Buying advice and some questions

[danowat]

Hi,

After getting horribly lost in the Netherlands this week I have finally deciede to shell out for a GPS system.

After a look around I have narrowed my choice down to 2 units

The Garmin streetpilot 2610 or the Magellen RoadMate 700.

I have found the Magellen to be more expensive, the cheapest I have found one for is £934 inc VAT and delivery, but I have found a place where I can buy a Garmin 2610 for £769 inc VAT and delivery, so on price the Garmin unit wins hands down.

Basically I need to know which unit would suit me best, I drive a lot in Europe, so a good european coverage is important, is the mapping software the same between these units?, or is one better than the other?

I also understand that because I have a heated front screen I am going to need an external aerial, would this have any bearing on my choice?.

The main difference between the 2 as I see it, is the Magellen unit has a HDD, so can store all the mapping info at once, where as the Garmin unit has a 256mb flash card, just how much info can be stored on a single 256mb card?

Thanks for taking the time to read my post, and any advice would be very much appreciated

Cheers

Dan.

[DavidW]

Have you decided that you want a standalone system - or are you amenable to considering PDA based systems as well, which can offer extra features (such as traffic jam awareness and speed camera warning) and can work out a bit cheaper as well, even if you buy a professional looking mount.

If you're wanting to be standalone, you could also consider the Navman iCN630, or the TomTom GO which will soon be released. There's also the Garmin 2650, though I can't remember what that adds over the 2610.


However, if you've narrowed your choice to those two units, I can't offer any advice, as I've no experience of either.

If you do go for the unit with a hard disk, be careful to keep it away from magnets. If it uses one of those very small hard disks, they can be damaged by a magnet.



David

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