CES 2016 - Questions For Garmin?

Attended (and worked) CES for many years. My favorite years doing CES were when I flew there and back with a friend in his private plane (his stock options at the startup were far, far better than mine).

Respectfully declined to go this year, and after the announcements of the new security measures (you're really going to try and run EVERYONE attending CES through metal detectors?), glad I won't be there.

I suspect Internet of Broken Things will be big, as well as everyone truing to get on the autonomous - nextgen vehicle bandwagon, which will also be a security nightmare.

Ask them if they will ever try to bring back the app Viago.
Let them know how well a lot of us liked it and that it wasn't around long enough to buy the maps we wanted to use with it.

Can you ask them what the future of standalone automotive GPS's is? I have to believe that that market's end days can't be too far off. I wonder how much of Garmin's money and resources are being put into what I think is a diminishing market. Too bad.

Phil

Perhaps you can find out about Garmin's intentions for improved longer lasting batteries. That has always been a weak spot for those who use their nuvis walking around towns (mostly foreign for me) using the old $10 Foreign City maps.

As a workaround I have used an aux power bank about the size of my 3690LMT affixed by rubber bands. It works well on walking tours but improved batteries in the units would be better.

Gary Hayman

not agree with you more, don't this was out long enough for them to really decide if profit incentive was really there.

It would be nice to get a answer on this from Garmins FAQ https://goo.gl/w00Rwh . "Garmin Real Voice uses refined speech technology to provide spoken instructions using a voice that sounds more realistic and friendly". Samantha has both real directions and real voice. When compared to voices without real voice.Is it really more improved?

How about some ways to let those of us who have purchased Viago to download the program and/or buy add-on's. I just updated my phone and are looking for ways to get Viago, maps etc. to the new phone.

I reinstalled mine after they discontinued it when I got my new phone.. Go to PlayGoogle, click on left side on apps then choose my apps. At the bottom of your apps click on show more and your Viago will be there to reinstall. You will have to reinstall your maps from the app after you install it.

I also agree, I would buy the Europe maps if they would let us. I have emailed them but they said no way...

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. The procedure works like a charm.

You are welcome, glad I saw your post.

Hi

I'm in the Market for a GPS watch. I believe the last Fenix 3 GPS watch was announced at CES. If the Fenix 4 isn't announced, then it'd be nice to know if there are any rumours of a launch date for the next model? Also be nice to find out the new features of the Fenix 4 if possible.

I'm holding off buying a Fenix watch encase a new one is announced @ CES.

Many thanks!

Dave

Hi

I'm in the Market for a GPS watch. I believe the last Fenix 3 GPS watch was announced at CES. If the Fenix 4 isn't announced, then it'd be nice to know if there are any rumours of a launch date for the next model? Also be nice to find out the new features of the Fenix 4 if possible.

I'm holding off buying a Fenix watch encase a new one is announced @ CES.

Many thanks!

Dave

They probably won't answer this, but I would like to know what kind of agreement Garmin has with the European auto manufacturers (BMW AG, Audi AG And Daimler AG) who now own the Navteq/Nokia/Here mapping products. I know their 5 year contract with Navteq was set to expire in 2015 ... about the same time that Nokia put Here up for sale. I have not heard whether Garmin has signed a new long term agreement with the current owners.

OK thanks for the questions. I'll see what I can find out. Some years they are very accommodating with info RE; new products and other years they don't want to talk to you about much of anything unless you are a re-seller buying thousands of units. We'll see how this year pans out and if they have some info for the above.

Thanks.

I sat on my garmin nuvi, not sure what the number is but here are some numbers. Ic 1792A-01652 the actual nuvi number sticker fell off. The screen has broken is there some place that fixes these? It was very expensive in the $500 range 5 yrs ago. Thank you.

I second this and would be pretty simple being they have already developed the app.

Viago app was and still is for some of us a very useful and familiar interface. Viago works great and if they added support for custom POI's it would be nearly perfect.

All the new product announcements for CES are now posted on the Garmin Blog at:

http://garmin.blogs.com/

The biggest news for us appears to be that the Nuvi is being replaced with a whole new line of automotive GPS units called Drive, see:

http://garmin.blogs.com/my_weblog/2016/01/garmin-revs-up-the...

Now that we see that the nuvi line is being replaced by the Drive line

http://www.poi-factory.com/node/45572

anyone attending the show should look at the four new model lines and report back if the devices have powered mounts or not.

Other questions to ask:

Are these MTP devices? If so, will they be user-configurable to MS mode?

What is the storage capacity of these new models? How much free space will they contain out of the box?

How many English language voices are offered with each from the factory? How many additional TTS voices are available through Garmin Express?

What voice engine is used in them? Will they use one of the current three voice engines? Or will there be yet another version of navigational voices beyond the current three?

http://www.poi-factory.com/node/42708

Also ask

1) Do they plan to continue to support the NUVI line?
2) Will the Nuvi's continue to get lifetime map support?
3) Is the traffic support built into the new models, the same as the current Nuvi's?
4) Will the current POILoader software that Garmin offers work with the new models?

Also, will the new Drive line be compatible with Cyclops safety camera subscriptions in North America. So far, it is only Europe.

Wow, FAST work! Garmin just added the Drive line to the Cyclops compatible list for North America this morning. So my question has already been answered. Thanks!

I saw the new units and now I want a new unit although I only use my Nuvi for vacations as I have a built in unit in my car and app on my smartphone. But I still want one of the new units with all the bells and whistles. I am going to have to do a lot of talking to get one. So far just a NO...

Why? Not t tying to be a snot just currious what you e seeing that I'm not.

I've got a 3597 and haven't really seen much difference...

I guess I'm between the two options. I would not replace my 3597 with the new Luxe but when my 3597 dies, I'll happily buy a Luxe. I do worry about some of the alerts and message-ey things in the Luxe and hope they can be disabled individually if I were to find them bothersome.

When the Owners Manuals for the various Drives come out, I think I will read through them...even more so, the new YouTube demonstrations of the Drives' new features.

I just bought a new Nuvi 2689 a couple months ago so I'm nowhere near a new unit, until it dies or support is withdrawn. The bells and whistles as compared to my 2460 are really nice.

As for the new line I'm not a fan of the text messages being displayed, like you, I'd want to be able to disable that kind of stuff. In fact I turn off bluetooth altogether on my GPS's, my Jeep can handle phone calls in a much better, clearer way.

My 2450 is just a basic unit. No bluetooth or anything modern. No link to phone, nothing. Just a basic GPS. As Soberbiker said above "No bells and whistles".

Bells n' whistles.. But I am looking for a GPS with a vacuum attachment!

OK...so I was hoping to get more information than I did on this trip. Usually I deal with a guy at the booth who gives me a lot of inside information about unreleased products that are coming out but not this time. I could not get so called Tier 2 techs to answer any in depth technical questions like I have in the past so I was stuck dealing with basic sales pitches on products we already know about. Personally, I did not find any of the DRIVE products to be innovative in any way. It's basically another rehashed NUVI. The resolution and features are basically all the same with a few new bells and whistles. The only thing I believe they did improve was the built in camera on the Drive model. They say it is now up to 1080P but I couldn't get anyone to confirm this. In any event, based upon some of the questions above, I received some answers but unfortunately, somewhat limited. Let's say a disappointing visit for me this year at Garmin.

*Powered Mounts - Only the Deluxe model has this. The other Drive models still plug directly into the unit.

*MTP / Mass Storage Mode - Yes. I confirmed by going to the hidden menus and the selection for both MTP and Mass Storage Mode are still options although it's hidden under yet another menu (which I can't remember the title off hand but it was easy to figure out)

*Free Memory Out Of The Box - This was amazing. I asked four people at the booth and NOBODY knew the answer to this. They were all guessing. They had no info on the units RAM.

*Is NUVI Line Dead? - Yes but lifetime maps are still going to be supported.

*POI Loader - Should still work on Drive models.

*VIAGO - Dead

Basically they kept pushing the driver alerts and FourSquare additions but that was it. I'm still holding onto a 3490 and that is a 4.3" at 800X480. It looks great. I remembered when it was released with the 3590 which was the 5" model and the screens resolution was not as great since it had the same 800x480 resolution stretched out to 5". Not to say it looked bad but like anything that is enlarged without an increase in resolution, it won't look quite as sharp. What I'm getting to is that the new Drive units are still at 800x480. My 3490 looked better. If you look at some of the new Samsung phones (for example) they have done wonders with screen sharpness and resolution. Why is Garmin so cheap in moving forward with some better technology for their screens? This is personal rant on my part - sorry.

Anyway, I was hoping to get more but that's all I could get out of them on this trip. Hopefully the next trip will be more productive.

Thank you. It's added a lot.

To me, the biggest remaining question is whether the new Drive models offering redlight and speed camera alerts will come with free lifetime updates or if a cyclops subscription will need to be purchased beyond the initial data supplied with the device.

It appears to me this new 2016 line is just a marketing ploy by renaming the Nuvi line to Garmin Drive product line. I see little incentive to purchase a new unit.

As far as the Cyclops Safety Cameras go, I highly doubt they will come with Lifetime Updates, I believe it will be the same as in the past that a subscription will be required. Some past models did include a one time free Cyclops Safety Cameras but only included the file which would need to be updated for the 25.00 yearly fee.

I'm sure everyone here appreciates the effort you went to for the lot of us... I know I appreciates your efforts.

Thanks for your efforts. I think I will be sticking to my 2797, maybe even buy a second unit for future use.

Thanks for the sleuth work, recently bought a Nuvi 2689, hopefully won't be needing a new GPS for quite awhile.

Thanks for your report Preroll. So Garmin said lifetime map support for the nuvi line would continue. Did they give you any specifics about their arrangement with the new owners of Here maps?

Yeah, I'm disappointed the new (sic) Drive models didn't go with higher resolution screens.

But when you think about it from an engineering perspective, there are a lot of added costs in going to a higher resolution screen, a lot more than just a different LCD --

--you need more memory for frame buffers (to build images and animation)
--you need more processor power to push around more pixels, particularly to do animation
--if you did your graphics as bitmaps for one screen size, you need to re-do all of those for higher rez
--you have to update most everything in your user interfaces (UI), element sizes, locations, line thicknesses, and more. The "big" computer companies, Apple, Microsoft, Google and the like put a lot of effort into their UIs, providing developers with UI building blocks to help deal with different screen (and window) sizes. Unless Garmin internal development had a great deal of foresight (backed up by iron wills), I'd imagine there are a whole lot of hard-coded sizes and positions in the various Garmin UI elements -- quick and easy today, many tears tomorrow.

And to make those changes, you're forking the software -- creating essentially a new branch for higher density screen support. You going to back-port that software to the old Nuvi line? When bugs are discovered, do you patch both forks?

(As part of the original Mac team at Apple, I did a lot of early coaching with developers, convincing them not to hard-code UI elements; just maybe, some day, we might have a different sized screen...)

Your reporting at CES this year as in the past is always very much appreciated

I agree with all your points k6rtm and can see why Garmin would keep the old screen resolution which is "good enough" for the application. That said, it makes me wonder what has reduced the estimated battery life ... smaller battery? more powerful processor? Garmin finally being honest about battery life? Any theories on this?

Preroll, thanks for your time and report.

Thanks for your efforts!

If it were up to me, I'd award you a COW!

CES must be slightly different than most of the other special events in Vegas.

My wife goes down to the NFR every year and has been to both Continental Cup (curling) events. I have been to a couple of trade shows there as well. Those functions run on very strict schedules... you're in, out and back to the casinos in less than three hours.

I watched some reports from CES on TV; I'm not sure I would have been able to tolerate the crowds, and the tech sales pitches.

Thanks for the commentary - it was more interesting then the TV reports!