Major Price Drop for GPS Units

**TigerMike** · 04-10-2007, 10:04 AM

Originally Posted by Ctowner

Interesting news about the TomTom XL Iâ€™ll have to look into that further. Since you are looking for a GPS unit and you have no desire for Bluetooth and MP3 player, The TomTom ONE will be perfect for you. Obviously from all the reviews you read you know it is a quality unit and the price right now is almost too good to be true.

Yeah, I think the Tomtom One will be just right for me. I will probably pick one up next month for my b-day, and it will come in very handy for our family trip to Disney in June. Garmin`s Nuvi line looks nice too, but personally, I think they are overpriced for what they offer. Garmin needs to be more price competitive, IMO.

Crutchfield is the only retailer so far that I have seen getting ready to sell the One XL... TomTom ONE XL Portable car navigator at Crutchfield.com

**mixxmstrmike** · 04-10-2007, 12:52 PM

As much as I like the Nuvi 350, it`s "STILL" overpriced IMO so I may look into the TomTom One... Like some of you, I just want a slim, no frills GPS unit with excellent "Recalculate Route" capabilities.

If that`s the one thing I enjoyed about borrowing my friend`s Nuvi 350, it was the recalculate feature. Anyone want to chime in on how well TomTom`s recalc feature works?

Thanks,

Mike

**BlackElantraGT** · 04-10-2007, 02:20 PM

If any of you live near a Fry`s Electronics and was in the market for a small, low priced GPS unit, they`re having a 2 day only sale (yesterday and today) on the Nuvi 360 for $400 after a $200 instant price cut from $599

According to froogle.com the next cheapest place wants about $488 for the same unit. Even after Circuit City`s $150 price cut, it`s still $550.

This deal was in the Los Angeles Times, so it may not be applicable to Fry`s outside of SoCal.

At $400, this is an awesome price because it basically has all the features of my 660 (minus the 4.3 in widescreen). And if you`ve never seen a Nuvi in person, they`re truly pocket size. Mine is smaller than most paperbacks.

**mixxmstrmike** · 04-10-2007, 04:15 PM

Originally Posted by BlackElantraGT

If any of you live near a Fry`s Electronics and was in the market for a small, low priced GPS unit, they`re having a 2 day only sale (yesterday and today) on the Nuvi 360 for $400 after a $200 instant price cut from $599

According to froogle.com the next cheapest place wants about $488 for the same unit. Even after Circuit City`s $150 price cut, it`s still $550.

This deal was in the Los Angeles Times, so it may not be applicable to Fry`s outside of SoCal.

At $400, this is an awesome price because it basically has all the features of my 660 (minus the 4.3 in widescreen). And if you`ve never seen a Nuvi in person, they`re truly pocket size. Mine is smaller than most paperbacks.

Thanks for the tip! Just got one at my local Fry`s (NorCal)... one more thing to play with... when will my car get some attention?

-Mike

**BlackElantraGT** · 04-10-2007, 04:33 PM

I love the text-to-speech function. For me, the best voice is the female Australian accent. I find both male and female American English voices too "computer" or robotic sounding for me. I get a laugh at hearing it pronounce some of the Spanish streets. It`s so "gringo" LOL. But for Hawaii folks, text to speech is pointless because 99% of the streets are mispronounced

Now, if only someone can find a way to hack the 660 and make it a 680 (pretty much the same unit except with MSN Direct)

**atticdog** · 04-10-2007, 04:42 PM

Garmin 2610 is still a nice unit and can be had for under $300 with a 1 year warranty

and if it doesnt have map source ver8 you should get a free upgrade

**Ctowner** · 04-12-2007, 01:48 PM

Originally Posted by mixxmstrmike

If that`s the one thing I enjoyed about borrowing my friend`s Nuvi 350, it was the recalculate feature. Anyone want to chime in on how well TomTom`s recalc feature works?

Thanks,

Mike

Honestly Mike when it comes to route-recalculation, all of the top line GPS units are very similar. I would be very surprised if you could tell the difference between a Nuvi 350 and a TomTom ONE even if you did a side by side comparison. The ONE can basically recalculate faster than you can make a u-turn, which is all that should matter. Since recalculation speed is so similar, I think you have to compare these units by other features such as price, mapping, and how user-friendly they are. IMHO the ONE wins in all of those categories at moment. Does anybody have anything else to add? I love talking GPS and this is pretty well informed thread. :heelclick

**mikelea4ever** · 04-12-2007, 02:39 PM

To those who have a traffic info added in their GPS, how much do you guys pay for it?

**BlackElantraGT** · 04-12-2007, 02:48 PM

for the FM TMC traffic, you get a 90 day subscription to its service and after that it`s $60 to renew for a whole year. My subscription just ran out April 1st and I haven`t decided if I want to pay for the service just yet. For me, I don`t think I would get my money`s worth since I don`t drive as much as before. Plus, the info is not as "real time" as I would like it to be.

I can understand if they miss an accident or something of that nature, but on the 22 freeway here in SoCal, there`s been some major work being done where some entrances and exits are closed completely, yet it`s never updated in the system. These kind of traffic info should be easy to update since they should be getting that info from Caltrans.

**Woob** · 04-13-2007, 03:17 AM

So any suggestions for a basic portable GPS system? Has to be really user friendly, as this will be my first unit. Broad question I know, hehe.

**TigerMike** · 04-13-2007, 09:57 AM

For those interested, Circuit City has a deal going on the TomTom One, this weekend only. Enter coupon code 7UATPXBAGZ at checkout for $50 off, making the One $249, and has free shipping I believe. Best deal I`ve seen on this unit.

Also, has anyone purchased or looked into the Mio C310x GPS? I have done a lot of reading on that unit, and it seems to get a lot of praise on the net for it`s bargain price. For $199 (or less), I might give it a shot also!

**Stu** · 04-13-2007, 10:45 AM

I have been running with a NUVI for about a year now. Love it! I do a lot of communications work for the State of Michigan, which gets me to a lot of RF towers. I pre-programmed all the co-ord in, and the Nuvi girl tells me where to go

And she sounds so good telling me too! Great investement!

Stu

**BlackElantraGT** · 04-13-2007, 10:59 AM

I have no experience with the Mio, but this past Xmas I tried to get one because it was one of those Black Friday item, which of course was sold out right away. Most people bought that because it was cheap, but it`s probably not in the same league as a TomTom or a Garmin Nuvi. For the average person it`s probably good enough. IMO Black Friday items tend to just be so so. Price is their main strong point. If it was $150 like during Xmas? I`d consider buying it if I didn`t have any GPS at all. But since it`s still not cheaper than it`s Black Friday price, I would spend extra to get a better unit.

**mixxmstrmike** · 04-13-2007, 12:31 PM

Originally Posted by Ctowner

Honestly Mike when it comes to route-recalculation, all of the top line GPS units are very similar. I would be very surprised if you could tell the difference between a Nuvi 350 and a TomTom ONE even if you did a side by side comparison. The ONE can basically recalculate faster than you can make a u-turn, which is all that should matter. Since recalculation speed is so similar, I think you have to compare these units by other features such as price, mapping, and how user-friendly they are. IMHO the ONE wins in all of those categories at moment. Does anybody have anything else to add? I love talking GPS and this is pretty well informed thread. :heelclick

Thanks for the info... I eventually went with the Nuvi 360 per BlackElantraGT`s eagle eyes on that Fry`s ad. I`ve got a Hawaii trip and I`m inputting "a few" favorite addresses and it`s simply a breeze to work with. I used a friend`s Nuvi 350 last year and thought it was the coolest thing...

I didn`t think I would use the bluetooth feature with my cell phone, but after using it the first time, I was hooked. I put a 4GB SD card in my 360 and it`s now my IPOD, if you will. This will get hooked up into our Pilot which has an auxiliary input so I "should" be able to have phone conversations over the stock stereo speakers... at least that`s my hypothesis at this point... We`ll put that to the test over the weekend.

-Mike