Garmin nuvi 285W/285WT

What a sweet device, can't live without thisone hey!

he case for the Garmin 285WT is sleek shiny black plastic. The case seems very sturdy - in fact all the pieces appear to be made of quality plastic. It comes with the power adapter for the car, and a USB cable to hook up to your computer. (Some of the less expensive Garmins do not come with the USB cable, which is a problem because you need a USB cable to register the unit.)

Pros:
The unit was extremely easy to set up. Upon first use, it guides you through set-up, which is simple. The icons on the screen are simple and intuitive. I started using it without even reading the directions.

After the initial settings are entered, it sets about finding the local satellites. I told it to skip that step, since I was just hooking it up to a wall charger (sold separately) to charge the batteries. Not only did it go ahead and find the satellites, it found them while sitting on my kitchen table. I don't know how it did that, but it did. There are green bars in the corner of the display showing you how many satellites have been acquired. There it was, displaying all four green bars after just a few minutes. That was impressive.

In the car, it locks onto the satellites extremely fast. It is much faster to find the signals than my friend's TomTom 910. To be fair, the TomTom is an older unit, but it was a much more expensive unit than the Garmin 285WT to begin with.

The display is extremely legible both in bright sunlight and at night. I had to turn the brightness down to the minimum because it was a bit too bright at night for my taste.

I am using the default voice. It is extremely clear and easy to understand. It has only messed up on one street name, as it assumed that N Street was the same as North Street. I am not in an area where there are street names in Spanish or other languages, so I have not had the chance to find out how well it deals with those. The voice is much more understandable than the voice in the TomTom 910 (I hope my friend doesn't read this...). (The TomTom also consistently mangled Spanish street names when we took a road trip to San Jose.)

If one drives past a turn that it has selected, the device instantly says "Recalculating," and immediately updates the directions. I missed a turn at night in a very dark area, (I would have had a hard time finding the alternative route) and it didn't miss a beat.

The 285WT comes with a feature that I really like called "Where Am I?" It's an emergency location feature - you can tap the screen to get your latitude and longitude. So if you get a flat tire out in the middle of the Mohave Desert, the tow truck from Trona will be able to find you. Assuming, of course, that tow trucks from Trona also have GPS devices.

The plastic suction cup holds extremely well. Be sure to take the transparent protective film off of it before using. I have it mounted on a Gilsson UBM Portable Car Non-Skid Friction Beanbag Dashboard Mount for Garmin, TomTom, Magellan and more that has worked out quite well.

If you live in an urban area, don't get too excited about MSN Direct, because Microsoft has already announced that they are killing it in 2012. It was originally developed for a device called a Smart Watch, which obviously hit the market with a big belly flop, or we'd all have one. More information can be found on MSN Direct and the planned demise thereof in an October 28, 2009 article at the PC World website.

Cons:
It gave me bad directions one time. It was a good thing I knew the area. Since I just got this unit, I don't know how often this sort of thing will happen. I am willing to forgive in this instance, because it seems to perform so well overall. (I don't know how forgiving I'd be if I had driven miles out of my way...)

Neutral:
This model is Bluetooth. I don't have a Bluetooth phone (I know, I know, I am using archaic technology...) so I couldn't test that feature.

The device also comes the MSN Direct (9 months free) which I found to be of very limited usefulness because I live in a rural area. I mean, c'mon, around here the 4H Club pancake breakfast at the volunteer fire department is a Big Deal, and MSN Direct is hardly going to tell me about things like that. I also don't have traffic concerns of the type that one would have in Los Angeles or San Francisco, for example. I also don't know why one needs a Doppler weather display on one's GPS, unless one is driving through Oklahoma in a thunderstorm during tornado season. It might be great for that, who knows?

All in all, I am extremely happy with this device, and recommend it without reservation. In fact, I am buying one for my son for Christmas.

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