Much of my work involves flying to cities I’m not familiar with, renting a car and driving to several different places.
I depend on my Garmin Nuvi 650 to get where I need to go. But now my phone (AT&T Fuze) packs virtually the same features as the Nuvi using Garmin Mobile XT for Windows Mobile (a Blackberry version is also available.)
I’m amazed by what Garmin Mobile can do. Turn-by-turn routing with spoken directions is no problem, of course. But I’ve also used it standing at Dupont Square in Washington, DC to see what restaurants are nearby. It can guide you to millions of points of interest—gas stations, stores, airports, attractions, entertainment and much more.
Garmin Mobile XT can also use your cell phone’s data plan to tap into Google Local Search. Or you can download a photo from Panoramio and get directions to where it was taken.
Garmin Online, available at no additional charge when you buy the program, also uses the cell phone data channel to give you weather and traffic information, gas prices and flight status.
I see this is a better solution for smartphones than using the GPS services offered by the phone carriers. You can pay $10 a month for GPS from some carriers, while there are no recurring charges with Garmin.
Another important feature is Garmin Mobile already has the maps on the memory card, without the need to download them. Downloading the maps while driving can bog down the phone and make the mapping sluggish—not a problem with Garmin.
The program and maps come pre-loaded on a 2 gb micro SDHC card. Garmin Mobile XT with North America maps retails for $99.99 if your smartphone has a built-in GPS. Or Garmin also sells the program with an external GPS for $199.99 for Windows Mobile.
The Blackberry version is similarly priced at $99.99 for phones with a built-in GPS. But the Blackberry version with an external GPS is $149.99, cheaper than the Windows Mobile version with the external GPS.
I’m not ready to give up my Nuvi as a GPS for driving. Mounting and powering a phone for use in a car are still a bit awkward. But Garmin Mobile is a full-featured backup and handy when walking.
The ability to download data and incorporate it with the GPS features has intriguing possibilities—-things a standalone GPS would never be able to accomplish.
A new feature I’d really like to see Garmin incorporate would overlay weather-radar data on the street maps. When I’m getting battered in a thunderstorm, I want to see what the weather is like ahead.
The XM satellite versions of weather radar for GPS are just too expensive for casual use. But the information is readily available from the National Weather Service and could be downloaded over the data channel on a smartphone.
That just begins to touch on the possibilities. I’ll be looking for more innovation from Garmin Mobile in the future.
Get the Garmin Mobile XT at Amazon
