Magellan RoadMate 1220 3.5-Inch Portable GPS Navigator
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I purchased this GPS after having a Tom Tom which stopped working. I thought it was a great price. . approx $122 on Amazon. When i got it home and started using it, I immediately noticed how slow it was to recalculate route. Then i sat in a block from a Dunkin Donuts and typed in “Dunkin donuts”. It gave me directions to the nearest one which was NOT true. It took me over 4 miles to one that I would never go to. (There were 3 or them closer!) Then i drove with it on and I noticed it didn’t have certain streets even on the map that were not new streets.
I checked the Magellen website, thinking I could download an updated map. Nope!! Said there weren’t any updates!
Returned it and will never buy a Magellen. I’m going for the Garmin which I should have in the first place!
Rating: 1 / 5
At first glance, the feature list for this unit isn’t bad. . . spoken street names, an established brand, POI DB, etc. However, in practice, this unit just isn’t worth the cost. Problems I had:
1) Poor POI database. I had only about a 40% success rate finding what I was searching for.
2) VERY slow satellite acquisition. It took 3-5 minutes and/or a reboot of the unit to acquire a signal after a powerup.
3) No re-calculating notice. The unit recalculates without telling you, leaving you wondering why it keeps changing it’s directions.
4) Poor GPS fix. Even after it has theoretically gotten a signal, it is often wrong and it jumps around for as long as a minute before it finally displays you as on the correct road.
5) Lousy mount. You cannot leave the unit plugged in while attaching it to, or removing it from, the mount. That means that you are leaning over, fiddling around near the windshield, trying to plug the charger in “blind”, as you can’t see what you are doing.
Positives:
1) The ability to avoid freeways is nice.
2) The tones right before each turn are helpful.
3) The fact that the interface removes letters and numbers that do not correspond to valid place names is nice. i. e. if a street only has an 800 and 900 block, 8 and 9 will be the only listed choices for the first digit.
This unit was acquired as a box for the wife’s car. As a secondary unit, it’s okay, but I would never use it as a replacement for my Garmin.
Bottom line:
Save your pennies and get a higher-end unit, or go cheap and get a value-priced one from an off-brand.
Rating: 3 / 5
I previously had a tom tom which stopped working, and picked this up because it had text to speech, was from a fairly reputable company and wasn’t too expensive. Its not quite as easy to read (I think the text and map details on the tom tom were a bit larger) and the screen doesn’t seem as bright under harsh daylight with the brightness turned up all the way (again I can’t compare these side by side since my tom tom doesn’t turn on anymore), but its a pretty nice unit. I would look at a couple of units side by side in the store if this is a concern (keep in mind you’ll probably be an arms length away from it and often under harsh daylight).
One thing which I noticed, all the small roads within the gates of my university that appeared as “unnamed road” on tom tom were properly named in the magellan. I’m not sure if this was because of more up to date maps, or because tom tom didn’t care to name them (the physical roads were on tom tom’s map database, just without names and corresponding addresses. Still, a welcome improvement.
The first place I went with this was the local target. Oddly, it suggested “Target optical” and not the actual target (the nearest “target store” was listed as a different location a bit out of the way). Not a huge inconvenience, I’m guessing the database they use has one business per address (target optical is within target), and another reviewer mentioned they had a problem with this. Again, not a huge inconvenience. The directions also initially had me make a “right turn followed by a u-turn” when I pulled out of the parking lot when I could have just turned left. I later found out this u turn thing can be turned off in the “navigation preferences” option under settings (also where you can find an option to dodge toll roads). This probably shouldn’t have been a default setting.
Besides that, the overall navigation experience is pretty up to par. The directions are loud and clear and I like how it reads the actual names. Anticipating turns is a piece of cake, and there is a notification when the turn is coming up. As you approach a turn it makes a noise and then reads you a direction. This is nice, because it gives you a second to stop the conversation you were having before the GPS gives you directions. Sometimes I’ve found myself going into a turning lane before it could finish saying the directions out loud, but it does a good job of telling me what I need to do ahead of time.
I really like how easy it is to find and enter in an address. While you are entering in cities that begin with the letter M, for example, it knows all of the cities and towns that begin with M have a second letter of A,c,e,i,o,t,u, and y so these are your only choices (all of the other letters are grayed out). This greatly reduces the odds of mistyping an address, since you can only physically type in actual addresses. You can hit a “list” button to see all of the matches, even if you’ve only typed in part of a town. The keyboard layout is alphabetical rather than a querty layout (with no choice to change that I know of) so at least I need to get used to it, but again that’s a minor inconvenience. You can also select a destination by looking at the map and clicking on the name, which is pretty nice if you just want to go to a general area and don’t really care to look up or type in an actual address.
Finally, compared to Tom tom, the “avoid freeways” rout is actually usable. Tom tom would still demand I take the parkway when I selected “avoid freeways” and even “bicycle mode” and roads with a “maximum speed of 20 mph” which was absolute rubbish when I wanted to drive 12 miles away during rush hour. While magellan lacks such fancy rubbish like the nonfunctional bicycle mode, when I tell it to avoid freeways it actually gives me a route that doesn’t touch the freeway.
The mounting system is pretty nice and easy to use. With Tom tom I had to struggle to click it into the mounting system and insert the charging plug (and I’m a 24 year old who plays piano so I’ve got pretty agile hands), almost rendering it useless for my father when he borrowed it. The magellan’s mounting system is great. You just slide it in and it easily clicks in place. You have to put the plug in after its been mounted due to the dopey shape of the plug, but thats easy enough.
Overall, I’m pretty happy with the purchase. It’s not perfect due to the clarity of the map during daylight
Rating: 4 / 5
I had the unit three weeks before I had an issue with the address input. I could only use addresses saved to my Address Book. I called Magellan and within five minutes of the phone call they agreed to replace it at no charge.
Functionallity on the actual unit is intuitive and very straight forward. I you are not familiar with electronics, though, it is at least easy to learn how to use it. I recommend this product as an entry-level or first GPS for any user. It’s a fair price, has several features including the address book and a decent archive of POIs, and very easy functionality.
Magellan customer service has been top-notch and very friendly. Unlike reviews I have read about other competitors.
Rating: 4 / 5
This is a compact, easy to use device. I was able to use it out of the box without even reading the instructions. Once you enter the town you’re traveling to, the street names will auto-complete as you start typing them in. On my first test of the product, I entered a destination that I had been to many times before, and it actually gave me a better route to use. Nice!
Rating: 4 / 5