| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| Team GpsPasSion |
Posted - 05 août 2009 : 11:50:11
USER REVIEWS - GARMIN NUVI 1690
Connected GPS (SIM Card) - nüLink Service : 2 year bundle
UPDATED 20110507 : new v3.90 software available, see details on page 27.
UPDATED 20100813 : new v3.60 software available, see details on page 23.
UPDATED 20100603 : new v3.50 software available, see details on page 18.
New software v3.40 available as of 2010/5/11. See page 17 for details.
UPDATED 20091214 : New v3.00 software available via the webupdater, fewer advertisements (less frequent and old ones not shown again), see details on page 7.
UPDATED 20091105 : there seems to be a screen flickering problem with all the 1690s manufactured before October 16th, see details on page 5.
UPDATED 20091008 : nuvi 1690 now available in the US, arriving early November in Europe.
User reviews :
- Moofy : >> LINK << on page 4
- ssandhaus : >> LINK << on page 4
- mitchellgibbs : >> LINK << on page 5
Links :
- Preview on Amazon : >> LINK <<
- Post on the Garmin Blog : >> LINK <<
- nüLink Service minisite : >> LINK <<
The IFA show is now underway in Berlin and the GPS manufacturers are firing from all quarters with new models. Starting off with Garmin who officially launched their first "connected" GPS, the nuvi 1690 leaked in August by the FCC. What we didn't know about was the nüLink Service bundled with the 1690. It is prepaid for two years in the US and for one year in Europe and then available for $5/month and €79/year, respectively.
The nuLink service is reminiscent of TomTom's LIVE launched last year and that failed to get widely adopted with an official 30% renewal rate, but possibly as low as 10%. The recurrent cost is a problem of course but also the lack of a "killer" feature. Nothing really new with nuLink apart from "flight status" or "Ciao" to broadcast your position. Will it be enough ?
Original post by flomat - Two days ago nuvi 1690 was reported to pass fcc featuring GPRS/UMTS/EDGE connectivity among others referenced at engadget or slashgear
I just hope Garmin won't stick to its recent notorious feature deployment policy by removing any gps functionality from this upcoming device ...  |
| 15 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| ddabcd277 |
Posted - 22 mars 2012 : 15:39:21
1690 series support all languages just like nuvi 13xx/14xx just not all languages are included in the "Text" folder because nuvi 1690 is sold only in the Western Europe.
Try to find the text file for romanian for nuvi 13/14xx series and you will have romanian. ;) |
| testerics |
Posted - 22 mars 2012 : 14:28:01
There is romanian language (not voice) on this new update?
Thanks. |
| gpspassion |
Posted - 11 mai 2011 : 06:59:09
Thanks, title and first message updated. |
| Morph3R |
Posted - 07 mai 2011 : 23:14:43
New Nüvi 1690 software available: version 3.90 (5. May 2011)
Changes made from version 3.70 to 3.90:
* Fixed several Picture Viewer errors.
* Fixed an error that caused address searches to return no results.
* Fixed an error with adding via points to a route.
* Fixed a weather display error.
* Fixed an error that caused incoming calls to be identified as 'unknown caller' on Razr phones.
* Fixed an error that caused ecoRoute HD calibration to fail.
* Fixed an error that caused the wrong turn prompt to appear on the turn review page.
* Fixed several keyboard errors.
* Improved software stability. |
| speedlever |
Posted - 28 mars 2011 : 17:42:30
No, this is NOT unique to the 1690. I suspect most, if not all GPS units, have a similar issue. |
| danham |
Posted - 28 mars 2011 : 14:45:34
@ speedlever:
quote:
I found that I had to watch the screen pretty closely when there were numerous exits in close proximity as it was easy to get on the wrong street and not recognize it until too late to recover.
Is this unique to the 1690? I found this to be an issue as far back as the 680, whose voice directions were sometimes dead wrong in such a situation, but if you ignored the voice and followed the purple stripe you found the correct exit.
-dan |
| speedlever |
Posted - 28 mars 2011 : 13:45:59
I had a trip to Atlanta this past weekend and had a few comments about the 1690 on the trip.
1) I saw several instances of junction view popping up unexpectedly. That is a fabulous feature and is really helpful in negotiating complex intersections. This was my first usage of JV on a road trip. Also, lane assist is extremely useful in helping get into the correct lane of travel for upcoming junctions. The speed limit display seemed pretty accurate and was helpful letting me know that I missed a change or two. I even had a red light warning or two pop up (we don't have any in my home area) but the volume of the alert was pretty low compared to the navigation audio.
2) Due to traffic conditions, I attempted to avoid the delay but instead, got into a worse traffic situation. I canceled the route and then told the 1690 to go to my destination, but I think it still carried over the avoid route in my new routing. Is there some way to prevent this? I thought canceling a route and setting up a new one (even to the same destination) would clear any avoids set up.
3) Googling is great but not without its pitfalls. On the way back, my wife wanted some coffee. So rather than the usual coffee shops, I thought we'd scope out a local specialty shop. I plugged the word coffee in the Google search engine and came up with a number of likely options and headed off route to try one out. Turns out that one must have been a home business because the routing took us into a residential area. So I tried another one... which took us into a business park and was a distributor. Then I started calling some and got a number of phones that had been disconnected. I finally gave up and just chose the nearest Starbucks.
Overall, the 1690 performed flawlessly during the 700 mile round trip and was extremely helpful navigating in unfamiliar territory. I found that I had to watch the screen pretty closely when there were numerous exits in close proximity as it was easy to get on the wrong street and not recognize it until too late to recover. This happened to us as we got off the highway near the ATL airport trying to locate our hotel. But it just took a few extra minutes to follow the GPS directions to get back around to where we should have gone in the first place and then it all worked out. |
| lexhair |
Posted - 13 mars 2011 : 04:32:15
quote:
Originally posted by speedlever
My phone book contact list sometimes loads and sometimes doesn't. I haven't seen a pattern to it yet. OTOH, it's not that big a loss since it's alphabetical with no way to search. But I'm mainly curious if others see their contact list come and go with the 1690.
Also, if I turn off my phone and then turn it back on, the BT will not auto-reconnect. I have to go into tools/settings/BT and recheck the button for my phone to re-enable the BT connection.
I don't ordinarily do that.. and perhaps that's a normal BT function, I dunno. Generally, my phone is on when I crank up the 1690 and the BT function reliably connects... except for the phone book contact list as per above.
I have the same issue with my iPhone's contact book. Sometimes it pushes snd sometimes it doesn't. I wish I could figure out a pattern but it's random. The iPhone connects reliably. |
| offthegrid |
Posted - 13 févr. 2011 : 05:29:05
Its $130 at BestBuy right now although I'm not sure about the 2 year subscription. If Google and traffic are good for two years at that price its a pretty good deal since that by itself is supposed to be $120 after the free period. Its like getting the gps for $10. |
| speedlever |
Posted - 09 févr. 2011 : 16:22:01
That is a killer deal on the 1690. I wouldn't think twice about that. And my power button is similarly difficult to find/press.
|
| icemaster |
Posted - 09 févr. 2011 : 16:08:19
Thanks gpspassion. I don't see any flickering on my unit so I think I will keep it. The power button is a little hard to press but that's not a big deal. I'm happy I was still able to get a free map upgrade, 2 years of nulink service's and a 1 year garmin warranty with my refurbished unit. The unit looks like brand new and for $128(AMAZON) that I paid it was a great deal. |
| gpspassion |
Posted - 07 févr. 2011 : 23:24:37
I don't think we ever got some serial number info but based on the activation of the maps it would be in the first series : http://www.gpspassion.com/forumsen/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=128769&whichpage=5#908893 and on - the good news is that if you don't notice any flickering, then you should be fine ;-) |
| speedlever |
Posted - 07 févr. 2011 : 20:15:58
I dunno. I've never noticed any screen flicker on my 1690.
|
| icemaster |
Posted - 07 févr. 2011 : 18:10:17
Hi, i am so glad i found this board. I just purchased a refurbished nuvi 1690 from amazon. I was reading about the screen flicker issues people were having with the older units. Can anyone tell me what I should be looking for? The unit ser# starts with 1SU037###. I can see that the maps were unlocked on Sep 30, 2009.
Thanks for your help |
| gpspassion |
Posted - 25 déc. 2010 : 11:09:04
Garmin haven't made it totally clear how their nuLink traffic differs from RDS TMC traffic, but GPRS/Edge does offer much more bandwidth, and I've seen mentions that they show "flow data" that's missing in RDS TMC. I've driven with the 1690/Euro and 3790 and 1695/USA and 3790 side by side and I have seen finer levels of detail for traffic info. When the 3790 showed yellow only, the 1695 showed red and then yellow and it was justified.
Google/White page addresses are nice but I've also found a lot of errors that I've attributed to "automatic geocoding" versus the manual placement of POIs done by Navteq or TeleAtlas for the POIs built-in the maps. Sometimes there is missing data too, like some stores of a chain missing for no apparent reason. Both of these situations can be a problem because with the built-in Google Local search you think you're covered and might not prepare your trip in advance. |
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