquire the present location. br /It seems it did not know where to look for the satellites, and took a lot of time finding them. A software fault probably, but workable. br /After I discovered this, I left the unit on up to my destination and the problem was solved.br /br /Something nobody seems to have mentioned; when a store or restaurant is located by this unit, it gives the address AND the phone number of the intended location, and I can call ahead and make sure they are open and have what I want. This has saved so much time. br /Also, touching the car icon on the map gives you a workable "Where am I?" which can be saved to favorites. br /br /The 260W does not have all the features of a higher end Garmin GPS, like routing, blue tooth, traffic, etc, but Garmin has deliberately omitted these from the (slightly) lower end products.br /The documentation is very limited, but reading a downloaded pdf for the Garmin 350 helps with the 260W. br /Garmin seems to believe that no one wants to read a manual. br /br /All in all, a very good GPS, very easy to use. Garmin may have proved that no manual is needed. br /br /UPDATE: br /When I wrote the above, I was not aware that a "hotfix" was built into the following Garmin Nuvi units to speed up satellite location:br /205,205w,255,255w,265T,265WT,275T,500,550,750,760,770,780,755t,765t,775t,785t,850,880.5000br /This is a built in hotfix and cannot be applied to your 260W unit by software means. This hotfix predicts the location of satellites so the GPS can tune in to them and boot up in as little as 3.5 seconds.br /Unfortunately, the only way to speed up the 260W is the method written above.br /Also, unfortunately, the newer 255W does not have the good text to speech quality of the 260W. br /If you haven't bought a GPS yet, check out the coming reviews for the Garmin 265WT in October 2008. br /br /br / |
| |
| "It does the job, eventually...." | 2008-09-19 |
| - Reviewed By User: A32APOXNDSLN6D |
| Having used this unit for 2 months, there are things I do and don't like about it:br /br /Likes:br /1. The screen is gorgeous! Especially when you turned it on for the first time.br /br /2. All the POI are sorted into different categories (unlike the TomTom One my girl friend has), so searching is much easier.br /br /3. Gets me from A to B. Afterall, that's what the GPS is for. br /br /4. Good windscreen mount. Much better than the mount my girl friend's TomTom came with.br /br /5. Very simple to use.br /br /6. The speakers are loud enough to hear clearly.br /br /7. Password protection just in case the unit is stolen.br /br /br /br /Don't Likes:br /1. Slow starting up. Is there really that much stuff to load?br /br /2. Often find it difficult to get a satalite fix. I have found myself wondering around for 5 minutes before the unit picks up the signal and start guaidance. It could just be the area I'm living in (Pittsburgh). br /br /3. Some of the POI are out of date. I was seaching for a gas station one day and found that 4 out of 5 nearest gas stations were either closed down (a long time ago) or non-existancebr /br /4. Some of the map is out of date or wrong (and yes I'm using the latest version of maps). The unit has told me, in several occassions, to drive into one way streets with oncoming traffic.br /br /5. No MapShare like the TomTom, so road works and other road changes can't be shared with other people.br /br /6. Low battery warnings and Poor signal reception warnings gets in the way. These warning messages blocks the entire screen so you wouldn't be able to see the map. Quite frankly, an icon blinking in the corner would do, quite why they had to cover the entire screen I really don't know.br /br /7. The TomTom has your current speed, current time, ETA all in display. In the case for Garmin, it's "either-or", so you can have the ETA but not the current time etc (it could just be me not finding the correct settings, but still)br /br /8. Not as many languages as the TomTombr /br /br /So in summary, this unit does work. I personally prefer the TomTom, but it really is a personal preference. Like all GPS units, it's not perfect. You need to get used to it and set it up the way you want it. It can be a little slow at times, it might be lacking one or two features, but when you take the price and everything else it does well into account, this unit should at least be on your consider-n-compare list. |
| |
Expedited Available
