Z3BUM,
What happens if your listening to the radio? Does the Nuvi still come through the car audio or does it revert back to the Nuvi speaker?

 

No, the stereo can only monitor one input at a time (Radio, CD, CD Changer, or AUX). You need to have the head unit set to AUX in order to hear the GPS, which means that you can't be listening to the radio, a CD, or the CD changer input and still hear voice prompts from the GPS through the AUX input.

 

Here are the pictures:






For the picture with the GPS mounted, I had the camera about where my head is while I'm driving, so you can see that the GPS doesn't block the Chrono Pack. To help make sure it wouldn't block anything, I mounted the post with the ball on it fairly high on the face of the Kuda mount.

My only complaint is that the covering on the Kuda mount is black leather, and the top of the dash is a dark grey, so it's not a perfect match. But it's not so far off that it bothers m, either.

 

Check out the my DIY alternative to the Kuda mount. Details at the following post

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...7&postcount=31

 

I bought the external antenna for my Garmin Nuvi 360 today. I have the Nuvi mounted on the Kuda mount as shown above. It used to be that it would take several minute to locate satellites. Now, even on just battery, with the external antenna, as soon as it boots up it says "ready to navigate". That's a very nice improvement on signal reception!

 

Scavenger; Please forgive me for being argumentative. The definitive experiment to demonstrate the improvement in acquisition time accruing to the use of an external antenna is to measure the improvement in Satellite acquisition time after the NUVI has been turned off for 6 hours or more.
Background:
Presently there are just 3 competitors making top performance GPS chipsets, Global Locate, Media Tek and SiRF. The NUVI 360 uses SiRF but Garmin being a very careful company has turned off the "cold start" quick lock feature built into the SiRF chipset. This was done because Global Locate is seeking enforcement of Patents 6,417,801, 6,937,187 and 6,704,651 which cover the quick lock feature.
Here is a link to the story:
http://www.globallocate.com/PRESS/Pr...L_SuesSiRF.htm
If the slow "cold" acquisition is a bother, you can downrev the NUVI's formware to the version prior to January.
Go to the following link
http://www8.garmin.com/support/colle...t=010-00538-00
cut and copy the link into the wayback machine below:
www.archive.org/web/web.php
Go to the January 9 2007 copy of the page and download version 3.30 of the Unit software, programme it into the NUVI using the USB cable.
Version 3.30 will not include all the latest fixes to the SW, thats the price for quicker satellite acquisition. If you use the Bluetooth you might find the compromise unacceptable, depending on which phone you use with the NUVI.

 

I don't consider your post argumentative, but rather informative. My first use of the antenna yesterday was "warm" probably, since I turned it on and off within just a few minutes. So, I'll try it today now that it's been off over night.

Thanks

 

Thanks for understanding my andragogical motives. I am irritated too at the slow cold start acquisition of the NUVI. The downrev option for me is impractical, I have the 660 which is currently at rev 3.80. I would have to go all the way back to rev 2.70 in order to benefit from the SiRF accelerated cold start feature. I can not figure out why Garmin do not periodically turn on the NUVI in the background every 3 1/2 hours for a minute to update the ephemeris data. If they just did this for 12-18 hours overnight 90% of us would get in our cars and have a "warm" welcome from our Garmin PNDs. Running the NUVI for 5 minutes total overnight would have nill effect on the charge in the battery. Im considering making a little circuit that powers the NUVI on for 1 minute every 3 1/2 hours as a work around for this issue.
BTW can anyone confirm that the battery actually charges from the car whilst the car is on and the NUVI is operational or is charging only done when the car is on and the NUVI is off?

 

Older firmware versions are available at this site.

http://www.gpsinformation.org/perry/nuvi/

I am sticking to an older version for my Nuvi 660 due to the change in the traffic display. The new interface for it is really annoying to me. I've never had the Nuvi take more the 1 minute to get a lock, moving, still, in my house, etc. Seems to work great. The chipset is a big improvement over Garmin's previous stuff.

 

Yes, the Nuvi charges even while it's operating, as long as it's plugged into external power. I've started off long trips with a partially-discharged Nuvi, and by the time I get where I'm going, the Nuvi is fully charged, even though it was operating the entire trip.

 

i installed mine into my R56 last night:

http://www.mini2.com/forum/general-d...ps-fitted.html

 

Does anyone know if these srf files will work on a street pilot 330? Might be fun!!
any input would be appreciated................

 

Sorry no they wont

 

Thank you for posting the Nuvi Mini PICs. That was very nice of you. Now if I can only find some for the Classic Mini I will have for both cars

 

Anyone installed the garmin mount themselves? Any trouble with codes or computer?

 

Update? Your doing a clone of the factory mount?

 

I did the install on my R53 using the official Mini mount.

No computer/code programming required.

You can do it!

 

Cool. I'm going to do it tomorrow night.

 

I know its a bit late in this thread but I felt it was necessary to thank Nor_Cal_Mini and Hunter99 for all their assistance with the MINI srf files.

 

Thank you. BBcooper here on NAM has been hard working on all sorts of custom SRF's that expand the files far beyond what Garmin and MINI ever did.
Make sure to give BBcooper a big shout out for this since the fair share of work goes that way.

I am been slowly, (very slowly) working to make a far better website out of it. In the future I would like to add a how-too and even custom files for other GPS units, including the factory NAV unit if possible. hat may take quite a bit of time but hopefully will get there soon.

 

This information was very helpful, thanks all for sharing.