Garmin StreetPilot c320 3.5-Inch Portable GPS Navigator
by Garmin
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List Price: Our Price: $129.00 You Save: $620.99 (83%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $29.99 (click here) Category: GPS or Navigation System See more product details |
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Customers in the UK,
Buy this product at amazon.co.uk
for British Pounds
Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Garmin StreetPilot c320 3.5-Inch Portable GPS Navigator
Customer Review: very disappointing-it's being sent back
Summary: 1 Stars
1. first peek the device looks small and cheap. the instructions are bare MINIMUM and the manual must be downloaded from garmin.
2. the cd took a LONG time to load, then would not go beyond a window stating ' error communicating with device' and there was no going any further...period, rendering the device useless.
3. to unloack the maps you need some type of 25 gigit code...which was nowhere to be found. you had to check a box which them connected you to garmin, supposedly to give 'the code'. by then i no longer trusted garmin and how they would then have access to data on my computer. some companies plant stuff and some take stuff and you would be none the wiser. so going that route, with all that goes on today, i do not think is prudent.
4. the device as sold is NOT legal in california. you need to buy as they say, 'accessories'. i called the chp and they confirmed the illegality of using the device suctioned or mounted onto a window. you want ticketed?? i do not. if they are selling in california they should be up front in their ads and state the inability to use their device as sold in california.
5. there are batteries somewhere IN the device. now i do not know of any battery that lasts forever. the batteries are well concealed and i could not find any access door to them. what happens then when they die? is the device kaput? can you change batteries? you just do not know, once again a failure to disclose.
i read the reviews and bought based on them. but i am disappointed and frustrated with the device. it is useless to me and so will go back to amazon. since i was never able to get the device to load, nor get the maps unlocked i have no idea how well it works...but i would be ultra skeptical. and my trust in garmin is at a zero point.
Customer Review: fixes to all garmin c320's problems
Summary: 5 Stars
The garmin c320 has many minor and some major problems. Here are fixes to all some of the mose known ones.
-The garmin c320 comes with a 128mb sd card. This will only hold mabey 4 states.
--Solution: 1gb sd card can hold US. A Toshiba 1 GB Secure digital card 1GB SD card costs $12.99 on amazon.
-In some areas, the signal is lost.
--Solution: For $19.95, you can get a gilsson antena that will defenetly at least double if not tripple your reseption.
--or a cheeper on on ebay
--of a none brand name on for ~$10
-Glare from the sun makes the screen harder to see
--Solution: you can get a Garmin StreetPilot c320 TrueVue Anti-Glare GPS Screen Protector for $9.95 on amazon.
--or there are shades for the garmin c320
-the window mount keeps folling off.
--Solution: use alcohol to clean that part of the window off. It really helps.
--or get a vent of dash mount. Dash is better because vent mounts block vent and can hurt vent.
all this stuff can be found cheeper but i just showed amazon's prices
On problem i can't help is the mapping software. Navteq is used by garmin and teliatlas is used by many of tomtom's stuff and mio. The thing about this is that all of the mapping software has problems. For citys in the us, navteq is the best. For Europe, it is defenetly teliatlas.
garmin c320 is a very simple gps and can be used by anyone with half a mind. on the other hand it dose not have as much stuff as the mio 310x. Problem about the mio though is that is is way to compicated and by parents are impared when it comes to tecnoligy.
If you need any help or have any other questions, email me at ej9988@hotmail.com
or
ej9988@gmail.com
Customer Review: Battery failed but otherwise OK.
Summary: 5 Stars
Editing my earlier review- device died after three months of ownership, had to send it back for warranty repair. Battery failure was the verdict, they shipped me an exchange unit that appeared to be brand new. I had to re-activate my maps software with the new serial number and reload maps. Since then it's working fine (knock wood).
This is the first GPS I've owned. Just got back from a trip to New England and used the C320 extensively there. It never steered me wrong, and the detour feature came in handy in Boston where there were some Big Dig related closures. It seemed to know about every little dirt road in Vermont (though I wish it had a way to include more detail about the road type). It was fast in calculating and recalculating routes. This model does not speak street names but was not a problem. The suction mount holds onto glass VERY well. The touch screen is sensitive and the user interface intuitive. I NEVER had an issue with satellite reception (except in tunnels, naturally- and when emerging it would pinpoint location again in seconds).
I do have a few quibbles. When using "shortest route" option it can send you on some odd paths. Claiming that you are a "truck" can eliminiate some of the back-road routes. Fastest route seems to work best. If you miss a turn, and have included UTurns in "avoidances," it can send you on quite a big loop rather than just having you turn around at then next intersection. It can be hard to read in bright sunlight. And it's "points of interest" seem to cover things like gas stations and tourist destinations well, but fall short on shopping.
Overall, I don't hesitate to recommend this as a good midpriced GPS option.
Customer Review: Custom POI software capability misleading
Summary: 2 Stars
A big reason I purchased the c320 was to load addresses into it using the available POI software, which advertises the ability to create custom points of interest. I planned on using .csv files of business addresses which I had compiled previously for other uses. The catch is that the .csv file has to already have the latitude and longitude for each address entered as a value, or the Garmin POI software won't work. If I had been sophisticated enough to have entered the latitude and longitude of hundreds of customer and prospective customer locations when I was creating the .csv file, I probably wouldn't be buying an entry level GPS unit. You can load address lists into Google Earth or MS Street and Trips, and they will plot the locations for you. Why the Garmin POI software won't, I don't know. With it you have to have the lat/long info already, which is pretty much the reason I bought the Garmin, to calculate that info for me once I provide an address.
All I wanted was to be able to transfer addresses into My Locations. I'd then pull them up when needed, and the unit should build the route just as if I had manually entered the address keystroke by keystoke. But it doesn't work that way. I can do this, but it will have to be entered one at a time, manually.
Not everone would plan on using the unit this way, and if you are only looking for an entry-level GPS unit and you don't mind typing in a lot of info to get to your route, and you don't mind having no browsing capability, and scrolling through several screens to get to the info you are looking for is okay with you, then this unit would probably be acceptable for the price.
Customer Review: Navigating in England and Italy
Summary: 5 Stars
Great GPS! Worked even in navigating back roads (to obscure locations) in UK and Italy on October/November 2006 trip. Good data base. Besides addresses, we could usually type in hotel or restaurant name and it would be there. Really great when traveling in unfamiliar teritory at night.
We chose the version where you load the software on your computer, then download only the maps that you want to the Garmin. Garmin comes with US map software; we separately bought the software maps covering all of Europe (quite expensive!)
Main criticisms all have to do with documentation. There aren't any paper instructions to speak of and the online documentation is not very helpful (or at least we couldn't figure out how to find answers we needed).
(1) For instance, we figured out how to select and transfer specific maps to the Garmin by trial and error. There are about 3 different selection/copy/pasting tools, and the right one to use is not obvious. (There may be lots of enhanced features we are missing because we don't know what they are.)
(2) Similarly, basic instructions for actual use would be welcome. We didn't realize at first that the voice tells you about a turn .2 miles before it occurs (as a warning) and then tells you again at the spot. At first, we were in a comedy of errors trying to turn before the turning ever appeared. Also, when first in England, we accidentally had the default set to avoid highways, so we spent half a day traveling on ridiculously back roads and lanes.
But all and all it is a great gadget -- one of the best purchases we made in 2006.