Garmin n?vi 680 4.3-Inch Widescreen Bluetooth Portable GPS Navigator
by Garmin
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Our Price: $349.00 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $130.95 (click here) Category: CE See more product details |
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Garmin n?vi 680 4.3-Inch Widescreen Bluetooth Portable GPS Navigator
Customer Review: Easiest to use ~ very inuitive
Summary: 4 Stars
I purchased this model NUVI to replace a 2008 Toyota NAVS system. It has found addresses when the Toyota's could not. The instructions are clear, it recalculates fairly quickly. I cannot compare it against more expensive Garmins because they have features I did not need.
PRO's. It takes an SD card which can be loaded with MP3's and Pictures. Interestingly it provides good background music in a hotel room when we travel so long as we use a power cord. Because the battery lasts so long we use it as a hand held rather then a mounted unit. (Our choice)
CON's. The voices that guide the traveled route are not as clear as they should be, however they do give you several choices of voice to use.
All in all I am glad we bought this unit. Rather than fight over who gets to take it for the day my wife bought her own NUVI 680 :)
Customer Review: Not My Favorite GPS
Summary: 3 Stars
I have owned by Nuvi 680 for about six months, and it gets me where I want to go. Unfortunately, it sometimes takes me the worst possible route. I have the most recent map updates (which cost way too much). Recently, on a trip from Las Vegas to San Diego, it wanted me to leave the freeway to spend five miles on a frontage road and then return to the freeway. There was no obstruction or traffic that would justify this. In San Diego, it frequently sent me the long way around. In one case, it wanted me to turn left when I could clearly see my destination on the right. On more than one occasion, I was directed to leave the freeway, when there was an exit closer to my destination (even though I had programmed it for fastest route.)
I am also disappointed in the points of interest. We recently asked for a list of nearby restaurants. We found one about a mile away and found out that there was a well-know restaurant within walking distance. We have had other experiences where major restaurants are not listed.
I previously owned Magellan GPS units, and they gave more helpful directions and showed more useful information on the main screen. My next GPS unit will probably be a Magellan.
Customer Review: Love the books from Audible.com for long trips
Summary: 5 Stars
I've owned 5 other GPS receivers and this is by far the best one yet. It's operation is very intuitive. Although I don't live in an area covered by the MSN service I activated the free trial period for a long trip to Florida. It saved us a hour delay through Atlanta taking us through city streets and dumping us back on the interstate on the other side of the traffic jam. While in Orlando it warned us of an impending strong thunderstorm and told us what was playing at all the area movie theaters starting with the closest. Just wish it was available where I live.
I love to eat, so the POIs, specifically resturants are a very important feature on the GPS. Very often the POIs are way out of date, but so far only one POI no longer existed when we searched it out.
My favorite feature is the ability to store audio books. Nothing seems to shorten a long trip more then listening to a good book. I use to listen to them on CD which required changing CDs all the time and often missing instruction from the GPS or part of the book because they were playing at the same time. With the book on the GPS the story pauses and even steps back a second or 2 when the GPS gives instruction, so nothing is missed.
On the negative side, people on the receiving end of a phone call through the Blue-tooth connection couldn't understand my mumblings because of the road noises.
I think this GPS will last me awhile.
Customer Review: Garmin NUVI 680
Summary: 4 Stars
I bought this unit for a trip to the Washington DC area and a trip to the mountains in W. North Carolina and on to Savannah. Overall I am pleased with the performance. One address that we entered for Arlington, VA it could not locate. At other times it didn't know where the address was located on a street when the address was new. In the first case, we knew an address that was close and we knew how to find the address from that point. In the second case, it was a simple task of looking for the name of the business as we drove down the street. The Garmin worked very well in taking us through a maze of twisting streets to our location. On the freeway it would warn which side of the road to exit or which lanes to be in for a split. The MSN service worked well for traffic congestion in metro areas and we didn't use the service for gasoline prices. The blue tooth would not work with our LG phones. Garmin n?vi 680 4.3-Inch Widescreen Bluetooth Portable GPS NavigatorCustomer Review: Garmin Garbage
Summary: 1 Stars
I bought the Nuvi 680 expecting a significant step up from my few years old Mio C310X. Let's jump to the one positive thing about the Nuvi, it uses Navteq maps. Now on to the reasons I find it unacceptable. The suction mount will not stay fastened to the windshield. I tried everything, cleaning first, dry install, wet install, and so on. It stays perhaps an hour, then it falls off. The 680 has a flip up antenna; great except that when the antenna is down it turns the gps off. Dumb. So you can't really put the unit in your pocket and use it when walking around town. My Mio gets great reception without needing such a silly protruding antenna. The unit is slow to start up when powered on, and then you have to tap an annoying "I agree" button before it will go to work. There is virtually no useful customization available in the software. Either Garmin decided this would be a GPS for dummies or they created this dumbed down design to cut down on customer service calls. My 5 year old Garmin GPSmap 60cx has far more customization capability than this thing. Why would one need that? Well, for example, with Garmin's design, your speed is not displayed on the map when you are in navigate mode. You see time to destination instead. Curiously, speed is displayed when you are in map mode, not navigating to anything. This is stupid. I always want to see my speed. I can easily configure the 60cs or Mio to do this, but not this "sophisticated" Nuvi. Another thing, the instructions say you can search for a city by postal code, but it does not work. Any attempt to enter a zip code just brings up Search All. The MSN direct antenna is built into the power cord, which is very bulky.
So how does the routing work? Not very well. Going from Newport News, VA to a business near the VA Beach Expressway took us through the I-64 tunnel. I thought that strange because the tunnel and I-64 past it was showing a lot of red on the MSN Direct traffic, and the other way around via I-664 is only about 10-15 min longer. The Nuvi is suppose to take traffic into account when it calculates the route. I decided to trust it, and found myself in stopped traffic 2 miles before the tunnel that would have taken at least an hour to get through. I managed to bail out at the downtown Hampton exit. Okay I thought, I'll let the Nuvi get us back to I-664 and we'll go that way. I used the touch screen to locate a point on I-664 South of Hampton, , verified the little tag that came up did say "I-664 S", and pushed Go. The route was calculated, and it was clearly wrong. It was taking us in the wrong direction to a ramp for I-664 North, directly opposite of what I asked for. It was no help at all. The MSN traffic is disappointing because the traffic highlighting is not displayed on the Garmin map. You have to switch to a separate MSN map. How dumb is that? As we went along I-664 we ran into a couple of moderate backups. Neither was called out by MSN. The places it did show are the predictable rush hour backups one experiences every day in the Norfolk area. I did not see a whole lot of value add. I used the unit to check for gas stations. It found a bunch, listed prices and distance, but the name of many stations were listed as "unknown". What good is that? Map zooming is frustrating. The switch from 2D to 3D view is clumsy, and the zoom level is never correct.
I summary, I found this Nuvi to be a clueless design that has not been thoroughly tested and does not deliver on its promises. I am looking forward to returning it for a refund.