I am considering buying the Garmin Nuvi 250 as we are doing a road trip in Italy soon. Can anyone help with the following questions? -
It says it doesn't come with a mains charger but if it is plugged in in the car does that mean it is being charged up?
Will it still work when we take it out of the car? We want to also be able to use when on foot to enable us to find our way back to the car
What does it mean when it says it has 2D & 3D maps?
What does SiRFStar III GPS Chipset mean?
This is the first time we have bought a sat nav so I dont know if these are 'thick' questions to be asking but I am hoping someone can help.
many thanks

[Sanders79]

Hi ribble,

I am no expert when it comes to satnav - just look at my questions re my tomtom for proof! However, I know a bit from when I was researching, so I will hopefully get you started...

I expect that the car adaptor will charge the unit - it is like that for my Tomtom and just about any other device I can think of that has a car adaptor, e.g. personal CD players, mobile phones...

2D maps will be like looking at a road atlas, i.e. bird's eye view, with just the various lines drawn on for roads, rivers etc... 3D maps on the systems I have seen show the journey from a 3rd person perspective. I don't know if you're into video games, but imagine the point of view in a racing game or a 3rd-person shooter and you are on the right lines. The screen would have an arrow or something else (my younger brother-in-law has a tank on his Garmin!) to show your current position and direction and it would move along the streets to chart your location.

The sirfstar III stuff is just the chip being used by the unit to receive information from the satellites. When I was looking a few months back, these were fairly standard across a variety of manufacturers (Fujitsu Siemens use them in their LOOX PDAs) so I guess they are pretty decent! My TomTom 710 has the same chipset and it tracks the location excellently.

Just out of interest, what has made you go for the Garmin Nuvi 250? And where are you buying from? Comet sometimes do some good deals on items you reserve online and collect in store, it's where I got the 710 from and I saved £50.

Thanks Sanders
we are thinking of either a Garmin or a Tom tom. On the compare section of comet it just seemed slightly better. The main criteria is that it has UK and Europe already loaded, we dont need bluetooth or MP3 etc etc and we dont really want to spend more than approx £200. We would prefer to get it from somwhere like comet or currys so we could take it back it we had a problem. I know you can get things cheaper from places like pixmania but we once got a camera from there which had a foreign plug on the charger, and when it broke it was a right performance sending it back so for us its not worth the hassle.

[Sanders79]

Fair enough - I have to say all the bluetooth gubbins has been entirely unused on mine so far! And will probably remain that way too.

Did you see this Tomtom one Europe Travel Edition? I find the TomTom interface so easy to use, it's really intuitive, and it was what sold the brand to me over Garmin. That said, my brother-in-law's is also pretty simple, just different. And I am jealous I can't have a tank on mine

Whichever you decide to get, go and have a play in a shop. There is only so much you can learn from info on the web, imagine getting stuck with a voice that drives you bananas!

EDIT: I don't think the model I linked to can be connected to a PC - not sure how important this is for you... I gather updates are done using a bluetooth mobile phone, so the data would be received at your mobile operator's rates I guess.

I am not sure how important the amount of digits you can enter for the postcode is. The Garmin says 8 andthe TT 7. I dont think in this country you would need more than 7 but I'm not sure about Europe. Its a good idea to go and see if we can play with one in the shop though. I think we would prefer to be able to link it to the PC as well

[markdugdale]

I'm also looking for one with european maps. I've found this LG LN505 Here, it's £30 cheaper than the Nuvi 250, any thoughts?

Hi Mark
I had a look at the link for the LG505 which looks quite good although it says the maps are on CD. I want one that is already fully loaded with the maps. I dont understand what they mean by street level mapping, aren't all roads at street level, I'm not aware of any underground or in the air
Does anyone know if you can input your location when you arrive at a place e.g. a car park, and then use it as a handheld device to enable you to find your way back to your car

[Sanders79]

Hi ribble,

I think the term "street level" means that the maps are going to be nice and detailed. I think some maps you get are not so detailed, especially for foreign countries, in that they might only include motorways and a-road equivalents, which is fine if you just need to know how to get from one town to the next, not so great if you want a specific address when you get there!

[itsamac]

My advice is that you don't generally need a sat nav in Italy. I did a driving holiday in Italy driving from Bologna - Modena & Parma - Ravenna - Venice and Naples - Positano - Sorrento - Almalfi - Pompeii and Mt Vesvius as well as around Sicily. I found that the roads are signposted pretty well making it really easy to get around. There was only one occasion where I got lost (in Modena) and the Italians were extremely helpful in getting me back on track (I don't speak Italian but if you try, they love it).

The only tip I have is if see a town on the right and the direction you are heading in is pointing to the left, keep going straight. They show an arrow in the opposite direction to signify keep going straight.

The saying of when it Rome, drive as the Romans do holds true. Don't be suprised if a 2 lane road becomes a four lane road (particularly in Sicily).

If you do feel more comfortable having a sat nav, I would recommend the Tom Tom units such as this one for £199 which promises door to door anywhere in Europe or failing that Navman (which are supplied the Western Europe maps as well. I use TomTom mobile and Navman. Prefer the TomTom but that is not to say the Navman is not a good unit.

Just my 2p worth

Well, I finally settled on a Garmin Nuvi 250W. Seems really good, been practicing here with it to make sure we are fully used to it before going abroad. If I get lost now in Italy I will be really mad!! Its so easy to use and the POI feature is really usefull. It also does what I wanted, where I can take it out of the car and then use it later to re-direct me back to the car if I've forgotten where i've parked (as long as there is enough battery life left of course). All in all really chuffed