voice volume on the 660

There are actually two volume controls for the 660. One is the Master Volume and the other is Navigation Volume.

Master Volume can be accessed once the 660 is turned on by pressing the On/Off button once and releasing.

Navigation Volume can be accessed by selecting Wrench, Volume

For the life of me, I can't remember how to do this so hopefully someone else more knowledgeable will post. There's actually three volume levels. One "internal" and the main/navigation ones.

There's a way to get into a maintenance or "sub" menu where you can check the "internal" volume setting which determines the overall volume output. You get to it by holding down a certain part of the screen through some combination of holding the power button or something...

Some found out that this maintenance menu setting was not 100% either from the factory or they bought it used and someone messed with it.. So, say, this maintenance volume level was set to 50% and the "external" volumes mentioned above were set to 100%, you'd only get 50% of the volume the unit is capable of producing. If they were set to 50%, you'd only get 25% output and so on and so forth...

My 660 is more than loud enough in my no-so-luxury-car-smooth SUV.

Press and hold the time in for about 5 seconds.

And use Jack, he talks like a real man!! Loud and clear!! Actually Jill was o.k. till the last upgrade. Then she got too quiet. So I now use Jack.

Yeah, My c530 was much louder/clearer then my nuvi is.

a wonderful Volume control on the outside, that you could just turn up and down in a second...without 3 menus...

Thanks for the help. I've tried the wrench and button double push. Can you help me with "holding the time in for 5 seconds?" I'm not sure what you are refering to.
gusb

Thanks for the help. I've tried the wrench and button double push. Can you help me with "holding the time in for 5 seconds?" I'm not sure what you are refering to.
gusb

Put your thumb or finger on the time, and push in for 5 seconds. It will bring you to the diagnostic screen. From there you can do a bunch of stuff that may or may not help or even matter. I think I managed to raise Jill's volume up, but won't know till I take it out on the road. In the house it seems loud enough.

Thanks oditius: I'll give it a try. I've also e-mailed garmin support. I'll post their answer when I receive it tomorrow.
gusb

They wanted me to reset my 660. That rids me of my favorites and such. Didn't want to do that. So I said forget it. I still can never see why ITS always wants you to return the unit to the "as shipped" condition? Especially when the user will just do everything to restore his settings anyway. And trying to fix it by email will takes days, if not weeks to accomplish. Because after every suggestion you have to take it on a field test to see if it is better.

oditius: you may be right about waiting for garmin. Havent got an answer yet. I tried holding the time, the wrench lights up every time and the unit goes to the varius modes you get when you press wrench? I even tried using my nail but the wrench still activates? I'd sure like to hear from "garmintech" on this problem. Hope he sees our discussion and responds. Thanks again for your help.

gusb

I just tried it and it worked on my 660. I used the tip of my finger and "rammed" my fingernail up against the edge of the frame to get it away from the "wrench" and it got me to the menu. Fat fingers might have a hard time, so try using your pinky and use a firm pressure as to not let up. It took my unit more like 8-10 seconds to get to the menu. For my voice, I like the Australian Karen using American English. Loud enough for me in my SUV.

To check the internal volume once you get to the maintenance menu, page down six times until you get to the Audio Test Page. Hit the "Test Freque" in the middle and on the right side of the next page, you'll see a keypad with "Volume (%)" at the top (make sure it's 100%). The "C" means "clear". You can adjust the internal volume there using the up and down arrows. If you hit "play" at the bottom center with the default frequency of 470 (left keypad), you'll see how LOUD the Nuvi can get! There's also a wealth of info in these pages, such as battery temp, charge cycles, checksum info, etc. Be aware as there's no way to get out of this menu, even by paging all they way back, because you'll get a solid blue screen. No biggie, just turn it off and it will boot normally the next time it's turned on.

Oditius, the last time I used the hard reset button under the antenna, I didn't lose any favorites or custom POIs so no worries about that.

On the 660, you just hit the power button quickly and it takes you directly to the volume and screen brightness page. Hit back to return to the previous screen. Pretty easy.

Use a stylus, works great! I also use one when I calibrate the screen.

Hey guys I did it!! I got to the suggestsd 6th screen. The volume was set at 100%. My hearing is not too good in the lower ranges so I raised the frequency from 470 to 490. I'm not sure if this will solve my problem but at least I know I'm getting the highest level of volume out of the unit. As I've said in the past "GREAT SITE AND GREAT PEOPLE" thanks for the help!

gusb

I received an e-mail and then talked to a garmin tech today. Neither could help with the low volume problem. The tech did say he would submit a request to increase the volume in a future firmware update. Weanwhile, I've set the vol at 100% and am using Jack's voice. Not too bad.

gusb

Get in www.radioshack.com and do a search for 40-1441.

Great suggestion at a reasonable price. I'm going to stop by radio shack tomorrow. Thanks for the help Nuvi addict.

gusb

Wow how did you managed to find out about this? Awesome!

I have seen almost everywhere problems with the nuvi 660 fm transmitter. In my case, yes there is static in the signal but I can still hear my music and directions clearly enough. Actually, I'm enjoyig it. It did not give me a hard time to give up using it yet. Can you give yours a second chance?

I would recommend to use the "manual tune" not the "auto tune". Keep trying different channels manually till finding a clear sound. Also, it has been suggested somewhere here to use a head-phone jacked to the unit audio output (while using the fm as unit's sound output) which increased the fm signal's strength. I did not try it yet, but I will do and I'll post what happened.

Please keep in mind that in some states it is illegal to drive while wearing headphones! ...not to mention the discomfort...

So, this time get in www.radio-locator.com/cgi-bin/vacant to fine tune your FM transmitter.

I've tried using a head-phone as external antenna to boost the fm signal. The signal did not improve by this method at least for my unit. Any other suggstions to boost the fm signal?