Garmin nüvi 650 4.3-Inch Widescreen Portable GPS Navigator

This is my first GPS and it is absolutely amazing. I saved lots of money compare to the 660 (features i really did not need). I am about to move to a new town/new state, and this is going to be a life saver for sure!


This Nuvi 650 is a a nice upgrade that is long overdue for me. I've been using the Garmin eMap for 7 years, and really appreciate the features of a well-made GPS. So what sets this unit apart ?
- The design of this unit is excellent - It feels solidly made, and has a look of high quality.
- The wide display on the 650 and the touchscreen work beautifully. Response to touchscreen input is quick and consistent.
- The 3D mapping on the widescreen helps to address one of the biggest challenges using a small electronic display vs a large paper map. With the 3D perspective, you can see a field much larger than can be displayed in 2D, so there's less need to zoom out to see roads that would be beyond the 2D window.
- The pre-loaded 6 million points of interest are amazing. In just a few days this unit has pointed out many local POIs I didn't even know existed. When I travel in unfamiliar territory, I frequently need to find a restaurant or bank or other POI and now I am confident I'll save time and aggravation, locating them quickly. Plus, the support for downloadable POI-TourGuides adds an exciting new dimension to sightseeing via GPS guided audio tours.
- Sound output is also very good, connected to my car stereo thru the aux input.
- Cost of the unit was a factor, and I saved some money vs the 660 by skipping unneeded features: Bluetooth, and FM transmitter.

OK, I gave it four stars and not five - Why ?
-The routing software is very good, and the voice prompts are very clear and timely, and ultimately it gets you there, but like other portable units, occasionally it will choose an odd path that is less than ideal, and send you off on an unnecessary parallel detour.
- I miss the Tracking "bread-crumbs" feature that records your movement, and is useful for back-tracking.
- The picture viewer displays large jpegs, and zooms them, but the initial view is small, not zoomed to fit the window. And zooming is slow. Ideally, it would "remember" the zoom from the last time viewed.
- MP3 player only plays MP3s, no support for WMA, which most of my music is formatted to. And no equalizer or tone controls.


This GPS is the best. Spend a little extra $$ to buy a good gps and you won't be dissapointed. If I had one "bad" thing to say, it would be that the voice can sometimes be a LITTLE hard to understand, but think of all those crazy words and road names she had to know! Everyone talks differently, so it would be nice to be able to select different voices (like you can on an apple computer). But overall, it is insignifigant compared to this awesome GPS. I'll never have to carry a map again- even if I go past my turn the thing can get me back to where I need to go. City or rural, you name it. I don't know why I didn't buy this a long time ago.

I've only had this unit a couple days and am mostly impressed. I haven't had the opportunity to use all the features but the ones I've used have worked very well. However, there is one exception.There is a four month old highway about 5 blocks from my home and the unit doesn't recognize it. Also, there is a Walmart about 3 miles from my home that has been open for about 3 years and the device also doesn't recognize it. Actually, it sends me to a Walmart about 20 miles away. I called Garmin about these concerns and was advised that I must wait for an update to be available in the fall. Hopefully, at no cost. I understand they only update these babies once every 12 to 18 months. That really concerns me.I purchased a brand new unit with year old data. Not too smart.At the price one must pay for these products they should be updated free every 6 months, at a bare minimum. Other than the above mentioned items ,it is a pretty nice unit and I think I made the right choice. Only time will tell. One caution for everyone, Check with the manufacturer of the unit you're considering purchasing to be sure it has been recently updated, otherwise you have up to an 18 month old program in a brand new unit.UGH!

I don't think routing creations are as updated or necessarily best in comparisons to a Magellan 300 I had been using. I was very surprised at this as Garmin has always been , I thought, the best and I have owned five other Garmins from the little yellow Etrex to the 175C and in between. Sometimes the 'cold start' or even the 'warm start' takes way too long to start navigation for what I should think a Sirus III chip should take. The screen and imaging is very nice, etc. but I think it needs more POI's (points of interests) which many cheaper GPS units have more of in many cases. I do know though that Garmin is very helpful and probably the best out there with their customer help and support so I will be contacting them re my problems and complaints very soon and am sure they will be resolved satisfactorly.


I have been in the market for an automotive GPS for a year or so. I have an old Garmin handheld unit that has been fantastic with many useful features. I put off buying an automotive GPS because the manufacturers are so obsessed with the dainty little 3.5 inch displays. That's great if you want to put it in your pocket, or for pedestrian use, but it's woefully inadequate for automotive use. Unfortunately, there are no reasonable options out there with a large enough screen, except for the Garmin StreetPilot 7200, which has a 7" display. And that model is way overpriced, and doesn't even have a built in battery.

After waiting a long time, I decided to buy the best deal out there with a display larger than the 3.5". At first I waited for the release of the new Mio C520 with the 4.3" display. But after checking it out at Circuit City, was disappointed. The Mio has tiny faint control icons that are barely visible and spaced very close together. Plus the menu icons used tiny fonts that were barely legible. Same problem with the top banner that provided directions and cross street info. Also, the colors they chose for the controls buttons didn't have enough contrast between the button background and font; whereas the Garmin use high contrast colors on their buttons/icons and larger fonts. Even the 3.5" Garmins were more legible than the larger Mio. Amazing a manufacturer could come so close and then botch it on something so basic.

Here's the pro's and con's of the Garmin Nuvi 650.
Pro's:
1) Bright display and good contrasting colors on control buttons/icons.
2) Thin case that allows more versatility in mounting.
3) Great/quick satellite reception.
4) MP3 and JPG viewer features (which I have no need for).
5) Great hardware/software quality and stability.
6) Allegedly good customer support (although I haven't needed it yet, that was a serious factor).
7) Unit powers on/off automatically with vehicle when plugged into 12 volt receptacle.

Cons:
1) Overpriced. The larger display simply does not justify the price hike over the smaller Nuvis. Even at 25% off MSRP, I don't feel it was a value. If not for restocking fees, I would consider returning it.
2) Needs an even larger display. The reviews referring to the display as "large" and to the StreetPilot 7200 as "huge" are ridiculous. Auto manufacturers would never get away with putting anything less than a 7" or 8" Nav display in cars.
3) Needs some type of lanyard or wrist strap for hand carrying and securing to bicycle or motorcycle. I use this GPS on my motorcycle and would like a lanyard to securely fasten the device in case it pops out of the cradle while hitting a bump or at high speed. GPSs are simply too expensive to not provide this basic security feature.
4) At over $500, this thing should at least come with some basic padded case or preferrably a hard case with padding to protect the device and the display.
5) Doesn't leave a bread crumb trail showing where you've been.
6) The jpeg viewer doesn't automatically resize photos to fit the screen. To view photos requires much tedious button pushing.
7) No north pointer in the 3D map mode.
8) The map starts to rotate as you approach an intersection even though the vehicle hasn't started to turn. If you then stop, the map is not properly oriented and it is difficult to align what is straight ahead in the real world with what the map is trying to show.
9) The most glaring omission is the restriction to only one via point when planning a route. This is simply inexcusable, particularly when even the cheapest hand held units have more extensive route planning capabilities. If you are planning a trip across the US, it is impossible to plan a route incorporating more than one desired stop. I generally know exactly where I want to go and which roads I want to take to get there. I want the GPS to cue me as the turns approach and to calculate trip info. Unfortunately, Garmin is bent on playing the backseat driver and only permitting me to select the final destination and one via point. It does this well if that's all you want. I'm hoping future software updates will rectify this problem.

Some additional features I'd like to see in a GPS:
1) More extensive/manual route planning.
2) A built in electronic compass so the unit knows it's orientation as well as position when not in motion (GPS only provides position). By the way, some hand held units have this feature.

All that said, the Garmin Nuvi 650 is as advertised and performs the provided features well.

In summary, I recommend waiting 6 months or a year as GPS prices are dropping drastically and manufacturers are starting to offer larger displays. The Nuvi 650 has potential, and it could earn another star from me with some software updating to make it more of a value (route planning enhancements, north pointer, etc.).

Let me preface this by saying I'm not new to GPS, and have used an old reliable Garmin GPS-V on long road trips for several years with excellent results. Being "early" technology from Garmin, my good 'ol GPS-V suffered from some drawbacks such as slow RS-232 data transfer (no USB), small monochrome display, limited and non-expandable internal map memory (only 19 MB), and a tedious method of data entry. All that notwithstanding, it was reliable and efficient as a rock and worked great, and had many excellent and useful "extra" features. My favorite of it's many features was the efficient way it made use of routes and waypoints. Not only can it download and store many routes and many waypoints within each route from your PC, but it will constantly show me in real time the distance, time, and ETA to the next way point and/or the next turn, in addition to the distance, time, and ETA to final destination. The old GPS-V also had a ton of the usual features such as current elevation with graphics and elevation gains, trip info (distance, stopped time, cumulative mileage, current speed, average speed, etc. etc., ad infinitum.

Fast forward to last week when my wife gave me a spanking new Nuvi 650 for Father's Day. Wow, what a display difference. Eye candy heaven! I loved the touch screen "buttons", the relatively large (compared to my old GPS-V) brilliant and sharp color display, the clever easy-release ball mount, and the huge POI database. I tried it out around town and it worked wonderfully. I figured that five years of rapid technical advancement in the GPS field would be mine with my new Nuvi 650. Well, guess what. A lot of my enthusiasm for my new toy came to a screeching halt when I decided to plug in a route with a bunch of waypoints for an upcoming 800 mile road trip, and realized I could only have ONE (count 'em, one!) "via" point (waypoint) between the start and end of the entire trip. Are you kidding me? That is a HUGE step backwards in GPS technology, and makes no sense at all to me unless the idea was to just quickly sell a pretty but grossly dumbed-down, idiot-proof device that was best suited to finding grandma's house across town. Considering the price of this thing, this is in my opinion totally unsatisfactory. It means on an 800 mile trip via long cross country highways like interstate 40 it will tell you the "next" turn is maybe 6 hours from now. Gimme a break. With my old GPS-V I could plug in dozens of small towns or spots I might want to see along the way, and it would keep a running display of not only how far and how long to the end of my trip but how far and how long to each of the waypoints along the way, thus breaking up (at least psychologically) a long and boring drive into something more interesting and palatable. Heck, this thing won't even store routes, period! The route you are on when you punch "GO" is the only route you get. Want another route? Want to repeat a trip, or do an "inverse" trip using the same path on return? With the GPS-V just scroll down the list of your previously downloaded routes and pick one, and you're off and running. With the Nuvi, you need to create another brand new route every time, and you are allowed only a single waypoint in that route.

It is absolutely stunning to me that Garmin chose to actually build LESS technology and usefulness into this new Nuvi GPS than my 5 or 6 year old GPS-V has. What kind of technology advancement is THAT? They appear to have decided to build and sell these based on simplicity and flashiness, and on that they have succeeded, because it is super simple to use, the display is certainly very flashy and pretty, and data entry can be done by a third grader. But sadly, when you look behind all of this glitter, this is a deliberately crippled version of Garmin's own 5-year old GPS technology. What a waste. The Nuvi 650 is a '96 Ford sedan with a flashy metalflake paint job and loud pipes. In other words, it's all show and no go.

My new Nuvi 650 is not totally useless, because I'll use if for around town and short trips, where I pretty much don't care about waypoints or elevation anyway. But beyond that it IS almost useless, and on my long road trips I'll continue to squint at the postage stamp display on my old GPS-V. Heck, for $600 the Nuvi doesn't even tell you elevations. Shame on you, Garmin. You got me this time, but I'll be more careful next time I buy. For serious road trip use, the Nuvi 650 doesn't cut it. As far as I'm concerned Garmin can continue to sell Nuvi's to the Ipod market, or to the folks who spend all day watching Paris Hilton footage on CNN and whose technological capabilities don't extend past using the TV remote. For serious long distance road use, it's a no go for me.

I gave it three stars instead of two only because of the super-nice display and very slick touch-screen operation.

This review may help someone like me who is not knowledgeable about GPS and is looking for basic functionality. I was looking for a unit that is portable (so I could also use it for walking or switch cars) and has a widescreen display, so I settled on comparing a Garmin Nuvi 650 Personal Travel Assistant for North America and a Plenio VXA-5000 4.3-Inch Touch Screen Car Navigation System with Bluetooth.

1. Audio - The Plenio does not have text to speech functionality, meaning the Plenio will announce "Turn left in 500 feet," while the Nuvi 650 will announce "Turn left on Main Street in 500 feet." I found the Plenio confusing if there were two possible left turns close to each other, and the display didn't always help. (See "Display").

2. Display- The Plenio display appeared dim and difficult to read on bright days, even at the brightest setting. The Nuvi had a brighter, easy to read display even when driving toward sunlight. When a turn is announced, the text of the street name on the Plenio is small and difficult to read; on the Nuvi the street name is announced and the visible text is larger, bolder and easy to read. This also makes it easier to keep track of cross streets when operating in "tracking mode" rather than inputting a destination.

3. Portability- The Garmin is thinner and lighter. The Plenio's suction mount is more substantial, but it has to be to hold up the device.

4. Controls- The Plenio has volume up and down controls, on the Garmin these are only accessible with some difficulty through the touch screen.

5. Accessories- The Plenio includes an FM transmitter, (sound can play through your FM radio) and Bluetooth; to get this functionality with the Garmin, a trade up to the Garmin Nuvi 660 Pocket Vehicle GPS Navigator and Personal Travel Assistant is necessary. The Plenio includes an AC charger, a useful tool in a portable GPS. If you have a mini USB AC charger, you can use it with the Garmin.

6. Waypoints- The Garmin allows only one waypoint (stopover on the trip); multiple waypoints are available on the Plenio.

7. **** Satellite reception- The Plenio has an internal antenna while the Garmin has a foldaway flip up antenna flap. The Plenio was totally incapable of getting a satellite fix, and therefore useless, while in my wife's car (she has a metallic layer in the windshield as some cars do); the Garmin had no such problem. The Garmin also could fix while indoors. The Garmin allows the user to turn on "WAAS" which is a combined satellite and ground GPS mode that is more accurate than satellite alone; I haven't seen that WAAS makes a difference to a basic user like me. The Garmin seems to get a fix from a cold start about 25% faster than the Plenio.

8. Points of interest and maps- The Garmin maps (v.8) seemed "less out of date" than the Plenio. (maybe 2 years out of date versus 3-4 years). The Garmin has a more substantial list of points of interest (POI's). The Plenio allows you to program the unit to show your choice of POI's (such as all gas stations and/or restaurants) as icons on the map, and bring up more information ( name, phone number) by touching the icon; the Garmin will provide this information from a separate search menu.

9. Map orientation- For some reason, the Plenio map orientation insists on switching from "driving direction up" to "north up" orientation and needs to be manually switched back each time it is turned on. The Plenio map displays a "compass rose", a nice feature, but it is small and unreadable when in 3D mode. The Garmin stays in the map orientation as programmed. There is no compass, but when in "tracking mode" there is a text box that gives the driving direction. (N, SW, etc.)

To summarize, the Plenio had more bells and whistles which I willingly traded in for the much improved basic functionality of the Garmin.

This unit, out of the several I tested at the local electronics store, was the most intuitive to use featuring three choices at the outset (all paraphrased): Where to? Show map, and Other (for other unit features such as MP3, etc.)

To go to a location, you select the "Where to" selection followed by an address, store type, favorites, etc. Simply type in a few letters and the unit matches addresses, store names etc. based on only a few entries.

If my luddite wife can easily use the machine to enter an address (she never could figure out my Garmin GPS V worked) then I believe it is a good choice for most people. Plus the screen size is one of the largest in the market.

Also if you are looking around, Amazon had the lowest complete price (price + shipping) of all the vendors I checked online for this unit

Love the Garmin Nuvi. Very user friendly. Would recommend to others.

Yeah, it's simple and easy to use. But where is the 700MB of free internal space advertised? Mine had a measly 220MB free when it was new, right out of the box. My Garmin's total capacity is 1.38GB, and not the 2GB in the literature. Why? I don't know. Garmin doesn't respond to emails and the page for registered owners to receive technical support is not working. Thanks, Garmin. If I have to spend more than 30 minutes on hold trying to get an answer, or your phone support is also not working, Amazon can expect a return and TomTom can expect some new business.

Oh, and Garmin overcharged me $40 for an add-on map compared to their own advertised price... no answer to my question on that little slip up either.

I normally never write reviews, but the person from NY who gave this product a negative due to "advertised available space", I felt it needed a rebuttle. This product is a GPS, not a PDA, MP3 player (yes it does play MP3's), or a laptop. The purpose of this product is quite clear. Get from point A to point B. If you are a local and know all the back ways, it won't compete with you. But it is very accurate and the maps are much better than the Tom Tom. I purchased a new Mio, Tom Tom, and the Garmin Nuvi 550, tested all of them on the same trip, here are my results.

Mio: Reports I am off road when I'm in my driveway (house is 5 years old, in New Jersey, one of the most densely populated states).

Tom Tom: Same, reports I'm off road when in my driveway (house is 5 years old, very confusing directions, when at a stop light, says "bear left" does that mean to turn left?

Garmin Nuvi: Very disappointing voice, actually liked the 1/2 price Mio better. Much better directions, went from Princeton, NJ to Flemington, NJ much quicker due to the fact the MIO didn't understand when it brought me out to Rt.202 it was one way and I had to drive 5 miles to turn around!

All in all, the Nuvi is the best I've had, just wished the voice sounded a little more natural. I've downloaded the U.K. speaker from Garmin, it does sound better, but not great.

Yeah, it's simple and easy to use. But where is the 700MB of free internal space advertised? Mine had a measly 220MB free when it was new, right out of the box. My Garmin's total capacity is 1.38GB, and not the 2GB in the literature. Why? I don't know. Garmin doesn't respond to emails and the page for registered owners to receive technical support is not working. Thanks, Garmin. If I have to spend more than 30 minutes on hold trying to get an answer, or your phone support is also not working, Amazon can expect a return and TomTom can expect some new business.

Oh, and Garmin overcharged me $40 for an add-on map compared to their own advertised price... no answer to my question on that little slip up either.

Love the Garmin Nuvi. Very user friendly. Would recommend to others.

This unit, out of the several I tested at the local electronics store, was the most intuitive to use featuring three choices at the outset (all paraphrased): Where to? Show map, and Other (for other unit features such as MP3, etc.)

To go to a location, you select the "Where to" selection followed by an address, store type, favorites, etc. Simply type in a few letters and the unit matches addresses, store names etc. based on only a few entries.

If my luddite wife can easily use the machine to enter an address (she never could figure out my Garmin GPS V worked) then I believe it is a good choice for most people. Plus the screen size is one of the largest in the market.

Also if you are looking around, Amazon had the lowest complete price (price + shipping) of all the vendors I checked online for this unit

This review may help someone like me who is not knowledgeable about GPS and is looking for basic functionality. I was looking for a unit that is portable (so I could also use it for walking or switch cars) and has a widescreen display, so I settled on comparing a Garmin Nuvi 650 Personal Travel Assistant for North America and a Plenio VXA-5000 4.3-Inch Touch Screen Car Navigation System with Bluetooth.

1. Audio - The Plenio does not have text to speech functionality, meaning the Plenio will announce "Turn left in 500 feet," while the Nuvi 650 will announce "Turn left on Main Street in 500 feet." I found the Plenio confusing if there were two possible left turns close to each other, and the display didn't always help. (See "Display").

2. Display- The Plenio display appeared dim and difficult to read on bright days, even at the brightest setting. The Nuvi had a brighter, easy to read display even when driving toward sunlight. When a turn is announced, the text of the street name on the Plenio is small and difficult to read; on the Nuvi the street name is announced and the visible text is larger, bolder and easy to read. This also makes it easier to keep track of cross streets when operating in "tracking mode" rather than inputting a destination.

3. Portability- The Garmin is thinner and lighter. The Plenio's suction mount is more substantial, but it has to be to hold up the device.

4. Controls- The Plenio has volume up and down controls, on the Garmin these are only accessible with some difficulty through the touch screen.

5. Accessories- The Plenio includes an FM transmitter, (sound can play through your FM radio) and Bluetooth; to get this functionality with the Garmin, a trade up to the Garmin Nuvi 660 Pocket Vehicle GPS Navigator and Personal Travel Assistant is necessary. The Plenio includes an AC charger, a useful tool in a portable GPS. If you have a mini USB AC charger, you can use it with the Garmin.

6. Waypoints- The Garmin allows only one waypoint (stopover on the trip); multiple waypoints are available on the Plenio.

7. **** Satellite reception- The Plenio has an internal antenna while the Garmin has a foldaway flip up antenna flap. The Plenio was totally incapable of getting a satellite fix, and therefore useless, while in my wife's car (she has a metallic layer in the windshield as some cars do); the Garmin had no such problem. The Garmin also could fix while indoors. The Garmin allows the user to turn on "WAAS" which is a combined satellite and ground GPS mode that is more accurate than satellite alone; I haven't seen that WAAS makes a difference to a basic user like me. The Garmin seems to get a fix from a cold start about 25% faster than the Plenio.

8. Points of interest and maps- The Garmin maps (v.8) seemed "less out of date" than the Plenio. (maybe 2 years out of date versus 3-4 years). The Garmin has a more substantial list of points of interest (POI's). The Plenio allows you to program the unit to show your choice of POI's (such as all gas stations and/or restaurants) as icons on the map, and bring up more information ( name, phone number) by touching the icon; the Garmin will provide this information from a separate search menu.

9. Map orientation- For some reason, the Plenio map orientation insists on switching from "driving direction up" to "north up" orientation and needs to be manually switched back each time it is turned on. The Plenio map displays a "compass rose", a nice feature, but it is small and unreadable when in 3D mode. The Garmin stays in the map orientation as programmed. There is no compass, but when in "tracking mode" there is a text box that gives the driving direction. (N, SW, etc.)

To summarize, the Plenio had more bells and whistles which I willingly traded in for the much improved basic functionality of the Garmin.

Let me preface this by saying I'm not new to GPS, and have used an old reliable Garmin GPS-V on long road trips for several years with excellent results. Being "early" technology from Garmin, my good 'ol GPS-V suffered from some drawbacks such as slow RS-232 data transfer (no USB), small monochrome display, limited and non-expandable internal map memory (only 19 MB), and a tedious method of data entry. All that notwithstanding, it was reliable and efficient as a rock and worked great, and had many excellent and useful "extra" features. My favorite of it's many features was the efficient way it made use of routes and waypoints. Not only can it download and store many routes and many waypoints within each route from your PC, but it will constantly show me in real time the distance, time, and ETA to the next way point and/or the next turn, in addition to the distance, time, and ETA to final destination. The old GPS-V also had a ton of the usual features such as current elevation with graphics and elevation gains, trip info (distance, stopped time, cumulative mileage, current speed, average speed, etc. etc., ad infinitum.

Fast forward to last week when my wife gave me a spanking new Nuvi 650 for Father's Day. Wow, what a display difference. Eye candy heaven! I loved the touch screen "buttons", the relatively large (compared to my old GPS-V) brilliant and sharp color display, the clever easy-release ball mount, and the huge POI database. I tried it out around town and it worked wonderfully. I figured that five years of rapid technical advancement in the GPS field would be mine with my new Nuvi 650. Well, guess what. A lot of my enthusiasm for my new toy came to a screeching halt when I decided to plug in a route with a bunch of waypoints for an upcoming 800 mile road trip, and realized I could only have ONE (count 'em, one!) "via" point (waypoint) between the start and end of the entire trip. Are you kidding me? That is a HUGE step backwards in GPS technology, and makes no sense at all to me unless the idea was to just quickly sell a pretty but grossly dumbed-down, idiot-proof device that was best suited to finding grandma's house across town. Considering the price of this thing, this is in my opinion totally unsatisfactory. It means on an 800 mile trip via long cross country highways like interstate 40 it will tell you the "next" turn is maybe 6 hours from now. Gimme a break. With my old GPS-V I could plug in dozens of small towns or spots I might want to see along the way, and it would keep a running display of not only how far and how long to the end of my trip but how far and how long to each of the waypoints along the way, thus breaking up (at least psychologically) a long and boring drive into something more interesting and palatable. Heck, this thing won't even store routes, period! The route you are on when you punch "GO" is the only route you get. Want another route? Want to repeat a trip, or do an "inverse" trip using the same path on return? With the GPS-V just scroll down the list of your previously downloaded routes and pick one, and you're off and running. With the Nuvi, you need to create another brand new route every time, and you are allowed only a single waypoint in that route.

It is absolutely stunning to me that Garmin chose to actually build LESS technology and usefulness into this new Nuvi GPS than my 5 or 6 year old GPS-V has. What kind of technology advancement is THAT? They appear to have decided to build and sell these based on simplicity and flashiness, and on that they have succeeded, because it is super simple to use, the display is certainly very flashy and pretty, and data entry can be done by a third grader. But sadly, when you look behind all of this glitter, this is a deliberately crippled version of Garmin's own 5-year old GPS technology. What a waste. The Nuvi 650 is a '96 Ford sedan with a flashy metalflake paint job and loud pipes. In other words, it's all show and no go.

My new Nuvi 650 is not totally useless, because I'll use if for around town and short trips, where I pretty much don't care about waypoints or elevation anyway. But beyond that it IS almost useless, and on my long road trips I'll continue to squint at the postage stamp display on my old GPS-V. Heck, for $600 the Nuvi doesn't even tell you elevations. Shame on you, Garmin. You got me this time, but I'll be more careful next time I buy. For serious road trip use, the Nuvi 650 doesn't cut it. As far as I'm concerned Garmin can continue to sell Nuvi's to the Ipod market, or to the folks who spend all day watching Paris Hilton footage on CNN and whose technological capabilities don't extend past using the TV remote. For serious long distance road use, it's a no go for me.

I gave it three stars instead of two only because of the super-nice display and very slick touch-screen operation.

I have been in the market for an automotive GPS for a year or so. I have an old Garmin handheld unit that has been fantastic with many useful features. I put off buying an automotive GPS because the manufacturers are so obsessed with the dainty little 3.5 inch displays. That's great if you want to put it in your pocket, or for pedestrian use, but it's woefully inadequate for automotive use. Unfortunately, there are no reasonable options out there with a large enough screen, except for the Garmin StreetPilot 7200, which has a 7" display. And that model is way overpriced, and doesn't even have a built in battery.

After waiting a long time, I decided to buy the best deal out there with a display larger than the 3.5". At first I waited for the release of the new Mio C520 with the 4.3" display. But after checking it out at Circuit City, was disappointed. The Mio has tiny faint control icons that are barely visible and spaced very close together. Plus the menu icons used tiny fonts that were barely legible. Same problem with the top banner that provided directions and cross street info. Also, the colors they chose for the controls buttons didn't have enough contrast between the button background and font; whereas the Garmin use high contrast colors on their buttons/icons and larger fonts. Even the 3.5" Garmins were more legible than the larger Mio. Amazing a manufacturer could come so close and then botch it on something so basic.

Here's the pro's and con's of the Garmin Nuvi 650.
Pro's:
1) Bright display and good contrasting colors on control buttons/icons.
2) Thin case that allows more versatility in mounting.
3) Great/quick satellite reception.
4) MP3 and JPG viewer features (which I have no need for).
5) Great hardware/software quality and stability.
6) Allegedly good customer support (although I haven't needed it yet, that was a serious factor).
7) Unit powers on/off automatically with vehicle when plugged into 12 volt receptacle.

Cons:
1) Overpriced. The larger display simply does not justify the price hike over the smaller Nuvis. Even at 25% off MSRP, I don't feel it was a value. If not for restocking fees, I would consider returning it.
2) Needs an even larger display. The reviews referring to the display as "large" and to the StreetPilot 7200 as "huge" are ridiculous. Auto manufacturers would never get away with putting anything less than a 7" or 8" Nav display in cars.
3) Needs some type of lanyard or wrist strap for hand carrying and securing to bicycle or motorcycle. I use this GPS on my motorcycle and would like a lanyard to securely fasten the device in case it pops out of the cradle while hitting a bump or at high speed. GPSs are simply too expensive to not provide this basic security feature.
4) At over $500, this thing should at least come with some basic padded case or preferrably a hard case with padding to protect the device and the display.
5) Doesn't leave a bread crumb trail showing where you've been.
6) The jpeg viewer doesn't automatically resize photos to fit the screen. To view photos requires much tedious button pushing.
7) No north pointer in the 3D map mode.
8) The map starts to rotate as you approach an intersection even though the vehicle hasn't started to turn. If you then stop, the map is not properly oriented and it is difficult to align what is straight ahead in the real world with what the map is trying to show.
9) The most glaring omission is the restriction to only one via point when planning a route. This is simply inexcusable, particularly when even the cheapest hand held units have more extensive route planning capabilities. If you are planning a trip across the US, it is impossible to plan a route incorporating more than one desired stop. I generally know exactly where I want to go and which roads I want to take to get there. I want the GPS to cue me as the turns approach and to calculate trip info. Unfortunately, Garmin is bent on playing the backseat driver and only permitting me to select the final destination and one via point. It does this well if that's all you want. I'm hoping future software updates will rectify this problem.

Some additional features I'd like to see in a GPS:
1) More extensive/manual route planning.
2) A built in electronic compass so the unit knows it's orientation as well as position when not in motion (GPS only provides position). By the way, some hand held units have this feature.

All that said, the Garmin Nuvi 650 is as advertised and performs the provided features well.

In summary, I recommend waiting 6 months or a year as GPS prices are dropping drastically and manufacturers are starting to offer larger displays. The Nuvi 650 has potential, and it could earn another star from me with some software updating to make it more of a value (route planning enhancements, north pointer, etc.).

I don't think routing creations are as updated or necessarily best in comparisons to a Magellan 300 I had been using. I was very surprised at this as Garmin has always been , I thought, the best and I have owned five other Garmins from the little yellow Etrex to the 175C and in between. Sometimes the 'cold start' or even the 'warm start' takes way too long to start navigation for what I should think a Sirus III chip should take. The screen and imaging is very nice, etc. but I think it needs more POI's (points of interests) which many cheaper GPS units have more of in many cases. I do know though that Garmin is very helpful and probably the best out there with their customer help and support so I will be contacting them re my problems and complaints very soon and am sure they will be resolved satisfactorly.


This GPS is the best. Spend a little extra $$ to buy a good gps and you won't be dissapointed. If I had one "bad" thing to say, it would be that the voice can sometimes be a LITTLE hard to understand, but think of all those crazy words and road names she had to know! Everyone talks differently, so it would be nice to be able to select different voices (like you can on an apple computer). But overall, it is insignifigant compared to this awesome GPS. I'll never have to carry a map again- even if I go past my turn the thing can get me back to where I need to go. City or rural, you name it. I don't know why I didn't buy this a long time ago.

I've only had this unit a couple days and am mostly impressed. I haven't had the opportunity to use all the features but the ones I've used have worked very well. However, there is one exception.There is a four month old highway about 5 blocks from my home and the unit doesn't recognize it. Also, there is a Walmart about 3 miles from my home that has been open for about 3 years and the device also doesn't recognize it. Actually, it sends me to a Walmart about 20 miles away. I called Garmin about these concerns and was advised that I must wait for an update to be available in the fall. Hopefully, at no cost. I understand they only update these babies once every 12 to 18 months. That really concerns me.I purchased a brand new unit with year old data. Not too smart.At the price one must pay for these products they should be updated free every 6 months, at a bare minimum. Other than the above mentioned items ,it is a pretty nice unit and I think I made the right choice. Only time will tell. One caution for everyone, Check with the manufacturer of the unit you're considering purchasing to be sure it has been recently updated, otherwise you have up to an 18 month old program in a brand new unit.UGH!

This is my first GPS and it is absolutely amazing. I saved lots of money compare to the 660 (features i really did not need). I am about to move to a new town/new state, and this is going to be a life saver for sure!


This Nuvi 650 is a a nice upgrade that is long overdue for me. I've been using the Garmin eMap for 7 years, and really appreciate the features of a well-made GPS. So what sets this unit apart ?
- The design of this unit is excellent - It feels solidly made, and has a look of high quality.
- The wide display on the 650 and the touchscreen work beautifully. Response to touchscreen input is quick and consistent.
- The 3D mapping on the widescreen helps to address one of the biggest challenges using a small electronic display vs a large paper map. With the 3D perspective, you can see a field much larger than can be displayed in 2D, so there's less need to zoom out to see roads that would be beyond the 2D window.
- The pre-loaded 6 million points of interest are amazing. In just a few days this unit has pointed out many local POIs I didn't even know existed. When I travel in unfamiliar territory, I frequently need to find a restaurant or bank or other POI and now I am confident I'll save time and aggravation, locating them quickly. Plus, the support for downloadable POI-TourGuides adds an exciting new dimension to sightseeing via GPS guided audio tours.
- Sound output is also very good, connected to my car stereo thru the aux input.
- Cost of the unit was a factor, and I saved some money vs the 660 by skipping unneeded features: Bluetooth, and FM transmitter.

OK, I gave it four stars and not five - Why ?
-The routing software is very good, and the voice prompts are very clear and timely, and ultimately it gets you there, but like other portable units, occasionally it will choose an odd path that is less than ideal, and send you off on an unnecessary parallel detour.
- I miss the Tracking "bread-crumbs" feature that records your movement, and is useful for back-tracking.
- The picture viewer displays large jpegs, and zooms them, but the initial view is small, not zoomed to fit the window. And zooming is slow. Ideally, it would "remember" the zoom from the last time viewed.
- MP3 player only plays MP3s, no support for WMA, which most of my music is formatted to. And no equalizer or tone controls.