Garmin has been designing GPS equipment since 1990 – which is a considerable timeframe for the relatively new GPS consumer market. Garmin’s products are well worth considering if you’re looking for the best car gps system for your money.

The C310 Garmin StreetPilot GPS Automotive Navigation System is the entry level model of Garmin’s C300 StreetPilot Series. The C310 has a 12 parallel channel WAAS enabled (which improves accuracy to about 3m) GPS receiver. In 2003 Garmin was actually first with a WAAS/GPS navigation certified integrated avionics unit. The GPS receiver is rated as having warm and cold acquisition times of approximately 15 seconds and 45 seconds respectively. The StreetPilot C310 has an internal GPS antenna however, it also has an MCX-type connector for hooking up an optional external GPS antenna.

The StreetPilot C310 has a 3.5 inch transflective TFT touchscreen display with a resolution of 320 x 240 pixels. It displays 64K colors and has an LED backlight. 2D and 3D perspective views are available for viewing maps. The touchscreen is used exclusively for GPS operation with an on/off switch and rotary volume control knob being the only other controls. The unit can be color customized with separately purchased color faceplates. For clear voice prompts the StreetPilot C310 has dual integrated speakers.

If you want to plan your route while out of the car, the C310 has an internal lithium-ion battery with a very respectable 8 hour life. A 12-volt power adapter adapter is included for in-car recharging.

Users can search for addresses and points of interest (POI) and can also upload their own POIs. A useful selectable feature is a proximity alert which notifies the driver of upcoming custom POIs. Up to 500 waypoints with name and graphic symbol can be entered. Software features include a trip computer, resettable odometer, timers, average and maximum speed outputs.

Operation and GPS Maps

For easy “out-of-the-box” use the C310 comes with a 256MB SD card with highly detailed MapSource City Navigator street data of one specific region. Additional coverage for all of North America or Europe can conveniently be added with the purchase of these areas on SD cards. The detailed maps contain information on highways, interstates, business and residential roads with attributes such as turn restrictions, speed categories and other navigation features. The map database features some six million points of interest including hotels, restaurants, gas stations, attractions, entertainment, shopping, emergency services, post offices, camp grounds, movie theaters and ATMs.

One way to navigate is to select a POI by touching its icon on the display screen. To make life even simpler Garmin has provide their free POI Loader software (which can be downloaded from their website) for you to import customized POI. It provides the ability to upload POIs created by others from your PC to your Garmin unit.

Having selected a destination from the touch screen interface, one is directed by recorded voice. Garmin’s text-to-speech functionality, which is only available on the C340 in the C300 StreetPilot series tells users the names of the streets to turn at. Missing a turn is not a major problem as the c310 automatically calculates a new route to the selected destination.

Traffic alerts are not available on the Garmin StreetPilot C310 – even as an option as with the StreetPilot C340.

Comparison Garmin StreetPilot C310 v

It’s important to note that the C300 StreetPilot series don’t have the following features which some might regard as important for their particular circumstances including:

• Integrated Bluetooth technology for making hands-free mobile phone calls.
• The latest SiRF high-sensivity GPS receiver which has lightening fast GPS signal acquisition capabilities as well as the ability to maintain its satellite lock under dense foliage or in urban canyons.
• Entertainment capabilities such as playing MP3′s

These features can be found in the C500 StreetPilot models.

The Garmin StreetPilot C300 Series consists of the C310, C320, C330 and the C340. Differences between the different models are detailed below:

StreetPilot C310:

• Street Maps on SD cards with European regional coverage

StreetPilot C320:

• Street Maps on DVD
• Full coverage
• Blank 128 MB SD card

StreetPilot C330:

• Street maps preloaded
• Full coverage

StreetPilot C340:

• SD card slot
• Full coverage
• Street maps preloaded
• TTS (Text-To-Speech)
• optional FM TMC traffic alerts

Further Reading

Our review of Pioneer’s AVIC-S1 Portable GPS Navigation System

Lorrance iWay’s 350c GPS Automotive Navigator Review.

Tom Tom’s GO 510 GPS Car Navigation Unit Review.

GPS For Dummies

Outdoor Navigation with GPS

Microsoft Streets and Trips 2007 with GPS Locator [DVD]

[eminimall products="Garmin streetpilot c310, Garmin StreetPilot"]

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