Garmin City Navigator Europe NT

For around $50 ($49 + shipping) I got this European complement to the America GPS I have--Garmin Nuvi 1370 or something like that (bought GPS this year, and it came with lifetime traffic and maps). The micro-SD card is about 1/2-inch x 3/4-inch, and it fit right into the side slot. They also include an SD adapter (twice the size or more) into which you can place the micro-SD card ... and then place the adapter in your GPS (I didn't have to use the adapter but I assume it works). My wife and I (both American) took a 3-week vacation to 7 countries in central and eastern Europe. We visited Germany, Austria, Slovakia, Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary, and Romania. I drove in all countries except Hungary (plane into Budapest and train out of Budapest to Timisoara, Romania). The total driven between 2 rental cars (1 was only for Romania) was over 2,200 miles. We had virtually no problems with navigation. (Once in Czech Republic we took a day trip from Prague 2 hours south to Cesky Krumlov, and halfway through that there was a detour for what looked less like roadwork and more like new construction on the motorway on which we were driving--not sure why that section of motorway was even in the GPS map, but you can't blame Garmin for that one. Anyway, the GPS told us to turn around and try the same thing, which we did and only ended up with the same roundabout and no discernable detour signs--not at all like you would usually see in America. It was the road crew's way of covering up the towns listed for the 1 roundabout exit on the blue sign with red electrical tape (and by doing so, implicitly telling you to find your own way) that really added a nice Czech flavor to our day trip. Eventually we followed the next 3 roundabouts' directions toward a city near Cesky Krumlov and ended up on a slower more minor road, but still got where we were going after the GPS recalculated once it realized what we were doing. One thing I noticed that would frustrate anyone...beware of this...our plane landed in Munich and we had 2 or 3 days there before we would get the rental car. Walking around the 1st day we were there, I got out the GPS to see if it would work or at least find satellites. It would not find satellites for the 10 or 15 minutes I had it out, and it was not a tall buildings issue. The night before we were to rent the car, I was in a bit of a panic because I wanted the GPS to work and not have to rent a GPS (which would have cost about $125 for the 13 days I drove)...so I looked up online how to get my GPS to recognize satellites. There was some method on some website telling me to hold down the power button for 30 seconds and change some setting in Tools/Options (or something like that, I don't remember at all) so it would forget my usual Pennsylvania USA satellite and try to get a new one in Munich as its preferred satellite--I found the idea that the GPS would not have the logic built in to figure out that it needs to re-default really archaic, but I tried it. I'm not sure if that is what worked (probably not, probably just time), but after trying that and then holding it out on the balcony of our hotel room for 20 minutes or more, it eventually found a satellite and all was well. Important note: Make sure your GPS is fully charged before you travel...in case you have to do this 30- to 60-minute process without having a car to plug it in. After the finding satellites issue, there was no problem with lag time finding satellites wherever we went. In 2,200 plus miles it may have told us to go the wrong way on 2 or 3 streets, but other than that and the occasional middle of the city "turn right onto trail" that is to be expected when you are turning 10 times in 1 minute down alleyways, it worked extremely well--I'm sure just as well as anything we would have rented. It worked flawlessly in Romania for crying out loud--Romania... (which is good because when we were in Bucharest and I had to turn around because we had entered Bucharest instead of the Otopeni airport suburb, I didn't have to roll down the window and ask for directions when a pack of 10 or so of their 200,000 stray dogs ran up to the car barking and charging). The reason I say that the GPS worked as well as (probably better than) anything we would have rented... when you rent a GPS from a car rental company with your car, you get a GPS with however old and out-of-date maps they feel like giving you. In present-day Europe (with their major road projects to attempt to stimulate the economy), 3 years out of date might be tough to use if they have built new minor or major roads or exits. 1 more note--I printed out general directions from city to city using viamichelin.com before we left...basically in case I got lost or the GPS would not respond. They helped me stay on track a couple times when I just didn't believe the GPS, and they could have been a lifesaver if anything happened to the GPS or it all of a sudden could not find satellites. (Buy it from Amazon or a low-price merchant--there is no reason at all to buy it from Garmin's website.)

We used the City Navigator Europe SD map in a US-purchased Garmin Nuvi 2555 LMT GPS unit (purchased in 2013). The SD care ended up being super simple to install -- just pop the micro SD card into the appropriate slot on your GPS. There were no instructions, but it was easy. A youtube video showed me how to do. The product comes with the maps on a micro SD card and full size SD card adapter into which the micro SD card can be put (if needed). The City Navigator NT Europe card (purchased in 2017) seemed to include maps and points of interest for "All of Europe" (see vendor's description of exactly where). We had no map issues in France, Germany, Austria, or Italy. Our rental cars ended up having installed GPS with much bigger screens. However, familiarity with how to make my own GPS function made me happy to have this. (and i didn't reserve cars with GPS, we just ended up with it). The point of interest searching seemed a little slower than in the US. While it might have not have even been real, the slightly longer lag may be because it was installed in the microSD card memory, rather than internal system memory. I think the description makes it clear, but this is a one time map/POI database purchase -- there are no Europe map upgrades included, even if you have "lifetime maps" feature on your GPS (that is only for native maps). So if you plan on using this over 10 years or more, the maps might get a little out of date... (As a side note, traffic worked in Germany and Austria, but did not seem to work in France -- traffic features have NOTHING TO DO THIS THIS PRODUCT which is a MAP and POI database).

I am traveling on the road in Spain at the moment and find that several roads and freeways have been added that are not on the European NT mapping system. In addition about 30% of the speed limits displayed on the software are in error. If you pay attention to the speed limit signs on the road signs and use the guidance of this software, you should be able to navigate the country successfully. Without this GPS software, I would have been lost many times as in the south of Spain there seems to be a roundabout every few Kilometers that you must navigate to stay on the right path. I found that the best way to find a location was to enter the coordinates for the location by looking them online and entering them ahead of time. I drove from Barcelona to several points in Costa del Sol (1100 KM)with only one recalculation. Amazing when you are driving for over 13 hours on unfamiliar roads the first time in any foreign country. It worked great maneuvering through the many one way alley ways and roundabouts of several of the cities. I also told it to keep me off of toll roads and it did a good job of that as it didn't take me on any the whole trip. Even though the software needs updating, it is a fine purchase that will get you to where you're going with the use of its guidance and some common sense.

My wife, a couple of friends and I had made plans to drive through southern Spain for two weeks. Altho I have driven throughout Europe at least a dozen times (once to Spain)previously, using only maps and my sense of direction to guide me, we had recently purchased a Garmin GPS for the US and decided to get the Europe "chip" for our trip. The "chip" (as advertised) came without packaging or instructions and whether purchasing the product in this way was a contributing factor in our unhappiness with the product may never be known. It may have been returned by a previous dissatisfied customer, defective or outdated. Here is a short list of our complaints. The "voice" of our guide was, at times, difficult to understand. In Spain (as elsewhere in Europe) roundabouts are a common method of directing traffic thru intersecting highways. The "voice" would tell us to "exit" on the (for example) "third" or "fifth" exit. Many times, we had trouble understanding which "number" she was announcing. Other times, she clearly gave us the incorrect exit, telling us to use the "second" when it should have been the "third" exit, etc. Most major highways are "named" with a letter and a number, primary highways being (for example) E 5 or N 393 although the letter in the name of the highway has absolutely nothing to do with the direction of travel. E, for instance, does not mean "east" insofar as the road titled with an "E" may travel in a generally N-S direction. Our Garmin navigator repeatedly told us to bare "east" on E roads or "north" on N roads which confused us and caused us to make wrong turns a number of times following the "direction" (east) we were given rather than following or continueing on the correct highway toward our destination. Most frustrating was the fact that, when we missed a turn or needed "recalculating", the Garmin GPS Europe rarely got us back on track and when it did, not easily. We frequently had to refer to maps and Fodor maps to get us to our destinations or hotels once entering the cities we were visiting. Of interest, the BMW we rented had a built in GPS system but we did not realize we had that feature at first (our rental agent never mentioned it) After discovering the in-board GPS, it took several days to learn how to use it, program it, find an English speaking "guide" etc. During the start of the second half of our trip, we used both the Garmin and the BMW GPS systems simultaneously. Whereas the Garmin often offered misleading directions and failed to get us back "on track" if we missed a turn, the BMW system (which was, overall, much easier to use)got us to our destination every time and without driving around in circles in search of our destination as we did with the Garmin on far too many occasions. Other complaints about the Garmin Europe include the "last minute" direction to "turn" left or right (in old "city centers" missing a turn can be fatal in the sense that between the one way and narrow streets can mean driving around for long periods of time relying on maps and asking locals for help) and the inability of the Garmin to recalculate directions. Anyways, that is enough. Can't rely on the Garmin. Have no confidence in it in Europe. Also, the keyboard of the Garmin itself, the unit being almost new, is not very responsive and it often requires pressing the "a" or "e" (of all) buttons numerous times before it is entered on the screen when in search mode. Very frustrating. That's it: good luck Stewart in Guilderland, NY

I haven't yet used this driving in Europe, but in preparation for our trip I have been able to enter and save all our hotel destinations. This process was exactly like you would use for US destinations. Update 23 June 2018: We just returned from Europe after using the City Navigator micro SD card in our Garmin nuvi 2455 for 3 weeks of travel in Holland, Belgium, Germany, France, Switzerland and Austria. We had no problems with the system and were very pleased with the way it worked. It provided excellent directions both between cities and in finding locations such as restaurants within cities. It seemed up to date and was very precise in taking us to all the hotels which I had entered and saved before to the trip. It was able to direct us over some tiny one-lane roads we needed to follow to reach a hotel deep in the Swiss Alps. It even warned us ahead of time of some major accident backups on German Autobahns we planned to use. Interestingly, our rental car also had a GPS so I used both. The only difference I found was that the car GPS seemed on occasion to pick more direct routes of travel within cities. In summary, I found the Garmin to work exactly as it had in the US.

These maps always amaze me with their detail. This micro/SD card has great city street details. It was an easy install of inserting the micro SD card all of the way into micro SD card slot on the right edge of my Garmin 3790 w/LMT. There wasn't any thing else to do except turn the GPS unit back on. I did go into the GPS' tool menu and then to the MY MAPS icon to see if the maps on the micro SD card appeared in the map list. Sure enough, they were there in the list stating the map type and the model/year if the map. There was also a green check-mark next to the map name (probably showing that the map was enabled and would be recognized by the GPS unit and ready to use). I am expecting that the GPS will work fine for us this fall in Eastern Europe with this micro/SD card. I did several simulated point to point drives with the simulator on using the "set location" for some of the cities we will base our driving trips from. It worked fine every time. So now I can retire my older Nuvi 370 with outdated maps.

This was useful to us in Italy this summer. The chip worked well with our GPS, for the most part. It occasionally was difficult to type in an address that worked (it was challenging, for example, to find the Futa Pass and the military cemetery there). One big error--when we were traveling from San Bartolomeo in Galdo to Rome, the GPS tried to take us on a route south and east (Rome was actually pretty much west and slightly north) back through Naples. We turned it off and reset it, and it still tried to take us back through Naples, but on a slightly shorter route. The third time, it was ok. There was also a missing fairly major road near Bologna (our car's GPS was also missing this road). Still, it was useful. But I recommend also checking your route in advance on a map or an on-line mapper so you can spot any potential errors.

Just got back from using it in northern Italy over a 2 week trip. Had a minor problem powering it up for the first time as we exited Milan's Malpensa airport heading towards Verona. The GPS could not calculate where we were or give directions, although it did track our progress on the map. Without warning it began to function as we entered the city of Verona and thereafter worked flawlessly navigating us from Verona to Alba, then to the Cinque Terre town of Montorosso Al Mare, followed by the Lake Cumo town of Blevio, and finally back to the rental car center at Malpensa airport. My only mistake was not taking it along as a handheld navigation device to Venice (took the train from Verona and back) where we walked for 1-1/2 hours searching for our lodging that was really only a 15 minute walk from the train station!!

The maps were perfect, received it quickly too.... Unfortunately our GPS stopped working at the beginning of our vacation and we had to purchase a new GPS in Europe which comes already preloaded with the European maps and therefore will end up selling the map chip purchased at amazon.

Das Garmin Kartenupdate hat meine Erwartungen erfüllt. Lediglich einmal hat das Navi sich `aufgehängt', funktionierte aber nach 3-4 Stunden wieder tadellos. Ansonsten problemloses Produkt.

期待通り！でした。 スペイン中部から北部をドライブ旅行するために購入しました。 高速・国道は紙ベースの道路地図でも十分ですが、街中の複雑な一方通行路などはナビがなければ無理だったと思います。 ホテルや観光地などは事前にお気に入りに登録しておいたので、現地での移動もとてもスムーズでした。 ガーミンのナビ自体が操作しやすく、画面表示はシンプルですが道案内としては必要十分だと感じました。 ヨーロッパでのドライブ旅行を計画していらっしゃる方にはぜひお持ちいただきたいと思います。 ナビ本体と合わせて5万円弱かかりましたが、とっても良いお買い物でした。

The SD card did not work despite being compatible with my GPS device. There was no fix available and had to return to amazon and pay out of my pocket for a new card from a local retailer which did work, and then wait for a refund from amazon. Garmin product support were very helpful and explained this has happened previously and their advice is to buy directly from them or their retailers. Amazon did honour the refund when product returned.

I purchased this to go with my Garmin Edge 800 so I could use the routing function when cycling. The roads are pretty good aside from one memorable instance where it invented a road (actually a footpath complete with steps) when I was cycling; fortunately I was able to get back on track fairly quickly but aside from that I am happy with it. As with many Sat Nav maps, certain tight corners are thought to be junctions. Very useful to have combined with my Edge for cycling, and can also be used for pedestrian or car modes I believe.