Garmin nuvi 265WT - First thoughts

Veni Vidi Vici

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Bought my first ever sat nav, the Garmin nȕvi 265WT (wide traffic) a 4.3” unit. After some use thought I would pass on my opinion.

I've previously used Tom Toms in the past (borrowed off mates or family). I bought my parents a TomTom One which is fine for what they use if for and is good to use. TomTom did give me some strange routes however, like telling me to go down one way street, and on a couple of occasions it just lost its route. On the whole it was ok though. I did however have trouble setting that up for them, I couldn't get it to update on the internet for about a week and when it did update it crashed the unit. The TomTom technical help was great however and after about 20 minutes on the phone they got it working and its been fine ever since.

My mates TomTom froze on him a few weeks ago but again TomTom fixed it for him within a week.

I've been dithering about which one to buy for ages and as I didn't know much about sat nav I couldn't decide what to get. Everytime I seem to ask anyone though they always said Garmin were better. My mate at work who is a gadget nut has had several sat navs over the years and swears by Garmin. I asked in Halfords what was the better unit and every time they said Garmin, and one even went as far as saying they had a fair few TomToms returned because they have crashed or frozen.

So I decided on the Garmin. So far so good. It doesn't have a many gimmicky features as the TomTom but it is very easy to use. The Garmin nuvi 265 WT has full UK and European street level coverage, text to speech, SD card slot, picture viewer, speed camera database, hands free calling and FM traffic receiver. It comes with the windscreen mount, USB cable, car charger lead, dashboard disc and one free map update and free lifetime traffic (TMC).

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PROS

Windscreen mount is great. Fixes very firm and doesn't come off (unlike the Tom Tom which was always falling off). The Nuvi has a little handle that you pull down and it sucks the mount to the screen, great idea.

Text to speech is great. Tells you the road names instead of just saying turn left, turn right etc...

Bluetooth hands free calling. It pairs with your bluetooth mobile phone so you can view your mobile contacts on the sat nav screen and call your contacts just by touching the screen, then speak whilst driving. Or if your driving and want to book a table you can look restaurants up and their numbers are preloaded on the Garmin (and hundreds of other places) and just press 'call' and it will dial it for you.

EcoRoute. This means you can put your fuel price in and cars MPG and it will tell you how much each journey has cost you.

Picks the satellites up very quick.

Has built in unit convertor, world clock and calculator if that interest you !!

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CONS

It took 4 hours to download the free map update (broadband connection !!!)

Speakers are at the back which although sound is ok I would have thought speakers at the front would be better.

The mini USB connection is a the back of the unit which means you have to take Garmin out of cradle to plug in the car charger.

No lane assist (doesn't bother me but might some people)

For some reason my home address didn't appear when searching the postcode and house number, but did appear when I searched the road name and house number ???

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For the comparible Tomtom I believe it costs almost £100 more (so I was told anyway I may be wrong on that), the Garmin cost £165 which although not cheap its a brand leader and has many good functions and works great.

So anyone considering a sat nav I don't think you would go far wrong with this one.
 
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I have an aging TomTom 700 and Garmin 255W. I'm happy with the Garmin now but wasn't at first. My opinions are

Garmin is better because
(a) Nicer screen and display graphics
(b) Nowhere near as buggy
(c) Easy to use with the computer (TomTom Home by comparison) is horrible
(d) More accurate routing

TomTom is better because
(a) 2D map handling is much better
(b) Even though the TomTom map is three years older it has greater road coverage and many more of the roads are labelled with names.
(c) Points of Interest (POIs) is handled better. More flexible. Icons on maps. You can choose which you want to see on the maps.
(d) Better speed camera management. The Garmin ones are built into the map DB and can't be removed - so if you add a third party set you get duplications.
(e) Better screen display configuration. You can choose what info you want displayed, whereas it is fixed on the Garmin.

At first I hated the Garmin because upto then I'd like to drive in 2D mode (like looking at a map). The Garmin 2D map zooms out to much making it hard to read. You can zoom in but within a minute or two the Garmin will zoom it back out. I was forced to use 3D mode which I didn't like as much.

But I've now got used to the 3D mode so overall whilst I think the TomTom does a lot of things better, when it comes to the really important functions the Garmin has the edge.

Cheers,

Nigel
 
Really enjoyed mine, but froze after a week leaving me stranded in east Durham (believe me, not a place you would want to be stranded).

Now have the Navigon 2150 max, £160 on Amazon but £120 at Halfords) and can't fault it, first class all the way..........
 

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