5. Navigating With the nüvi 205

Figure 21: nüvi 205 Main Menu

Power on the nüvi 205, and within a few seconds the Main Menu appears:

1. GPS satellite strength (Tip: touching and holding this icon brings up a more detailed satellite page)
2. Battery status
3. Current time (Tap to change time settings)
4. Where to? - Tap to begin entering a destination
5. View Map
6. Volume
7. Tools menu

Garmin's menu is clean, uncluttered, and easy to understand. The text is large enough to be easily read from the drivers seat.

Figure 22: Map Screen

Whether navigating to a destination, or simply driving around, you'll spend most of your time looking at the Map Screen, shown above.

The nüvi 205 benefits from an updated map screen design that improves on Garmin's already excellent layout. An upcoming turn indicator has been added - a most welcome addition that now displays the direction of an upcoming turn, giving you enough time to see which direction the next turn will be.

Let's take a closer look at the information displayed on the map:

1. Upcoming Turn Indicator - Displays the direction of the next turn, or lane guidance information when appropriate. Touch this icon to view the Next Turn page (A 2D detailed view of the next turn).
2. Text Bar - This text bar displays the current navigation instruction. Tapping on this area displays the turn list (a list of all up-coming turns)
3. Zoom - Touch the plus or minus icon to zoom in and out on the map
4. Vehicle icon - This customizable icon represents your vehicle on the map. Tapping on the vehicle icons allows you to save your current location (even if there's not a valid street address at your location)
5. Highlighted Route - The highlighted route is "painted", or marked, in magenta color
6. Speed Limit - When available, the nüvi 205 displays the speed limit for the current road you are driving on
7. Speed - Displays your current speed. Touch this icon to view the Trip Computer
8. Menu - Tap the Menu icon to return to the Main Menu page
9. Arrival - Displays the estimated arrival time at your destination. Tapping this box displays the trip summary screen

A well designed map is essential for any turn-by-turn navigation system. Garmin's map is easy to read, uncluttered, functional, and automatically intelligently adapts to various driving conditions. The automatic zoom feature automatically adjusts the map's zoom level based on your speed and proximity to a given turn.

Figure 23: Next Turn Page

The Next Turn Page is available by tapping on the upcoming turn icon, and displays a detailed view of the next turn. This split-screen shows a 2-dimensional drawing of the next turn on the left side of the screen, and a text description of the turn on the right side. Also displayed are the time and distance to the turn.

Tapping the up/down arrows in the lower-right portion of the screen cycles through the remaining turns, one at a time. Voice prompts are also announced as each turn is viewed.

Figure 24: Turn List

The Turn List is a list of all upcoming turns. The turn list can be viewed by tapping on the text bar (the horizontal green bar across the top of the Map Screen). Each turn can be selected to view a more detailed view of the turn, or the Lane Assist view if available.

Figure 25: Trip Computer

Tapping on Speed data field on the Map Screen (the left bubble on the information bar) brings up the Trip Information Page, shown above. This screen displays a running counter of various statistics about the current "trip", or since it was last reset.

Figure 26: Main Menu, While Navigating To A Destination

Tapping on the Menu button while navigating to an address brings up the Main Menu, shown above. From here, you can stop routing to the destination by tapping Stop, or detour around a problem area by (such as a traffic jam or closed road ahead) by tapping Detour.

Including the Stop button right on the Main Menu is a nice feature. I've tested a lot of GPS devices over the years, and have found that canceling a route can be a surprisingly difficult task. For example, looking at the menu screen of a TomTom GPS, one might conclude there's simply no way to cancel the route at all (you can make this option appear by switching the TomTom to "Advanced" mode, but under the default menu there's simply no way to cancel the current route).

Figure 27: Main Menu - Detour

In my testing I found the detour function worked adequately, although there are no options for specifying how far you want to detour, nor can you choose from a list of alternate routes. Also sorely missing is the ability to avoid a specific road (i.e. you can't view the list of turns, and choose a specific road or highway to avoid).

Still, the a basic detour function is better than no detour ability at all, and it does provide a quick and easy way to get off the current road if you run into a problem.

Figure 28: Map Screen - Day and Night Modes

The nüvi 205 automatically switches to "Nighttime" mode at sunset, darkening the screen brightness and adjusting the color scheme to better fit nighttime driving.

You can also manually force Daytime or Nighttime via the Color Mode menu.

Unfortunately, you can't create your own custom color scheme to use on the map, so you're limited to the Daytime and Nighttime preset color modes that Garmin provides