Garmin nüvi 255W Review

Written by Michael Rohde Monday, 09 May 2011 14:53

Back in the day when I wanted to plan a trip or get somewhere new, I either asked for directions and wrote them down on a sheet of paper or I unfolded a big, clunky map. I even remember back in High School taking drivers ed, that the teacher actually spent a class showing us how to fold a map. For some reason, I don’t think drivers ed teachers cover paper maps anymore...

Then came along Yahoo! maps and then Google maps stole the show. That worked very well, until it became a pain to print new directions, and then I had a stack of 20 maps and directions piled up in my car. Then it became more of a nuisance.

After that, a little company by the name of Apple came out with something called the iPhone and suddenly printing directions from Google Maps became archaic. Sure, Maps still has it’s time and place, but seriously, who prints directions anymore? For a long time after the iPhone came out I thought it was kind of redundant and unnecessary to get a GPS-dedicated device. I also thought a Garmin or a TomTom unnecessary due to the high cost. But then my family went on vacation and we decided to spend a few extra bucks on the rental car and get a Garmin GPS unit. After all, we were going to be in a new area and we had no idea where we were going. And plus, my wife didn’t want to have to keep giving me directions from her phone all week. So, we went with the Garmin. And we did not regret it. These GPS devices are pretty awesome.

First off, the interface is pretty slick. While providing directions, there’s a little blue car icon on the screen, which you can change per your liking through downloads. The Garmin speaks the directions to you, you see your next turn on the screen and how far you have to go before you reach the turn, and you see the road you’re on along with the immediate surrounding area. Some models will even tell you which lane to get in, which can be helpful while on the highway. In addition, the screen turns as you turn, so left is always left and right is always right. That’s something that always drove me crazy with my iPhone 3G, I never knew if I turned the correct direction until after I did it. If you do make a wrong turn using the Garmin, it will automatically re-route the directions for you.

Inputting a destination address couldn’t be more simple. Using the touch screen, you type in the city, then the number of the address, then the street. The Garmin auto-completes for you with amazing accuracy. If you want suggestions on where to go, you can select options to see what is in your immediate area. This is very useful when looking for an ATM while in a new place, or if you’re looking for restaurants, gas, lodging, entertainment, etc. All of it is extremely fast and accurate.

The Garmin nüvi 255W, as well as many of the models, will save your recent destinations and you can program in your home address. There’s even a dedicated Home button that you can press for added convenience.

The Garmin GPS unit comes with a suction cup holder that fixes firmly to your windshield, and comes with a nice long cord so you can keep it plugged in. If you’re on a short trip, it does have a battery, but the battery life is estimated to last for four hours. If we were to drive from San Francisco to LA, we’d have to keep it plugged in, which isn’t an issue at all. A feature to the mounting device is that you can easily pop it on and off the suction cup so that you can store it out of sight while the car is parked. This is especially nice since I don’t really like the idea of advertising a roughly $100 piece of technology on my windshield while I’m away from the car.

The best endorsement I can give for the Garmin is that after our vacation my wife and I decided it would be a worthwhile purchase. So, a few weeks later, we bought one. We haven’t regretted it since.