Cheap Magellan Meridian Gold GPS Traveler Value Pack - GPS receiver - personal (Electronics) Price

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Customer Reviews of Magellan Meridian Gold GPS Traveler Value Pack - GPS receiver - personal

Cons:
Big & heavy. Buttons too easy to press accidentally. Serial connection (serial?! why not USB?). Screen hard to read in shadows. Messy menu navigation.

On a like-for-like comparison to other mapping handheld GPS this gets 5-stars. On the basis of what it could have been had Magellan really thought it through, it gets 2-stars.

I'd say this (and others like it) are the last of the 2nd generation GPS. Good for their time, but rapidly being obsoleted by developments in other areas. Expect to see a switch to a variety of GPS/PDA/phone/bluetooth/radio combos with much better integration into the wireless PC world coming in the next product cycle.

Best value out there for general purpose GPS use
The Meridian (h/w)/Direct Route (s/w) combination is the best value going today. It does *not* provide voice directions, but can be set to an audible beep when a turn approaches if desired. It is not color, but color does not really add much to a GPS anyway (and consimes more battery power), it is the resolution that counts and the Meridian is more than adequate.

The nice thing about this GPS is that you can use it in your car for turn-by-turn navigation, while hiking in the woods to keep track of where you are and how to get back, as well as on your bicycle etc. There are better specialized GPS units available (for instance ones for use specifically in a vehicle), but they lack the flexibility of the Meridian to use where you want to use it.

Finally, the Meridian can hold a lot of street level detail through the use of SD cards, where most, if not all, of the competition can only use the built-in memory supplied with the unit. I think you will find this to be a huge advantage when you find out how much you can store on these cards, and how limiting the built-in memory is.

Average GPS
This was my first GPS. I ended up returning it. Here is my experience:
Cons:
(1) Difficult to use for driving even though it received signals very well. When I bought it I thought it was voice prompted. Actuall it was audio prompted, meaning that it beeps when it thinks you should make a turn.
(2) Rerouting is not automatic. You have to press a button. That's not convenient.
(3) screen is small and black and white. Looks primitive. For $450, I thought it should be better than that.

Pros:

(1) Does have detailed street level info when you load the CD.