Garmin nüvi 260W 4.3-Inch Widescreen Portable GPS Navigator

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description
Go wide with the ultra-cool nüvi 260W that speaks street names. This widescreen navigator is attractively-priced and simple to use. Like the rest of the nüvi 200-series, you’re just a few screen taps away from anywhere.
Navigate With Easenüvi 260W comes ready to go right out of the box with preloaded City Navigator® NT street maps, including a hefty points of interest (POIs) database with hotels, restaurants, fuel, ATMs and more. It even announces the name of exits and streets so you never have to take your eyes off the road. Simply touch the color screen to enter a destination, and nüvi takes you there with 2-D or 3-D maps and turn-by-turn voice directions. In addition, nüvi 260W accepts custom points of interest (POIs), such as school zones and safety cameras and lets you set proximity alerts to warn you of upcoming POIs. Take It With YouLike the rest of the nüvi 200-series, nüvi 260W sports a sleek, slim design and fits comfortably in your pocket or purse. Its rechargeable lithium-ion battery makes it convenient for navigation by car or foot.Go Beyond NavigationNavigation is just the beginning. nüvi 260W includes many travel tools including JPEG picture viewer, world travel clock with time zones, currency converter, measurement converter, calculator and more. It also comes with Garmin Lock™, an anti-theft feature, and is compatible with our free Garmin Garage where you can download custom vehicles that show your location on the map. Enhance your travel experience with optional plug-in SD cards such as Garmin Travel Guides for detailed data on attractions.Compare all Garmin nüvisClick the button below to compare by series, user type, and features.
What's in the Boxnüvi 260W, preloaded City Navigator NT for North America, vehicle suction cup mount, vehicle power cable, dashboard disk, and quick start manual.All nüvis come with detailed NAVTEQ maps containing more than 6 million pre-loaded point of interest locations.
Manufacturer's Notice
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Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 4.8 x 2.9 x 0.8 inches ; 5.1 ounces
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.
• ASIN: B0011ULQNI
• Item model number: Nuvi 260w
  

Technical Details

• GPS system preloaded with City Navigator North America NT
• 4.3-inch touchscreen display with 2D/3D mapping perspective
• Turn-by-turn directions with voice guidance and text to speech
• Rechargeable lithium-ion battery makes it convenient for navigation by car or foot
• Includes JPEG picture viewer, world travel clock with time zones, currency converter, measurement converter, calculator and more

 

Garmin nüvi 260W 4.3-Inch Widescreen Portable GPS Navigator

 

Customer Reviews

I bought the GARMIN nüvi 260W to help with work and family travels. After extensive research with Magellan, Mio and Tom-Tom, I bought the Garmin for three reasons. 1) Ease of use. 2) Screen clarity. 3) Amazing accuracy. And no, despite where I live, I have no affiliation with Garmin. I don't even know anyone that works for them. I am in the architectural business.
I have tried several GPSs while traveling with business associates, friends or in rental cars. As such, I have seen them in real world action. All of the devices saved me time and most found the place I needed to be. I could used any of them and been somewhat satisfied.The problem: I am a perfectionist. As such, I want the unit to be the best. So, after using a text-to-speech Garmin GPS unit earlier this year, I knew that was one feature I could not live without when I pulled the trigger on a purchase. Text-to-speech is a must have on GPS. A MUST. If you have never used a GPS, trust me, you have to have text-to-speech. It eliminates the frustration of urban driving and having the non text-to-speech units tell you to turn right in 200 feet, only to find two roads that are 200 feet away and have to pick one and hope it is right.
I decided to wait until a wide screen GPS came out that didn't have so many bells and whistles and was priced fairly. The GARMIN nüvi 260W 4.3-Inch fit the bill. Pulled the trigger still knowing that GPS units drop in price every month it seems and I would knowingly be mad in 90 days when the unit was 20% cheaper (oh well).
Back to the GARMIN nüvi 260W...I am amazed how it can find the driveway of my house at the end of a cul-de-sac directly adjacent to a road that is named the same. It is so accurate that it lets me know if I pulled into the wrong driveway 15 feet away from mine (I know, I tried it). It is so easy to use; I didn't even use the manual - once. It is that user friendly. I even downloaded new voices via the Garmin site without a manual. I like the fact the screen is very clear and refreshes quickly. I can even use my polarized sunglasses with the Garmin 260W screen and it does not distort the screen colors or have numerous horizontal lines (if you use polarized glasses, make sure to try out any GPS screen before you buy. Many look blank when using polarized glasses).
The POI seem to be pretty good, but I really haven't used it long enough to evaluate POI depth. I do know that the maps seem to be fairly accurate in terms of new roads since I have yet to find a road that does not exist on the map.
Not everything is perfect with the Garmin 260W. The downside is the time to acquire a satellite. The 260W takes longer than I like...sometimes up to one minute. However, once it gets a hold of the satellites, it never looses them. Plus it gets such a strong signal (with no external antenna); I can use the device on my lap in the passenger seat (when I am not driving and after it finds a satellite). Another couple of downers are it has very few voices that work with the text-to-speech feature. I hope Garmin increases the choices via a web download in the future (I want celebrity voices...please). Plus, I would have liked a case, any case to be included for the price I paid.
Overall, the unit is amazing and the larger screen size of 4.3 inches really helps those with fat fingers and those that don't want to squint to read a map. I am just sorry I had to wait this long to own one. It is a must have for those that travel to unfamiliar areas.

I've used this product for several trips and I've never used another GPS. I love the text-to-speech feature, which is very natural; the instructions are usually very clear, but it is worth glancing at the green bar at the top of the screen to see the full instruction. The map with the graphics can often clear up confusion. The other great thing about the map is it labels upcoming streets so you are not peering at street signs.
I purchased the friction mount, which is great because I can take it off my dash and put it under the seat very easily. Around here, there have been a lot of break ins of cars with suction marks on the windshield.
A couple of glitches so far:
1. The Nuvi did not know the street that I was headed to in West Virginia.
2. Once in West Virginia in the mountains, the Nuvi could not pick up a satellite signal.
3. Out on a road trip, I stopped at a restaurant. I restarted my car and turned the Nuvi on again; I have the security feature on, so it asked for my pin. I misentered the pin -- AND IT LOCKED ME OUT UNTIL I RETURNED TO MY HOUSE. That's it -- one shot -- get it wrong, and no navigator for you. Even my ATM machine lets me try more than once. I'll check to see if you can set the number of tries, but I don't think you can.
4. Occasionally it gives instructions that can't be followed -- like when it wanted me to get over four busy lanes in 0.2 miles.
5. Note that when it says "Keep Left" it does not mean, get in the left lane. It means don't take the swerve to the right option by mistake. I got over to the left and was then told to exit right.
6. If the next turn is coming up very quickly, the Nuvi will give you the next instruction immediately. But I turned onto a highway where I had to go 40 miles; and the Nuvi did not give me the next instruction until we were almost on top of the exit and it was too late to get into the lane to make the turn.
I'm still really happy with my purchase and it will be endlessly useful navigating in more urban environments. It recalculates routes quickly. It also tells you on what side a turn or ramp is, which is wonderful.
LATER: Maybe I missed this in the instruction manual, but there are some other neat features that I discovered by playing around. 1) If you touch the car symbol, you get the option of saving your current location as a favorite destination; 2) If you touch the green bar at the top that contains a direction, you can see and scroll through all of the directions so you can see which way you'll be going; 3) I stumbled into a way to set a way point (although I don't remember how). There's no particular reason to have a waypoint -- that is, you can route to your first destination and then route to your second, so no difference; except perhaps if you are trying to generate an alternate route to your destination by perhaps avoiding a closed road.
Would love to have, but don't think it does, a feature that lets you select a particular turn or direction in the list to route around.
This is the only GPS I've ever owned, so my next comment is probably applicable to GPS systems everywhere, but I've found that the Nuvi is quietly changing my life by making me bolder about going to new places, particularly if it involves night driving. Trying to drive to a new place by yourself juggling your complicated handwritten instructions or your printout from Mapquest was always a challenge; doing it at night was downright stressful. You still need your directions just in case, but with the Nuvi I haven't had to look at them yet. I didn't realize how narrowed my world had become because I hesitated to drive to some place I had never been.
LATER: See user comment below that claims that if locked out you can simply power Garmin off and on and try again. I haven't tried this, as I have disabled the security function.
Also, I was in an insanely complicated intersecting freeway knot and I took a wrong turn. Garmin's recalculation was sufficiently slow that I had real problems getting back on the right track, as I had to keep making decisions to turn long before it finished its recalculations. I had to choose some random direction and go in it long enough to allow Garmin to recalculate the route. So it's not perfect.