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| Garmin nüvi 680 4.3-Inch Widescreen Bluetooth Portable GPS Navigator | 
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| Brand: Garmin
Category: CE
List Price: $964.27
Buy New: $329.00
You Save: $635.27 (66%)
New (74) Used (3) Refurbished (1)
Avg. Customer Rating:  154 reviews
Sales Rank: 712
Platform: Not Machine Specific
Media: Electronics
Autographed: No
Memorabilia: No
Batteries Included: No
Native Resolution: 480 x 272
Display Size: 4.3
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 9 x 2.9 x 4.9
nv:Type: Receiver
Acquisition Time Cold: 38 Seconds
Acquisition Time Warm: 1 Second
Update Rate: 1/second, continuous
GPS Accuracy Position: 10 meters
GPS Accuracy Velocity: 0.05 meter/sec RMS
Inputs: USB
Inputs: Bluetooth
Display: TFT
Touch Screen: Yes
Voice: Yes
Expansion Slots: SD Card
Battery Type: Nonreplaceable Lithium-Ion Battery
Battery Life: 3 hours
Antenna: SIRF-GPS antenna
Legal Disclaimer: Warranty does not cover misuse of product.
Warranty: The Official Ford Licemsed Garmin nüvi 680 product features a full 3-Year Warranty from Garmin. The Ford Licensed Garmin nuiv 680 comes with a 3 year warranty certificate from Garmin in the box. This is a FULL 2-Years longer than the Garmin warranty offered by other retailers.
MPN: 010-00540-25
Model: 010-00540-25
UPC: 053759067992
EAN: 0053759067992
ASIN: B000MF4N42
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
 Love the books from Audible.com for long trips August 13, 2008
I've owned 5 other GPS receivers and this is by far the best one yet. It's operation is very intuitive. Although I don't live in an area covered by the MSN service I activated the free trial period for a long trip to Florida. It saved us a hour delay through Atlanta taking us through city streets and dumping us back on the interstate on the other side of the traffic jam. While in Orlando it warned us of an impending strong thunderstorm and told us what was playing at all the area movie theaters starting with the closest. Just wish it was available where I live.
I love to eat, so the POIs, specifically resturants are a very important feature on the GPS. Very often the POIs are way out of date, but so far only one POI no longer existed when we searched it out.
My favorite feature is the ability to store audio books. Nothing seems to shorten a long trip more then listening to a good book. I use to listen to them on CD which required changing CDs all the time and often missing instruction from the GPS or part of the book because they were playing at the same time. With the book on the GPS the story pauses and even steps back a second or 2 when the GPS gives instruction, so nothing is missed.
On the negative side, people on the receiving end of a phone call through the Blue-tooth connection couldn't understand my mumblings because of the road noises.
I think this GPS will last me awhile.
Garmin NUVI 680 August 12, 2008
I bought this unit for a trip to the Washington DC area and a trip to the mountains in W. North Carolina and on to Savannah. Overall I am pleased with the performance. One address that we entered for Arlington, VA it could not locate. At other times it didn't know where the address was located on a street when the address was new. In the first case, we knew an address that was close and we knew how to find the address from that point. In the second case, it was a simple task of looking for the name of the business as we drove down the street. The Garmin worked very well in taking us through a maze of twisting streets to our location. On the freeway it would warn which side of the road to exit or which lanes to be in for a split. The MSN service worked well for traffic congestion in metro areas and we didn't use the service for gasoline prices. The blue tooth would not work with our LG phones. Garmin nüvi 680 4.3-Inch Widescreen Bluetooth Portable GPS Navigator
 Garmin Garbage August 10, 2008
I bought the Nuvi 680 expecting a significant step up from my few years old Mio C310X. Let's jump to the one positive thing about the Nuvi, it uses Navteq maps. Now on to the reasons I find it unacceptable. The suction mount will not stay fastened to the windshield. I tried everything, cleaning first, dry install, wet install, and so on. It stays perhaps an hour, then it falls off. The 680 has a flip up antenna; great except that when the antenna is down it turns the gps off. Dumb. So you can't really put the unit in your pocket and use it when walking around town. My Mio gets great reception without needing such a silly protruding antenna. The unit is slow to start up when powered on, and then you have to tap an annoying "I agree" button before it will go to work. There is virtually no useful customization available in the software. Either Garmin decided this would be a GPS for dummies or they created this dumbed down design to cut down on customer service calls. My 5 year old Garmin GPSmap 60cx has far more customization capability than this thing. Why would one need that? Well, for example, with Garmin's design, your speed is not displayed on the map when you are in navigate mode. You see time to destination instead. Curiously, speed is displayed when you are in map mode, not navigating to anything. This is stupid. I always want to see my speed. I can easily configure the 60cs or Mio to do this, but not this "sophisticated" Nuvi. Another thing, the instructions say you can search for a city by postal code, but it does not work. Any attempt to enter a zip code just brings up Search All. The MSN direct antenna is built into the power cord, which is very bulky.
So how does the routing work? Not very well. Going from Newport News, VA to a business near the VA Beach Expressway took us through the I-64 tunnel. I thought that strange because the tunnel and I-64 past it was showing a lot of red on the MSN Direct traffic, and the other way around via I-664 is only about 10-15 min longer. The Nuvi is suppose to take traffic into account when it calculates the route. I decided to trust it, and found myself in stopped traffic 2 miles before the tunnel that would have taken at least an hour to get through. I managed to bail out at the downtown Hampton exit. Okay I thought, I'll let the Nuvi get us back to I-664 and we'll go that way. I used the touch screen to locate a point on I-664 South of Hampton, , verified the little tag that came up did say "I-664 S", and pushed Go. The route was calculated, and it was clearly wrong. It was taking us in the wrong direction to a ramp for I-664 North, directly opposite of what I asked for. It was no help at all. The MSN traffic is disappointing because the traffic highlighting is not displayed on the Garmin map. You have to switch to a separate MSN map. How dumb is that? As we went along I-664 we ran into a couple of moderate backups. Neither was called out by MSN. The places it did show are the predictable rush hour backups one experiences every day in the Norfolk area. I did not see a whole lot of value add. I used the unit to check for gas stations. It found a bunch, listed prices and distance, but the name of many stations were listed as "unknown". What good is that? Map zooming is frustrating. The switch from 2D to 3D view is clumsy, and the zoom level is never correct.
I summary, I found this Nuvi to be a clueless design that has not been thoroughly tested and does not deliver on its promises. I am looking forward to returning it for a refund.
 Disappointed by Garmin July 31, 2008
I chose the Nuvi 680 over other comparable devices based on the Garmin reputation. I should have known better. This product consistently gets me lost and comes up with head-scratching routes for me to take. The only options I have to tweak the route calculation settings are faster or shorter route. You can't adjust the sensitivity for freeways or surface streets, etc. I assume the faster route gathers traffic info from the MSN Direct receiver but since the receiver does not appear to accurately receive updated traffic data unless it is always plugged in to an outlet (even when you are nowhere near your car or gps unit) it is not surprising the faster routes seem pretty slow. The short route option is simply zig zagging through streets to reach your destination since driving diagonally toward your destination is usually not an option.
Now back to the MSN Direct receiver. If you do not keep your MSN Direct receiver plugged in and draining your car battery, it will take about 45 minutes to sync up. By then you will have already reached your destination.
One of the reasons for purchasing this product was the 1 year free MSN Direct subscription. What a joke this feature is. While driving on the freeways of Los Angeles (the 10 or 101) it often gives me flash flood warnings. OK. Or it directs me to a freeway route and the traffic data is actually correct--there is traffic! Thanks for suggesting this route.
The navigation through the menus is not the best either. Though the menus are simple, you often have to hit the back button several times before returning to the main screen. There isn't a main screen button. This can be distracting when you are driving. :P
Also, the map displays all freeways as RED. Hmm, that's a good color for freeways. Makes me think all freeways are heavily congested all the time. Even in LA that is not always true. If you are going to put traffic data on a map, better make it straightforward. Green for no traffic, yellow for moderate traffic, and red for bumper to bumper. It would be nice to show the sections of freeway with traffic as well, like Google maps. Instead, the nuvi 680 only displays a little sign that represents traffic and only for your immediate location. Yeah, I can see that there is traffic right in front of my front windshield but where does it end and where is there no traffic? Let me reiterate the traffic sign only shows up when you are already in the thick of it. You can't look at a bird's eye view of an area and see where the freeways are congested. This is where I pull out the iphone and check Google maps.
The only reason I am giving this unit 2 stars is for the physical design and bluetooth phone feature. Though, the speaker is horrendous for a $400 piece of equipment (think iphone).
Perhaps if I had no experience with a GPS unit I would have given this unit 3 stars. Perhaps if I lived under a rock and never used Google maps with traffic I would have given this unit 3 stars. The fact is, I also have an outdated unit from Lowrance. At least the Lowrance always gave me good directions with an easy to use interface. I never regretted buying the Lowrance. Can't say the same for the Nuvi 680. I curse it every time I get lost BECAUSE of it.
best gps for the price July 30, 2008
Love this product,easy to use.But i do think the tom tom 930 would be better but it cost alot more. Tom tom have free updates to Poi and maps through all of there customers.
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