Garmin Nuvi 1200
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Written by Kate on June 26, 2009 – 9:59 am
The Garmin Nuvi 1200 is super thin so that you can easily carry it around and it has an inexpensive price of only $199. Not bad.
When you first turn on your Garmin Nuvi 1200, it is ready to lead you to your destination. The screen gives you two options: “Where To? and “View Map”. If you want to just drive around with your GPS on, you press “View Map”. If you want your Garmin Nuvi 1200 to lead you to a destination, you start out by pressing “Where To?” This then leads you to choose from near by Points of Interest (POIs) or type in the address of your destination. After you choose, the Garmin Nuvi 1200 will speak to you directions to lead you to your destination and it will show you through the preloaded City Navigator® NT 2D and 3D maps. This is great, because no matter if you are in the continental USA, Puerto Rico, Hawaii, or Europe, the Garmin Nuvi 1200 will lead you where you want to go. And it will lead you there faster.
How? The Garmin Nuvi 1200 has the HotFix™ satellite prediction that basically calculates how to get your destination faster than other GPS models. This is great because there is nothing more annoying than when you are running late and you don’t know how to get to where you are going…and the GPS takes five minutes or longer to calculate how to get there. If you were on time before, you are now 5 minutes late, UGH! I am definitely excited about the HotFix technology.
If you are in an unfamiliar city and you want to walk around by foot, the cityXplorer™ feature on the Garmin Nuvi 1200 is designed to help you around the city. You basically download the map for the city you are in and it will guide you by walking, buses, subway, and any other type of pulic transit around the city. This is pretty cool and will keep you from getting lost…the only bad thing is you have to pay extra for it, around $9.99 per city… but that’s not bad. Plus, the Garmin Nuvi 1200 is easy to carry around since it is 25% slimmer than past Garmin GPS models, so you actually can fit it in your pocket or your purse.
A new feature of the Garmin Nuvi 1200 is ecoroute. It basically calculates the most fuel-efficient route and it also tracks the amount of fuel used as well. This is great if you are looking for ways to green your driving and if you want to save money on gas!
The Garmin Nuvi 1200 also has a lot of features that are great when travelling with it like the JPEG picture viewer, world travel clock with time zones, currency converter, measurement converter, and calculator. When you go on trips, especially to other countries, a lot of these can be really helpful. I love the idea of the JPEG picture viewer because you can upload pictures to your GPS, so let’s say you are missing Bruno your dog, you can look at a picture of him on your GPS, aww. The Garmin Nuvi 1200 also lets you download pictures to your GPS from the site to use when navigating around an area. For example, you LOVE Moe’s Southwest Grill. Well you can download a picture of Moe’s and every time you are near a Moe’s, the picture will show up on your map. Neat, right? Mmm, Moe’s Queso = Yum.
If you want to get traffic alerts on your Garmin Nuvi 1200, you can do that, you just have to buy the Garmin FM Traffic Receiver. What is great is that once you purchase it, you have FREE traffic updates for the life of you GPS. WOOHOO! I am super excited about this, because I always listed that paying extra for traffic updates was ANNOYING on past GPS Reviews, so I love that now it is free. If you want MSN Direct features, you have to purchase that subscription, but it is an option if you already have the FM Traffic Receiver.
Worried about what happens if something happens to you or your car? Let’s say you run out of gas… (not you, right? Never!) All you do is press the “Where Am I?” menu item and it will show you your nearest latitude and longitute, address, fuel stations, hospitals, and other emergency centers. So it is easier to get help and for help to find you.
Cons of the Garmin Nuvi 1200
Not a lot of fancy features. No bluetooth, you have to pay extra for a FM Traffic Receiver ($119). You have to pay extra for cityXplorer™ maps…although it isn’t tooo pricey. I just don’t like to pay additional costs for features once I dish out a bunch of money already for the GPS.
Pros of the Garmin Nuvi 1200
It is thinner, so you actually can carry it around and the cityXplorer™ maps make walking around with your GPS easier than ever. The HotFix™ satellite prediction is great because I HATE slow GPS startups.
Overall a good GPS for a good price, the Garmin Nuvi 1200 is a nice new model from Garmin. What do you think? Leave a comment!
| Garmin Nuvi 1200 | |
| Physical & Performance | |
| Unit dimensions, WxHxD: | |
| Display size, WxH: | 2.8″W x 2.1″H (7.2 x 5.4 cm); 3.5″ diag (8.9cm) |
| Display resolution, WxH: | 320 x 240 pixels |
| Display type: | QVGA color antiglare TFT with white backlight |
| Weight: | 4.0 ounces (113.4g) |
| Battery: | rechargeable lithium-ion |
| Battery life: | up to 4 hours |
| Waterproof: | no |
| High-sensitivity receiver: | yes |
| RoHS version available: | yes |
| Maps & Memory | |
| Basemap: | yes |
| Preloaded maps: | yes (regional) |
| Ability to add maps: | yes |
| Built-in memory: | internal solid state |
| Accepts data cards: | microSD™ card (not included) |
| Waypoints/favorites/locations: | 1000 |
| Features | |
| Voice prompts (e.g. “Turn right in 500 ft.”): | yes (internal speaker) |
| Speaks street names (e.g. “Turn right on Elm Street in 500 ft.”): | yes |
| Speech recognition (navigate with voice commands): | no |
| Lane assist (guides you to the proper lane for navigation): | no |
| 3-D map view: | yes |
| 3-D building view (displays buildings in 3-D): | no |
| Auto sort multiple destinations (provides most direct route): | no |
| Auto re-route (fast off-route and detour recalculation): | yes |
| Choice of route setup (faster time, shorter distance, off road): | yes |
| Route avoidance (avoid highways, tolls etc.): | yes |
| Custom POIs (ability to add additional points of interest): | yes |
| Hands-free calling with Bluetooth® wireless technology: | no |
| FM traffic compatible: | yes |
| MSN® Direct for U.S. compatible: | yes |
| XM® Navtraffic (includes basic weather) & Radio for U.S. compatible: | no |
| TomTom Mapshare compatible: | no |
| Help Me! (find closest hospitals, police & gas stations, nearest address & intersection) | no |
| Where Am I? (find closest hospitals, police & gas stations, nearest address & intersection): | yes |
| Garmin Locate™ (marks position when removed from windshield mount): | no |
| Photo navigation (navigate to geotagged photos): | yes |
| MP3 player: | no |
| Audio book player: | no |
| Document Viewer | no |
| Picture viewer: | yes |
| Garmin Garage™ (select car-shaped icons for map navigation): | yes |
| Current Location Icon Choice | no |
| World travel clock, currency & unit converter, calculator: | yes |
| Touchscreen: | yes |
| Qwerty or ABC keyboard (choose keyboard layout): | no |
| Remote control: | no |
| FM transmitter: | no |
| RDS-TMC Traffic Receiver | no |
| Headphone jack/audio line-out: | no |
| Dead reckoning: | no |
| Garmin Lock™ (anti-theft feature): | yes |
| Motorcycle-friendly: | no |
