|
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
Garmin announce 200 nuvi SatNav products
Article by: Mike Barrett
Date: 24 Aug 2011
Today Garmin globally announced about 200 new nüvi products… That sounds amazing, but is based on 7 core devices in three concept ranges. The 200 products are made up from mapping and feature variations. These will replace the current nüvi devices and will be introduced on a country by country basis. The UK devices are expected to hit the shops on January 12th.
The concept ranges are Essential; Advanced and Premium. Essential provides the 'bare essentials' the type of SatNav for when you just need to get for A to B and has 3 core models. The Advanced range adds Traffic and Guidance 2 (see later) and provides 2 base models. Premium is the top of the shop with just a single model, it has smarter design, a capacitive screen, 3D Traffic and Guidance 3.
Garmin's Director of Product Management, Clive Taylor, told us that: "We are proud to bring out a complete range of new products: Essential, Advanced and Premium. These showcase 3D traffic, and new levels of Guidance which makes the navigation experience quick and simple, more intuitive, easier and faster."
Garmin invited us down to their European Headquarters yesterday to get a hands on look at these new SatNavs. Read on to see some pictures of these new PNDs and get an initial idea of capabilities of each of the ranges.
Before I continue I should stress that these are nüvi devices and not nüLink!. That means that the new SatNavs do not have a Sim card and cannot provide interactive live services. The traffic information is provided by RDS-TMC. There were no announcements about any nüLink! devices.
Common to all of the ranges is the inclusion of a microSD memory card slot. This will help with expansion in the future when upgrades may require more memory than is on the core device. This helps to future-proof the SatNav for future application updates. All the new SatNavs also use the same tried and trusted ball mounting system of its predecessors.
The Essential nüvi Range
So lets start at the beginning with the Essential Range. Essential is for entry level users that just want to get in the car and drive. These are basic models with no frills, and priced between £80 and £100 (or as the Gamin Marketing guys would say £79.99 and £99.99). The three core models are differentiated by screen sizes: nüvi 30 3.5" screen; nüvi 40 4" screen; and nüvi 50 with a 5" screen. These are resistive touch screen devices. The Advanced nüvis are a little thinner than the Essential ones.
Of all the new nüvi SatNavs these are the thickest. There is no capability to add traffic to these systems. The software includes junction views, but these are not the new Photo Real images.
The Advanced nüvi Range
Moving on to the nüvi Advanced SatNavs we have 2 core models: the nüvi 24xx and nüvi 25xx. The 24xx has a 4" widescreen whilst the 25xx has a 5" widescreen format. Once again the new devices have resistive touch screens. These are replacements for the current 1000 nüvi devices. This range will be priced between £100 and £249 depending on mapping and hardware specifications.
The advanced nüvi features what Garmin are calling Guidance 2. Guidance is not an evolutionary system but is more a feature based system. Guidance 1 (not mentioned) is the base feature set, Guidance 2 has more advanced features and Guidance 3 has the premium features. Guidance is a combination of hardware and software combined to enhance the navigation experience. With Guidance 2 you get Photo Real junction views; Faster routing; and faster searching. In particular searching for POIs can be up to 10 times faster.
The advanced nüvi also includes 3D traffic. This is faster, more accurate and provides more coverage than previous traffic data. There is also Automatic Volume Control which monitors the background noise in the car and adjusts the audio output level. The selection of the screen orientation is manual. There is an Instant On feature allowing you to get going as quickly as possible.
A new feature of this range of nüvis is a magnet in the mount. When the SatNav is removed from the mount the position is recorded. This enable you to find where you left the car if you forget where you left it.
The nüvi Premium Range
The flagship of the new nüvi ranges is the Premium device. There is just a single SatNav in this range, but it is by far and away the best of the current Garmin nüvi devices. The Essential and Advanced ranges could be described as evolutionary, whilst the Premium 34xx device is revolutionary.
Starting with the hardware it has a 4" widescreen with the latest capacitive touchscreen technology as found on the iPhone and other SmartPhones. Having mentioned the iPhone the looks of this SatNav are a little reminiscent of the Apple phone, indeed, you may be forgiven for thinking it is a phone as it's design is more like a modern SmartPhone than a traditional SatNav. Some hardware options allow ASR (automatic speech recognition) to control the system.
The device comes with a special mount which not only has built in power, but also has an auxiliary speaker to complement the internal (small) speaker. As with the Advanced range the nüvi 34xx has a magnet in the mount to pinpoint the location of the car when you remove it from the mount. Garmin are calling this the Smart Mount. It is also able to rotate the screen automatically to match the Portrait or Landscape orientation of the device.
Moving on to the software we are now looking at Guidance 3. This has all the features of Guidance 2 but now: routing is twice as fast; complex junctions get a birds-eye view; mapping includes 3D terrain; there are 3D buildings; and Safe Texting has been added.
The birds-eye junction view is a great addition for some complex junctions. It will not be implemented for all junctions, just those that have complex combination manoueovers. This shows in simple form where you need to go.
The 34xx is priced between £199 and £299 with the top of the range being fully featured with continental mapping.
Press Release
The official Garmin Press Release follows:
Garmin® announces new 2012 range of nüvi® sat navs
Garmin, the global leader in satellite navigation, today announced the new 2012 range of nüvi sat navs featuring a new tiered series with ‘Essential, Advanced and Premium’ to meet the lifestyles and budgets of customers.
Also new to the 2012 line-up is advanced Guidance 2 and 3 navigation engines for faster and more intuitive user experience including enhanced features that result in Garmin’s most capable navigators yet.
“Whether you’re a student, a busy parent running the kids around town, or a road-warrior spending significant time in your car, the tiered structure of the new 2012 nüvi line makes it easy to pick the features and price point right for you” said Clive Taylor, Garmin’s EMEA Product Director, Automotive. “The ESSENTIAL, ADVANCED, and PREMIUM lines bring features and capabilities that do far more than just get you from A to B. They make everyday driving easier and provide time and fuel-saving benefits that only a dedicated navigation device can offer.”
Full breakdown of the new 2012 range:
ESSENTIAL: The nüvi 30/40/50 series is the perfect starting point, providing GPS navigation at its simplest with accurate turn-by-turn directions and spoken street names. These entry-level sat navs are budget-friendly and easy to use, making them a great solution for first-time drivers, students away at University, or as an extra navigator for the other family car.
ADVANCED: The nüvi 2405 and 2505 series offer sophisticated features at an affordable price, an ideal choice for the multi-tasking parent or the professional with a longer commute. The Advanced line comes with Guidance 2, a new navigation engine with a faster, more intuitive user experience that enhances the speed and accuracy of searches and routing up to 10x faster POI search and up to 2X faster routing.
Selected models even offer ‘call me angel’ a feature which allows you to give your nüvi a name, that when spoken provokes your nüvi to awaken ready for hands-free voice commands that really work.
With Guidance 2, complex junctions and exits are simplified using photoReal™ junction view. Road signs and junctions along the route are realistically displayed with photographic detail to clearly mark the correct lanes to be in for junctions and exits. Garmin’s exclusive junction view database now includes 34,000 junction views in Europe,
Also part of Guidance 2 is 3D Traffic. A Garmin sat nav with 3D Traffic technology, compiles historical traffic information (where traffic tends to be at certain times of the day), computes it with 80 million current traffic sources (from real-time data) to confidently predict future traffic.
The world’s most geographically extensive traffic information technology obtains 2 billion feeds per month from GPS probes on the road and also 80 million real time sources around the world so ensuring Garmin sat nav owners know where the traffic is and more importantly where to turn to avoid it.
PREMIUM: The nüvi 3400 series, Garmin’s premium line of PNDs, features Guidance 3 and the award-winning design of the popular nüvi 3700 series - the benchmark for the future design of premium sat navs. At less than 9mm it’s the thinnest navigator in the world. The design features pinch-to-zoom touchscreen interaction and automatic dual-screen orientation. With the most robust features available on any device, this product series is perfect for people who want the best Garmin has to offer.
Guidance 3 is Garmin’s most innovative navigation engine and includes all of the features of Guidance 2 plus more. Guidance 3 includes photoReal junction view technology enhanced with Bird’s Eye junction view. This stress relieving technology highlights from an overhead perspective the correct lanes to be in when approaching complex junctions which require multiple maneuvers.
Also on selected models is Safe Texting*; a text reader feature that allows the driver to hear and reply to texts without taking their eyes off the road, myTrends™; a predictive feature which automatically remembers favorite route destinations and predicts the destination and estimated time of arrival (ETA) without the user needing to activate a route, and 3D terrain & buildings for a real view of the road ahead.
The new 2012 nüvi product line is expected to be available in the UK in Q1 2012. For more information about individual models, features and pricing, visit www.garmin.com/move.
Since its inception in 1989, Garmin has delivered 88 million GPS enabled devices – far more than any other navigation provider. Garmin’s market breadth in the GPS industry is second to none, having developed innovative products and established a leadership position in each of the markets it serves, including automotive, aviation, marine, fitness, outdoor recreation, tracking, and wireless applications. Learn more about Garmin’s products at Garmin.blogs.com or at http://twitter.com/garmin.
* relies on new and developing BT format (.map)
| Comments
|
 Posted by zebsogo on Wed Aug 24, 2011 11:39 am |
 |
Talk about saturation I have lost count how many Garmin models there are now
--
Navigon 92 Premium Live,TomTom Go 6000,Garmin 2699 LTM-D and a TomTom Go 1005 Live ( For the wife )
|
|
| Posted by mikealder on Wed Aug 24, 2011 5:41 pm |
|
| News Team Wrote: | | the nüvi 34xx has a magnet in the mount to pinpoint the location of the car when you remove it from the mount. Garmin are calling this the Smart Mount. |
How the heck does a magnet in the mount assist you to locate the car, that doesn't make sense to me, even rare earth magnets wouldn't have the pull to locate a car in a car park or does the magnet trigger the device to remember where the device was removed from the mount recording the GPS position when pulled off? Wouldn't be much use in a multi-story or underground carpark.
I hope they retain the true 3D mapping you get with the current 3790T as that is excellent in use - Mike
|
|
| Posted by M8TJT on Wed Aug 24, 2011 6:14 pm |
|
Could possibly be that it trips a switch inside the unit to save the current location? But as you say, abt as much use a a chockolate fireguard without a lock. But I suspect there are more times that you don't park in a cave than when you do 
He He. Novel spelling of chokkie
|
|
| Posted by jeta1 on Wed Aug 24, 2011 11:18 pm |
|
Wonder how this announcment will impact sales of current models, espacially as the release appears to the far side of (dare I say it) Christmas?
I was on the point of ordering a 2440, now I'm wondering if I should hold off ... another thought is could there be some end of line pricing on current models?
|
|
| Posted by Kremmen on Thu Aug 25, 2011 5:39 am |
|
With the recent posted TT crippling exercise(s) Garmin could stand to clean up here 
Interesting to note that Garmin are to use RDS-TMC. That's what my built in SatNav unit uses and it works perfectly (except for Junction 11 of the M25 where the beacon/transmitter has been out of action since January and Trafficmaster seem reluctant to fix it).
DashCam:
Viofo A119 V3 |
|
| Posted by smiley1081 on Thu Aug 25, 2011 6:34 am |
|
| zebsogo Wrote: | | Talk about saturation I have lost count how many Garmin models there are now |
Not a real problem, given that on December 31st all the old models are ex-parrots...
FNORD |
|
| Posted by chimalsu on Fri Aug 26, 2011 8:08 am |
|
still no aux out,to me the most important bit so i can use on my bike through the autocom and in my tvr through the car radio as the built in speakers are useless
|
|
| Posted by mikealder on Fri Aug 26, 2011 8:29 am |
|
| chimalsu Wrote: | | still no aux out,to me the most important bit so i can use on my bike through the autocom and in my tvr through the car radio as the built in speakers are useless |
The units that use the mount fitted with a speaker are quite easy to modify to add either a 3,5MM socket or better still a 2,5MM socket for audio output. Fit a socket that is the switched type and you have the option to use the built in speaker or the audio output lead, to drop the voltage you simply add a suitably sized resistor so you don't overload the input to your stereo/ bike audio input.
I am currently looking at modifying a 3790T mount to add Bluetooth A2DP to it which is a little more involved but certainly achievable - Mike
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
javascript:emoticon('
