When the Garmin Nuviphone was finally released, it was quickly received as a disappointment. This so-called smartphone is a great tool for GPS purposes, but is not worth it when it comes to being a phone. The device is based on a Linux platform, includes an HTML Web browser, and offers many basic features. However, the capabilities of these features are limited and both the system and the user interface tend to cause problems for the user. AT&T should have known better than to price this phone at $299.99 with a two-year contract, because it is really just an expensive GPS system.
The best aspect of the Nuviphone is its GPS features highlighted by pre-loaded North American 2D or 3D maps and points of interest. Voice guided directions are included, negating the need to pay for a subscription to a location-based service. The GPS function allows for planning of multiple destination trips and offers various routing preferences. The display on the phone is bright and large enough to suit GPS-related purposes.
Additional connectivity features include Yellowpages.com and Flight Status to view airline arrivals and departures. With a subscription, users can get traffic updates in real time, current gas prices, and weather conditions. In terms of general features, the Nuviphone offers world roaming, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and 3G compatibility. Text messaging is supported, but multimedia messaging is not. The 3.2-megapixel camera is basic, offering no editing settings or video recording.
The major negative aspects of this phone are numerous and they start with the built-in accelerometer that will not always change from vertical to horizontal orientation as requested. This makes using the phone for navigation purposes rather difficult. Exiting out of programs to get back to the main menu is complicated since the phone has no dedicated home key. The virtual QWERTY keyboard may be viewed only in landscape mode. Switching to portrait mode yields only an ABC keyboard, which is not very user friendly. Though the HTML browser is nice to have, it loads pages very slowly and requires a lot of user manipulation for proper viewing.
The Garmin Nuviphone 360 excels when it comes to GPS functionality, but it falls very short when it comes to being a smartphone. Lack of multimedia messaging, slow browser performance, a temperamental accelerometer, and sometimes-unavailable QWERTY keyboard are just a few of the drawbacks. It really is not worth it to pay $300 for this glorified GPS system.
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