Garmin nüvi 550 3.5-Inch Portable GPS Navigator Review
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Garmin nüvi 550 3.5-Inch Portable GPS Navigator Feature
- High-Sensitivity GPS Receiver For Improved Performance And Reception
- Built-In 3D Basemap
- Built-In US Maps
- 3.5-Inch Display, 320 X 240 Pixels
- Easy Touch-Screen Interface
nuvi 550Perfect for crossing over the threshold from city to backcountry, the Garmin nüvi 550 provides a high-sensitivity GPS receiver with turn-by-turn navigation in a ruggedized, waterproof exterior that you can use while hiking, biking, or boating. With its high-sensitivity, WAAS-enabled GPS receiver and HotFix satellite prediction, nüvi 550 locates your position quickly and precisely and maintains its GPS location even in heavy cover and deep canyons--whether in the city or out in the wilds. And it easily switches modes (driving, walking, biking and boating) to navigate through your active lifestyle depending on your activity. Other features include a 3.5-inch touchscreen, microSD memory expansion, geocaching GPX file capabilities for complete cache descriptions and hints, and Garmin Connect Photos--enabling you to associate your favorite images with saved locations.
The waterproof nüvi 550 guides you while you drive, hike, bike or boat. |
The nüvi 550 offers detailed City Navigator NT street maps for the United States and features digital elevation maps that show you shaded terrain contours at higher zoom levels. The map data, provided by NAVTEQ, features over six million points of interest, including hotels, restaurants, gas stations, ATMs and attractions.
The DEM basemap (above) provides shaded contours, and the nüvi also includes a digital compass. |
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Weighing 7.6 ounces and measuring less than an inch thin, the nüvi 550 fits easily in a purse, backpack, or jacket pocket. The 3.5-inch color touchscreen display (with 320 x 240-pixel resolution) is easy to read even in direct sunlight, and the nüvi's easy-to-use interface means you'll spend more time enjoying the outdoors and less time searching for information. Simple controls and sub-screens make it easy to enter or search for destinations and get data about your trip. Simply touch the color screen to enter a destination, and nüvi takes you there with turn-by-turn voice directions, 2-D or 3-D maps and smooth map updates as you navigate. Its digital elevation model (DEM) mapping shows you shaded contours at higher zoom levels, giving you a big picture of the surrounding terrain. In addition, the nüvi accepts custom points of interest (POIs), such as school zones and safety cameras and lets you set proximity alerts to warn you of upcoming POIs.
Garmin's HotFix capability automatically calculates and stores satellite locations, greatly reducing satellite acquisition time so that you can turn the unit on and get going. With HotFix, your nüvi 550 remembers the position of all satellites it is tracking when you turn it off, and calculates their movements in order to predict where they should be the next time you turn it on. HotFix can predict satellite positions for up to 3 days after the device was last turned off.
Conveniently plug in optional preloaded microSD memory cards for all your outdoor activities on land or water. Just insert an optional Garmin MapSource card with detailed street maps (such as for locales outside the United States), and the nüvi 550 provides turn-by-turn directions to your destination. And with optional BlueChart g2 Vision maps, you'll get everything you need for a great day on the water including depth contours, navaids and harbors.
A user-replaceable lithium-ion battery will give you up to eight hours of battery life (depending on use). In addition to an AC charger, the unit also ships with a 12-volt power adapter for vehicle charging, as well as a windshield suction cup mount.
Specifications
- User modes: Driving, Boating, Bicycling and Walking
- Expansion: microSD card slot for optional mapping and data storage
- Wherigo player
- Geocahing: Supports Geocahing.com GPX files for complete cache descriptions and hints
- Dimensions: 4.21 x 3.35 x 0.9 inches (WxHxD)
- Display size: 3.5-inch QVGA color antiglare TFT screen (320 x 240-pixel resolution) with white backlight touchscreen
- Weight: 7.6 ounces
- Battery type: user replaceable lithium-ion
- Battery life: up to 8 hours depending on use
- Waterproof standard: IEC 60529 IPX7
Navigate by Photo with Garmin Connect Photos
| Using Garmin's Connect Photos Web site, you can choose from millions of geo-located photos provided by Google's Panoramio photo sharing community and download them to the nüvi for a richer navigation experience using pictures as a guide.
- Choose from Panoramio's collection of photos from around the world.
- Easy to use interface displays photos on Google Maps.
- Search for photos by location name or map area boundary.
- Transfer photos directly from Garmin Connect to device with the Garmin Communicator.
- View photos in Google Earth.
- Supports Internet Explorer 6+, Firefox 2+, Safari 3+ on Windows and Mac.
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Play Wherigo Wherever You Go
This nüvi GPS device is compatible with Wherigo, the latest GPS-based activity from geocaching pioneers Groundspeak. Wherigo (pronounced "where I go") is a toolset for creating and playing location-based multimedia experiences in the real world. Using the Wherigo platform, Wherigo authors can build exciting adventure games, historical tours or other innovative activities.
3D Terrain Maps
If you add topographic maps to your device, then you can view them as shaded relief terrain so you know when to expect hills, mountains, forests and other natural features. Topographic terrain maps are viewable when using the 2D "birds-eye" view.
What's in the Box
Garmin nüvi 550, preloaded City Navigator North America NT1, lithium-ion battery, vehicle suction cup mount, vehicle power cable, dashboard disc, quick start manual
Which nüvi is Best for You?
Note: All nüvis come with detailed NAVTEQ maps containing more than 6 million pre-loaded point of interest locations.
Device | Screen Size inches (W x H) | Included Maps | Text-to-Speech (Directions in Real Street Names) | Traffic | Bluetooth | Media | FM Transmitter (audio through car stereo system) | Multi-Point Routing | Battery life (hours) |
Cont. U.S., Hawaii, and Puerto Rico | AK and Canada | Europe |
| nüvi 550 | 2.8 x 2.1 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos | | | up to 8 |
| nüvi 205 | 2.8 x 2.1 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 205w | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 255 | 2.8 x 2.1 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 255w | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 260w | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | | | Photos | | | up to 5 |
| nüvi 265T | 2.8 x 2.1 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (receiver included; Lifetime Traffic) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 265WT | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (receiver included; Lifetime Traffic) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 275T | 2.8 x 2.1 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (receiver included; Lifetime Traffic) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 285WT | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (receiver included; 3 months free); | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 465T | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | FM (receiver included; Lifetime Traffic) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 755T | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (receiver included; Lifetime Traffic) | | Photos, MP3s | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 760 | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos, MP3s | | | up to 5 |
| nüvi 765T | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (receiver included; Lifetime Traffic) | | Photos, MP3s | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 775T | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (receiver included; Lifetime Traffic) | | Photos, MP3s | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 780 | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (receiver included; 3 months free); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos, MP3s | | | up to 5 |
| nüvi 785T | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (receiver included; 3 months free); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos, MP3s | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 850 | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos, MP3s | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 855 | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos, MP3s | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 885T | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (receiver included; 3 months free); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos, MP3s | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 1200 | 2.8 x 2.1 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 1250 | 2.8 x 2.1 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 1260T | 2.8 x 2.1 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (receiver included; Lifetime Traffic) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 1300 | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 1350 | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (with optional receiver) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 1350T | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (receiver included; Lifetime Traffic) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 1370T | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (receiver included; Lifetime Traffic) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 1390T | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (receiver included; Lifetime Traffic) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 1490T | 4.4 x 2.5 | | | | | MSN-enhanced (with optional receiver); FM (receiver included; Lifetime Traffic) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
| nüvi 1690 | 3.81 x 2.25 | | | | | NAVTEQ Traffic, 2 years free (Garmin nüLink! service) | | Photos | | | up to 4 |
Perfect for crossing over the threshold from city to backcountry, the Garmin nüvi 550 provides a high-sensitivity GPS receiver with turn-by-turn navigation in a ruggedized, waterproof exterior that you can use while hiking, biking, or boating. With its high-sensitivity, WAAS-enabled GPS receiver and HotFix satellite prediction, nüvi 550 locates your position quickly and precisely and maintains its GPS location even in heavy cover and deep canyons whether in the city or out in the wilds.
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