raytsui's Full Review: Garmin StreetPilot 2610 Car GPS Receiver
The StreetPilot 2610 is the newest entry in the line of automotive GPS navigation units from Garmin, one of the leaders in consumer GPS units. It is the successor to the StreetPilot III, which is still being sold and was at the top of Garmin's line of car navigators. The 2610 is a sibling to the bigger brother 2650 which has some "dead-reckoning" capabilities to better handle "lost satellite reception" scenarios, but requires professional installation due to special connections to the vehicles speedometer output. The 2610 does not need any special connections to your vehicle and can be bought at any Garmin retailer and works identically to the 2650 otherwise. There is also the new 2620 model which is basically the same as the 2610, but instead of using memory cards, it has a built-in hard disk preloaded with map data for North America.
Consider this unit to be an alternative to the factory supplied navigation units that you buy as an option on cars, it is a fully featured GPS that rivals those systems in capability. But of course, this unit is not restricted to use in one car, and not integrated with the dash. But the price is a lot less expensive.
Here's some tidbits that you should know upfront. There is a wealth of features that I could spend hours describing, but here are the highlights.
- It is a transportable GPS unit with street level mapping and voice prompted navigation which is installed onto your dash (needs an open location with a clear view of the sky...typically front and center on your dash). It will provide automatic calculation of routes to any specified destination, and will guide you along to that destination using a series of voice prompts on a turn-by-turn basis, and displayed information on its large 256 color LCD display.
- Everything is supplied to get you going. You get an mounting adapter with permanent or semi-permanent adhesive backing "discs" so you can mount your unit, or use the supplied large "bean bag" friction base which allows your unit to stay in place without adhesive. You get AC adapters for using the unit indoors, DC adapter for your car with built-in speaker to let you hear the voice prompting and sounds, USB cable to transfer map and other data to and from your computer, Mapsource software with USA mapping data for all of the USA, and a 128 Compact Flash data card which will typically hold enough mapping data for about 4 states. Compact Flash cards are available in 512, 1G, 2G sizes now. Buying a 512 will go a long way to loading enough data for the typical road trip.
- The unit is designed for navigation in road vehicles, and is not designed to be used as a general purpose GPS unit (like, for hiking), because it cannot be battery powered (must use external power adapters), and is quite hefty to boot. It can resist light splashes of water. The memory is permanent (nonvolatile) meaning that any data accumulated is not lost if you unplug the unit.
- The unit uses a clear bright touch screen (visibile even with polarized sunglasses) display of 256 colors with self adjusting brightness depending on ambient lighting conditons. It switches from a light to dark background depending on time of day. I found the unit to be highly readable after tweaking a few options. There is the ability to customize the display to your liking (vary the amount of information displayed, as well as color scheme, brightness, and transparency). Normally, in either navigation or normal map mode, there is extra information displayed on hideable tabs. The size and color of the tabs is changeable, and I found that the default transparent display was a bit cluttered and less readable. So I changed the width of the tabs to a smaller size, and made the background a solid color. Common operations that you can perform on the street map is pan the map by point/dragging, adjust the pointer for locating objects, zoom in and out using the cursor menu, hide and display the informational tabs on the right size of the screen. The touch screen is used to enter text for address using an on-screen keyboard, and has icons and menus for changing options. The options pages are similar to the dialog boxes you get on Windows operating system with "x" close buttons/tabs/combo boxes/check boxes etc. There are also real buttons for common functions like activating menus, setting volume, doing find, etc. The buttons have two functions depending on how long you press the button.
- You also get a infrared remote control that a passenger can use to control the unit instead of the touch screen. The remote sensor is on the front left of the unit. It has buttons for most common functions, a telephone keypad for numbers and text, and a joystick lever for cursor and panning control. I won't use the remote much because the touch screen interface is so much faster to use in comparison.
How do you use this unit?
Out of the box, the unit has built-in maps of most major highways in the USA, but the first thing you would do is load the detailed USA City maps onto the unit for the regions you are interested in. For Canadian users like me, you should buy the Metroguide Canada CD for detailed mapping because the supplied CD comes only with information for inside major metro cities in Canada and has no coverage for smaller country roads. Once you have installed the Mapsource software and drivers, you select the "chunks" of maps you are interested in, plug in the unit using the USB cable, and save the chunks to your GPS unit. Doing so takes a few minutes at least depending on your computer. The Mapsource software allows to do generate sets of routes you want to use, map out waypoints, measure distances, find points of interest, everything you can do on the GPS itself. After you have downloaded the mapsets you can move the unit into your car and you're basically ready to go. Mount the unit using the supplied adhesive disks, or use the bean bag mount. Then plug it in using the DC adaptor, and you're good to go. You can adjust the unit by tilting it back and forth or swivel it side to side.
After you turn it on, the unit will take a minute or so to figure out its location by acquiring the satellite signal. And then it will show a real time display (updated once per second) of your location, your speed and compass direction, which street (and address number if possible) you are on, and the next cross street as you are approaching it. You can also see more detailed trip information such as average speed, time stopped, etc by using the page button. You can zoom in and out or pan the display using the tools on the left side of the screen (touch that area to see them).
If you need navigation help, you have to set the destination first. You can set the destination by using the Find function which has lots of options. The map set data has a lot of Point Of Interest database and you can select them by category (Food, Exits on the current highway, Services, Accomodations etc), and you can filter the list by Name to narrow down the list. You can also search/sort by which ones are nearest. You can search by address or intersection also. There are a myriad of options, and sometimes it might take a while to find the exact one that you are interested in, so a bit of practice experimenting with this feature will prove worthwhile. Because this is a national database, keep in mind that the list will be out of data somewhat, and the nature of restaurants and stores being so transient, and even new residential roads being added, that it won't be perfect, but it will be as good as most paper maps at least. You enter addresses by using an on-screen keyboard or using the cursor keys or telephone keypad on the remote. The screen dims the sucessive characters that don't match any of its database matches as you enter the street or location name. The address has to be entered exactly to match the database so sometimes you have to experiment with the spelling to get a match if the address involves "road" versus "crescent" etc.
Once you find the destination, you select "Go To" button, and then the unit will start the routing calculation which will take a few moments. You have the option of shortest road distance, fastest road route, or straight line (ignore roads). Once it has plotted the route, it will show the route using a thick highlighted line on screen, and the display will change to show information including: distance to next turn, time to next turn based on your current speed, direction to turn. At the same time you will hear (and see on the screen) progressive instructions announced through the speaker such as "Drive 2.5 miles until a right turn", "In 500 feet, make a right turn", and then later "100 feet, make a right turn". If you deviate from the route, the unit will announce that and immediately recalculate a new route. The calculation takes only a few to several seconds due to the unit's fast processor. It usually takes a few moments until you are well off the route before it figures out that you are off-route, so in the first few moments, it might give you directions as if you are still on-route. Otherwise, this all works well, and it's pretty hard to get confused by the directions as the system gives you clear prompts throughout the journey. For extra measure of security, you can eyeball the map and map sure you are following the thick marked line, just to make sure. Initially, when you start off, you may find that the unit is a bit confused if you are in a parking lot and may have to wait until a few moments driving on a road because the unit tries to lock your location to the nearest road in its database. So when you start off, pay attention to which direction you are initially facing and figure out whether what you need to do to get to the main route. That may save you a u-turn right off the bat. As long as you stay onto a road, I find the navigation prompts to be nearly foolproof.
A few times, there were some erroneous details like "Stay to your left" even though it didn't make any difference, or it was obvious to do so. Again, use the screen to confirm any directions when it may not be clear from the voice prompts aloone.
I feel confident that the routes it generates are pretty near-optimal and will get me where I need to go. Of course, there still may be better routes, as sometimes it will choose a high traffic road with more stoplights than one with less, but for the most part, the system does a good job, and will get you there.
So what don't I like?
Not much, except that the full European mapset with full auto-routing capability is very expensive (around $300+ USD). And the unit may get confused when you are starting off or resuming a route. No battery operation means I can't use the unit without plugging it in with a power source (e.g like when I want to go into a restaurant and want to look up things).
Of course, the map data is always a bit out of date which can't be prevented but something you have to keep in mind. Since the maps seem to come out every year or two, there are bound to be errors, but Garmin uses the industry's best map providers, so this is as good as it gets.
Lastly, I wish there was some way of sticking the unit onto the lower part of windshield instead of using adhesive on the dash surface.
All nitpicks, but they are my nits to pick. Otherwise, this thing is the best accessory thing to come along for my car that I've bought, it's surely going to prove very useful for years to come.
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update
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I just took a trip around Alberta abandoning paper maps to really put this to the test. In the city, there were definitely spots where tall buildings blocked reception of the GPS signal. Deep into the mountains, reception was lost at times intermittently.
On my V4 Metroguide Canada, I did notice a number of errors with the map data. On routing to the Calgary airport, there was an obvious error that routed me in the middlef a main road to do a U-turn which didn't make sense, and out of Banff, there was sections that were out of date on the Bow Valley Parkway, and a cloverleaf ramp that was changed to a straight ramp. Also, coming out of Red Deer, the ramp directions seemed wrong. And I did note that a few restaurants had moved since the map was created, even a Costco I was trying to get to have moved! But all-in-all, the unit worked very well, and I was always able to get to where I wanted provided I used some common sense in conjunction with the unit's announced directions. Paying attention to the road and road direction signs is still necessary but I am overall very pleased with the unit's functions and performance overall. Not having to rely on maps is such a convenience and stress reliever.
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update 2
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Garmin has released many new versions of the firmware. Installing new firmware will fix bugs, add new features to the GPS. It's easy to do, connect the GPS to your computer, and run the downloaded firmware updater program. That's it.
The new versions of the firmware (it's now at 3.7) adds a lot of features to the GPS. It adds WAAS capability, and as well, the display text is much easier to read since the black text has a white outline to give the text contrast on any background. You can do things like specify "via" points, route back to your preset home location, specify roads to avoid, preview of routes, adjust routing priorities, find things along a route, etc.
Kudos to Garmin for addressing their bug fixes and adding new features so proactively.
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update 3
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After using this unit for a while, I would like to give an update.
If you are inside the city center and have lots of buildings around you, reception of the GPS signal can easily be blocked. I was driving around Montreal downtown and I was only getting a signal 50% of the time when there were tall buildings all around. I think if you really need good reception, you might want to invest in an external antenna that connects to the MCX port on the unit.
Comes with alphanumeric remote control and external speaker; includes USB interface with cable Bright, automotive-grade 8-bit color LCD: 3.3 x 1.7 inc...More at Amazon Marketplace
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