Re: Garmin 2720 reviews?

Man, I hope the transparency issue can be fixed with a software update
by garmin.

I just ordered a 2720. I was stuck between the 2610 & 2720 and went
with the 2720. I hope I made the right decision.

The biggest reason I picked the 2720 over the 2610 is because of the
upadted maps and POI's. Although, now it seems that garmin will update
you for free.

I'm gonna go to best buy today and mess around alittle before my 2720
ships.



In article <BF210088.296C%bpariseauspamno@xxxxxxxxxxx>, Robert Pariseau
<bpariseauspamno@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> I spent an hour playing around with the Garmin 2720 on display at a local
> Best Buy. I currently use a 2610. Here's my comparison.
>
> First the speaker was not hooked up on the unit I played with, so I can't
> comment on the new text to speech. Nor was the GMT-10 traffic info device
> hooked up so I can't comment on that. And of course there were no "custom"
> POIs installed. Routing tests were via the driving simulator -- Find and Go
> To with the GPS off -- using Detour to go off route and then forcing a new
> route calculation. I'll have to assume that, as with the 2610, performance
> would not be significantly affected by GPS processing in real use.
>
> The display seemed quite good. The touch screen accuracy also seemed quite
> good.
>
> The performance for finds and routing seemed similar to the 2610 --
> essentially instantaneous for nearby stuff and "fast enough" for distant
> stuff.
>
> The menu structure is different but seems to work intuitively. The PDF of
> the user manual can be downloaded from the Garmin site if you want to see.
> As usual, Garmin doesn't go into all the details in the user manual for the
> configuration options -- for which see below.
>
> I spotted one improvement I've been asking for since the 2610 came out. The
> Auto-Zoom function can now be set to a user chosen max value. It still
> zooms all the way in as you approach a turn, but when you leave a turn it
> will zoom out no farther than the selected max value rather than zooming out
> far enough to show both your current location and the next turn. Set it to,
> say 5 Miles and it won't auto zoom out beyond the 5 Mile scale even if your
> next turn is 50 miles away -- thus you avoid unreadable map scale settings
> after a turn. The "Auto" setting gives the option of working as in the
> 2610.
>
> The 2D track up and track North displays work as in the 2610. The 3D
> display is visually interesting, but at first blush seems more confusing
> than helpful. It might seem better with practice, and of course with the
> aid of the voice prompts.
>
> The big problem I found is in the configuration of the data tabs displayed
> with the map. First of all, there's no way to set the data tabs to
> "transparent", so whatever screen real estate is taken up by data reduces
> the visible map area. I can only assume they did that to speed up the map
> drawing time.
>
> Second, there's no easy way to dismiss the data tabs from the map display if
> you'd like to see more map temporarily. Third, the configuration options
> are limited. There is a "Normal" display which apparently is NOT
> configurable, although it shows different data when routing or when driving
> without a route active. This is the configuration shown in the screen
> shots.
>
> The customizable alternatives are "Wide" or "Narrow" and the choice affects
> all data fields for both routing and driving without an active route. As
> with the 2610 you have up to 4 data tabs in a column on the right, and you
> can select which pre-formatted data you want in each tab -- with some
> choices taking up 2 tabs vertically. But ALL the tabs for routing and
> non-routing will ALL be either wide or narrow, and with no transparency.
> Thus if you select wide tabs, the displayed map is kind of tiny.
>
> I've gotten used to being able to use the full width of the 2610 to see maps
> when I want, so to me this is a real gotcha in the 2720.
>
> And apparently the line of text across the top of the map -- as shown in the
> screen shots -- only exists in the non-configurable "Normal" mode.
>
> Let's see. The info screen displayed for a found item now has text on the
> right and the map area including the item on the left. This is good.
>
> Text displayed on the map seems to be more readable than with the 2610.
> This may be due to the enhanced resolution or just better fonts.
>
> Performance for dragging the 2D map screen around, and precision of touch
> selection of a feature on the map both seem better than with the 2610.
>
> That's it for now.
> --Bob
>
>
.

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