Product Description

The Nüvi 250W GPS from Garmin is a widescreen version of the Nuvi 250 GPS! This navigator has a stunning 4.3" touch screen for clear instructions and increased user comfort. All you have to do is enter the postcode and the name of the town you're heading to for it to display your itinerary. Garmin has also kitted the Nüvi 250W GPS out with Navteq maps of 33 European countries and preloaded speed camera alerts. What's more, this GPS lists over 1 million points of interest, including restaurants, petrol stations, bars and tourist sites, and will help you to organise your next family excursion. In addition to this, you can customise your GPS by saving your own points of interest and up to 500 of your favourite destinations and addresses. Furthermore, the Nüvi 250W also features a JPEG image viewer, a currency converter and a PIN code protection system.The Nüvi 250W is the ideal on-board computer! Maps included: Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Monaco, Germany, Greece, Italy, San Marino, Vatican City, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Ireland, Spain, Andorra, Sweden, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, United Kingdom, Bulgaria, Croatia, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #353 in Consumer Electronics
• Brand: Garmin
• Model: 010-00656-02
• Released on: 2007-07-17
• Dimensions: 1.74 pounds

Manufacturer's Description

nüvi 250W Great value, easy to use widescreen. Pre-loaded European street maps. Wide 4.3” sunlight readable touch screen display Get the bigger picture, view map detail, driving directions, photos and more in bright colour. Its sunlight-readable, antiglare, landscape, 4.3 inch display with white backlight is easy to read. Pre-installed Cyclops safety camera database Accurate & comprehensive safety camera database from Cyclops. You can download safety camera updates daily to have the most current information available. You will be alerted when approaching traffic cameras, helping you to keep within the speed limit and avoid accident blackspots. Garmin Lock™ theft prevention Disables the Garmin until a PIN is entered or taken to a predetermined location. Points of interest database Preloaded hefty points of interest (POIs) database with hotels, restaurants, fuel, ATMs and more with ability to add customized POIs such as school zones and safety cameras. You can then set proximity. Travel Kit with Currency Converter and Picture Viewer Make the most of your nüvi with picture viewer and currency and measurement converters. Re-chargeable li-ion battery - up to 5 hours life. Turn-by-turn guidence with voice prompts.

European Mapping Touch Screen 4.3" Widescreen Safety Cameras Points of Interest Voice Guidence Travel Kit

Box Contents

Customer Reviews

Novice sat nav user
I was hostile to the thought of Sat Nav until we tried it. It is very effective for urban driving and is very patient when you don't follow its instructions.
The ability to have instant directions in a strange place to a petrol station or supermarket is very useful.
This one does work with a heated front windscreen.

Beaware of map update prices!
Beware! Any map updates ahve to be purchased and are not cheap.Pity QVC didn't warn me!

my first Navi system.
I bought this as my first navigation system because of price and the widescreen. I would have liked a more expensive one with MP3 and all the bells and whistles, but I settled for a basic unit that only does navigation. I live on mainland Europe, so I am reviewing European use, not UK. But for me that shouldn't matter. It should still work the same.

For me, the best way of decribing it is "a bit hit and miss". On the whole I am happy with it, but it does tend to confuse me sometimes. I am not even sure if 4 stars was the correct rating to give it. On most occaisions it is great, and gets me to where I want quickly and easily. Yet on others it confuses. For instance, I made several shortish journeys recently where the Nuvi guided me there perfectly with no fuss whatsoever. And it turned out to be the optimum route. I'd say it's done this the majority of times for local trips. But it has also guided down one-way streets (the wrong way !), and told me to turn left/right when I can't, and taken me to a cul-de-sac by a motorway exit where there was nothing but trees and a field, that was supposed to have been a shop I wanted to go to. I eventually found the shop right down the other end of the road, quite a distance away, because it quite obviously wasn't at my "destination". It also gets very confused sometimes by a large roundabout nearby my home. The roundabout has around 5 exits, yet it is almost impossible to tell which one it is talking about, and which one it is indicating on the display. It's also confused me at motorway slip roads, especially when the slip road branches off into two motorways, and has proved that it can be a bit dangerous. I was told to "keep right" as I was driving along, and when I left the road I was on to join the motorway, I found out that I was joining the wrong motorway entry as the Nuvi suddenly changed and told me "keep left" to down the left branch, and had to go across the white lines to get on the correct one. From that point it can be dangerous. OK, I should have had my wits about me and not done that, but I find SatNavs divert your concentration and make you anxious that you're suddenly heading onto a motorway in completely the wrong direction. I tended to rely on the Satnav rather than look at the road signs to get an indication of where I am going. In future I won't, because it is quite dangerous if you suddenly make a knee-jerk reaction to change lanes.

So, it can be great, and the rest of the time you get endless "Recalculating" feedback when you've gone down the wrong road, but I have to say that when it has recalculated, it usually does a good job of it and gets you back on track quickly. Sadly this happens a few too many times, as I also find that the little car icon on the screen lags quite a bit behind your actual position. So when it says "Turn right" and you look at the map, you will see the icon travelling towards the turning, but in reality you've already reached it or driven past it. That is annoying, and is not a problem when you only see one right turning and ignore the map, but if there's a few, you're probably going to go down the wrong one. I read that the map lags behind your actual position if you have chosen to display the most map detail on the screen. But I changed it to a low setting and it still does it.

As for the rest - the picture facility is pretty pointless and can't see myself using that, but you never know. The extras are sometimes very useful, like listings of nearby petrol stations, restaurants, hotels, shops, banks/cash machines, entertainment, parks, attractions, etc.... So if you need a cash machine, you go to "banks" and it tells you where the nearest one is, and guides you to it.

I am very technically aware because I work in I.T and I am a total gadget freak. So I am pretty sure in my own mind that these problems are nothing to do with me. My considered opinion (for what that's worth) with any new technology, is that it will take time to get to the point where people can rely on it as much as they think they can rely on it. Many people think it's an "all-knowing" SatNav and will take them anywhere with no fuss. But working in I.T, I am not for one single second surprised that the mapping is not fully correct and it's got bugs and issues. There will be errors. I'd be shocked if there wasn't. It's the way technology is. You can never account for human error, either in programming it, or in using it - i.e. my reaction to switch lanes suddenly.

Would I buy it again knowing what I know now ? Yeah, I am sure I would. Just learn it's little peculiarities, and learn when to ignore it.
If you want a cheap SatNav, I doubt you'd do better. I know guys who spend hundreds more on top of the range TomTom's and others, and still get taken to wrong places and down one-way streets. Like I said, it's all new technology, and you can't beat this for what it is.