gps routing

[beagle]

I'm tech dumb so bear with me. I need to know if the 550 or 2820 gps can take a list of random locations, and make a logical direct route between them

[John Bentall]

You have to tell the GPS what order you want to visit them, otherwise it does not know whether the individual locations are part of the outward or the return journey.

[Davis]

I don't have any experience with the 550 or 2820. I run Garmin iQue on my PDA or Garmin nRoute on my laptop in conjunction with a Garmin GPS10 receiver. In both of those applications, you can have a route end point and a bunch of vias and tell it to optimize stops and it will create a route from your current (or start) point to the end point passing through all the vias in what it thinks is the most efficient order. My brother has an old Magellan that will do the same. I'd be very surprised if Garmin doesn't offer this in its latest systems.

 

Edit: curiousity got the best of me: From the 2820 owner's manual

Route Point Editing Options

Auto Arrange - arranges the points to provide the shortest route

 

And from the Zumo 550 manual:

Touch Optimal Reorder to

automatically order the points

according to straight line distance

between your start and end points.

[MTRREF]

I'm tech dumb so bear with me. I need to know if the 550 or 2820 gps can take a list of random locations, and make a logical direct route between them

 

Short answer is YES. Both of these units will do automatic routing. Using your PC, you can create Waypoints (or locations) for your random locations. You can then string them together and the software will create a route for you. You can also modify the route. Once you are happy with the results, you can download the route, and the waypoints, to your GPS. If the settings on the PC and the settings in the GPS are the same, the theory is that the route will be duplicated on the GPS for your riding pleasure. If the settings are different, or you deviate from the route, the little GPS brain will only promise to get you to all the waypoints, (not necessarily on the roads that you selected)

 

Jim

[EatnAsphalt]

And some models like the 2610, can follow the exact route you created in Mapsource without recalculating it.

[marcopolo]

A downside with the Zumo (until Garmin produces a software update for the unit that can be downlaoded) is that you cannot turn off automatic route recalculation. I would never buy one until that oversight is fixed. Until it is, all your carefully crafted routes are for naught when the unit recalculates the route without you wanting it to.

 

There's much debate about the Zumo. After reading much of what Zumo owners have posted on various boards, I conclude that if you've never had a GPS before, you'd find the Zumo wonderful; if you already have a fairly recent, "upscale" GPS, you'd probably find the Zumo's basic navigation functions wanting. What good is bluetooth, XM etc. if the navigation functions are "dumbed down"?

[beagle]

Wanna hear a good one... I was in chicago yesterday for work and I stopped by the garmin store. Two men assisted me with questions regarding both units. The 2820 can indeed be given a start point, and end point, and find the most logical route for what lies between. As for the Zumo, they agreed to disagree. Now that's a knowledgable sales staff!! I really like the zumo, but i guess i'll buy the 2820 next week wnen I get back to my office