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BTW, did you go for the latest map upgrade? I'm debating spending the $75.
Mark
There are certain bypasses that I know should be in there, Rt. 404 bypass around Bridgeville, MD, for instance, was there for years before I got my GPS, and it's not mapped.
It's also missing all the fast food places just east of the Bay Bridge on Rt. 50 in MD.
-juice
No need to load individual "map sets" on the Garmin nüvi series. The entire U.S., Canada and Puerto Rico, with over six million points of interest, are preloaded on a unit that fits in your shirt pocket.
Have you been keeping your C320's software up to date?
http://www.garmin.com/support/collection.jsp?product=010-00401-00
I believe that's free for the life of your unit.
This is a website that you might enjoy:
http://www.gpspassion.com/forumsen/forum.asp?FORUM_ID=160
I like my Garmin, and once I reset the maps I'll be set for a while.
Mark
Thanks for the links, gotta remember to do that tonight at home.
-juice
My wife & son drove from Silicon Valley to Indiana with stops at the Grand Canyon and I got every map they needed on a 128 MB card!
Put in a call to Garmin tech support.
The language update worked - so now I can have her give me directions in Portuguese. Too bad it's not a Brazilian accent, but one from Portugal instead. I still prefer American English.
-juice
But how did you get the map updates? I have City Select North American v6, something like that. I didn't see how to get free updates for that package, where did you go?
I think I bought it in August 05.
-juice
If your C320 is set up similarly to the nüvi series, "Favorites" USED TO BE located in a file called "waypoints". It was recommended that the file be saved on your hard drive as you increased its contents. Several months ago, one of the Garmin nüvi firmware updates changed the name of the file to "current.gpx". Perhaps you'll find yours there.
During that earlier firmware update, if a user did not save the waypoints file to their hard drive, and copy its contents back to the current.gpx file on the nüvi, it was lost forever.
The gpspassion.com website has lots of good info about such things.
First, I reloaded everything on my work PC.
Then, I got the POI loader working, you download from here:
http://www.garmin.com/support/download_details.jsp?id=927
and then I got POIs from this index of POI collections:
http://www.gpspassion.com/forumsen/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=56474
so I added MD/VA/DC speed traps, red light cameras, and Costco, Wawa, and WalMart stores.
The cool part is I programmed the speed traps to go off only if I'm doing 10 miles over the limit. Otherwise it just stays quiet. Pretty nifty.
It also beeps now when I approach red light cameras.
Not that I'm planning increaseing my speeds or running any lights, but the warnings should help me stay out of trouble with the law.
Can Acura's and Lexus' NAV systems do that? :P
Also - a big issue was that I had to load and install the MapSource software on my PC. That let me backup my Favorites and see what maps I have loaded on the unit. So it doesn't start over from scratch. I'm sure I could add one state at a time rather than reload the entire thing again, but I haven't tried that yet.
Having that on the PC also lets you add Favorites on the PC, but...they don't synch very well. The ones I edited ended up in duplicate on the GPS. So you have to be careful about that. If you delete them on the PC, they also don't delete from the GPS. So the information isn't really synched, it just travels in one direction at a time.
Any how, much better now.
All I'm waiting for is for Garmin to get back to me about getting map updates for free. Mine came with MapSource NA v6, and I found out I'm eligible for v7.
v8 is out and brand new, but I don't want to shell out the bucks right now, especially since the maps aren't really up to date to begin with.
Just thought I'd share all the progress I made.
Great news that you are able to customize your C320.
-juice
Frankly, I haven't had more than one or two instances of need for mapping more recent than the 2003 date of the original Honda DVD. And those were nothing more than minor inconveniences.
How much you need the new DVD depends on how important it is to have much more current maps, businesses and restaurants than will be on the 2003 DVD.
I also use the nüvi 350 in my wife's car, as well as in rentals. Both systems have equally fine mapping. Restaurant and business POI's will always be a year or two behind, as local businesses go in and out at a prodigious rate.
Normally I would not bother, but my exit changed about a year ago, so the exit is different, and it tells me I'm "off route". Technically I'm off the road completely, because it's a new ramp. :surprise:
Who says you can't take a Miata off roading? :shades:
Also, the v6 maps are missing the Rt. 404 bypass around Bridgeville, MD, and we own a place at the beach and take that route every other weekend. The GPS tries to send you through town, and re-routes about 5 times in that area.
If those two are fixed, I'll be quite pleased.
-juice
Not exactly but with Lexus you can set up marked points with directional chimes. For example, if you want to take precaution on a westbound road where the speed limit changes from 55 to 25, just hit Mark when you are at the point where you want to be warned. Then later edit the point in "My Places" and add a directional sound. After that, it will always chime at that location.
But the whole idea behind a custom POI list is that you can download a list that someone else already built. Plus you don't have to do it one at a time.
I downloaded speed traps in MD, DC, and VA, and it added up to something like 7700 entries!
-juice
Once POI's are loaded onto a c320, how do you set an "alarm" so that the speed trap warnings only go off at Xmph over the limit?
You should do a search for POI here:
http://www.gpspassion.com/forumsen/forum.asp?FORUM_ID=160
Basically the files I found were pre-set to have alarms go off at the exact speed limit. I changed it to that it only goes off 5 mph over the limit. I may even change it again to 10.
But for each category, each CSV file you load, you can set the alarm to go off at a certain distance (ex: 1/4 mile before each red light cam) or a certain speed (default is the limit, but you can adjust for each speed limit category).
My wife had it this weekend but I have a road trip for the 14th so I should get a really good test of it then.
One catch - put all your CSV files in one directory, it uploads them all and deletes all the old ones. No biggie, it only takes a few seconds to upload them.
-juice
I pretty much always know where I'm going.
Is a Nav system one of those things that you never thought you needed, but once you get it, you can't understand how you lived without one? (Like Tivo... and I seldom watch TV)
Just looking for some thoughts...
One feature that I use all the time is the "Go Home" choice after I've been to a place and am heading home. My home address is saved so it is easy to quickly find my way out of an unfamiliar area, especially at night.
I keep finding all kinds of new uses for the system that I never thought I would care about. For one, it's great to have a built-in map always ready for you with "You are Here" right in the middle of the screen. I love looking at paper maps so it is great to have this always at my fingertips.
I also like that I can always find a restaurant, store, gas station, etc. easily. Listings include a phone number so I can call ahead for reservations, see if something is in stock, or make an appointment.
There's much more to it but I'll never buy another car without it. I had no idea it would be this useful.
I differ from some of the others here - I feel a portable NAV system is more practical as I can use it in my primary vehicle, as well as when I travel elsewhere. With the built-in I can't do that.
One other way NAV helps. My SIL is asking for a NAV for her birthday/holiday gift. She started a job in a nearby city where she only know how to get there and home. One day the road was closed with no detour signs. It took her an extra 30 minutes to get home until she was able to find a road she recognized. She said if she had the NAV she would have felt more safe and arrived home earlier.
Mark
It's like keyless entry in that way. You probably thought "I know how to use a key" before you got keyless, right? Can you imagine a car without that now?
Or cruise control? Same thing.
Just the other day, I went to FedEx Field, which has been around for nearly a decade. You can take 3 exits from the beltway, Arena Dr. is the best but it's close on non-game days. So I always went to the exit after.
The NAV system took me to the exit before, and I discovered a shorter route, probably saving me a few minutes in each direction, plus some aggravation. So even in familiar areas, when you *detour* from the best route, you'll know the next best route.
Other uses - your wife/kid/self craves a specific food, say you get a Big Mac Attack. No problem, go to Food, enter McDonalds, and find the 5 closest ones. Then see them on a map and pick the one that creates the shortest detour. Then eat.
Same for gas - say you have a Shell credit card, or you happen to like Wawa stores because they tend to combine cheap gas with clean bathrooms. Voila. NAV will find the closest one from any given point.
These features do become more valuable in unfamiliar areas, but you'd be surprised how much you don't know about the area you live in.
-juice
The only complaint is that the tones are loud if the kids are sleeping. I may mute the tones and just leave the read warning message on the screen itself.
But it is a neat feature.
Also, since I updated to City Select v8 (it came with v6) the maps are so much better. It now gets my home exit right, as well as a few other new roads near me. In fact I haven't stumped it yet, so I'm quite happy with the newer maps.
-juice
Thanks,
Christina
There is a Bluetooth thread, and people come for help trouble shooting all the time. If it's not listed, my guess is it will not work.
Does your carrier offer phones that are listed?
-juice
I'll check out the BT thread, I hadn't found it (or looked) for it before this.
The Razor is listed as compatible, so I could always get that. But I may just wait a little longer, there's no big hurry.
Christina
The maps and points of interest are always up to date and you are not distracted by screens of map graphics.
Click the link and then wait several seconds for the video to play automatically.
http://www.buick.com/turnbyturn/index.jsp?cmp=tbt_buickhp
First off, they hand-pick a perfect example. I'm not sure exactly what she meant by scenic, but avoiding the highway alone doesn't necessarily mean the roads are scenic. You may end up in busy city streets with tons of stop lights. There's no way the OnStar advisor knows the difference between "scenic" and just "avoid highways".
Right off the bat, it says "Start out NE".
Which way is that? Even if you have a compass that can be confusing.
She says no need for "changing navigation screens".
That's not true. You never really need to do that with a GPS. Once you set the destination and hit go, there is no need to change screens on any GPS systems I've ever seen. So the claim is unfair.
"2 hands on the wheel"
Already possible with voice guided systems. And again, an unfair claim, because once you set the destination, just as the woman did in the example, before she drove, you would not have to touch the GPS system again, so you'd have 2 hands on the wheel anyway.
But I've mentioned this before, in this thread - the maps are INCREDIBLY useful, almost more so than the voice instructions themselves. In fact there are times when I turn the volume down and just use the maps.
Perhaps an example is best. There's a place in Northern Virginia called 7 corners. Basically several roads intersect there.
Now, let's say OnStar tells you to turn right, well, which right? There might be 4 of them? Sharp right? Not specific enough. Easy right? Again, good luck with that.
A map will show you which one it is, exactly, so you know what to expect. Voice instructions can't be specific enough, you would have to rely on road signs, and that sort of defeats the entire purpose of a NAV system.
If you do find the maps distracting, just dim the display, problem solved. I can't imagine anyone would actually do that.
It's not bad for a low budget alternative, better than nothing for sure. But not nearly as useful as what I've used.
-juice
That adds up, you can buy a Garmin c320 unit for under $300 on Froogle and never pay fees again. So you break even early in the 3rd year of ownership, and have maps you can see so it's better.
It makes OnStar more useful, but it's still no match for maps you can see.
-juice
I'm an IT guy, it's what I do for a living, but a laptop setup would be too fussy for me. Too much waiting for boot up and all that.
That's why I got a self-contained portable, much simpler and quick and easy to setup. It has a battery so you can even take it with you in any other car.
-juice
I think the hassle soured you on the whole idea of GPS NAV.
-juice
But yeah, sell it and it goes with the car, unless you want to do a reverse install.
The reason I didn't go with those was that the interfaces were very cumbersome to use. I played with at least one of those models at Best Buy and pretty much couldn't get anywhere.
With the Garmin, in 15 seconds I had found my house, piece of cake.
-juice
This is similar to the GPS nav systems I've seen in the Chrysler minivans.
Watch the video again and you'll see the nav display in the Lucerne's radio.
If you want to keep up to date maps and POIs, you have to buy yearly updates with other gps systems, so they are not a one time expense that lasts forever.
You will have unlimited POIs with the OnStar system since the advisor can look up anything for you and then input the address and beam it your car.
So the $75 per year is still cheaper than even the incremental cost of the OnStar Service ($10 per month, or $120 per year).
Long term, I still think you'd be better off with a portable unit you bought yourself.
But...if you want OnStar anyway, I think it's easily worth the extra $10 per month. I'm just not sure I'd pay that full amount since I don't really care to pay for the other OnStar services.
It is a smart way for them to draw in new subscribers, though.
-juice