13 out of 13 people found this review helpful.
Worth the money
Date of Review: Sep 7, 2007
The Bottom Line: Good for the beginner with ergonomic design for the car - but would rather buy something that I can use in other rental cars that dont have the cigarette lighter.
This was my first independent GPS system. Prior to this I have used the DeLorme GPS attached to my laptop. Carrying a laptop was cumbersome on my trip so bought this GPS along with the TomTom One. TomTom One provided a wall-power supply and I could immediately get going with it. But I did not like the shape of the TomTom One and returned it in a day, and got the Magellan Maestro 3140.
This system is Compact, clear, loud, 2d/3d modes, Points of Interest, AAA functionality, Bluetooth and good voice clarity. AAA POI is different from the ones loaded on the system, and has to be updated from the CD.
This system cannot be used out of the box, but will first need charging in YOUR CAR. Does not include a wall-power supply. This has been designed as a navigator for the auto and so a power supply was pinched somewhere.
GUI is pretty easy to follow and the documentation is excellent. Everyone should check what each symbol stands for on the main map display. Lots of links from the main map.
Street names differ from the road signs. This may be present on other navigators but this is the only one that I have used.
Routing options are not helpful. You can select [1] shortest distance [2] fastest time [3] least use of freeways [4] most use of freeways. Option [4] is quite flawed as it tries to maximize use of one freeway and then use internal slow roads to the destination. (Google did a better job than this).
Changing the region when crossing borders. It took me a good 1 day to understand routing across borders (into Canada). Would have liked it to be seamless since the zip codes are really different.
