Garmin Nuvifone hitting AT&T for $500 plus?
By Thomas Ricker 
posted May 1st 2008 3:26AM
posted May 1st 2008 3:26AM
"Now, how likely would you be to buy the Garmin nüvifone (for yourself or as a gift) if offered by AT&T for $499.99 with a two year contract? You would be required to have both a data plan that would include unlimited Internet browsing and unlimited Navigation for $19.99 per month and one of the standard voice rate plans for a monthly fee."
So dear readers, we ask you... does that sound reasonable for a 3.5-inch touchscreen cellphone with GPS navigation, 3.5G data, WiFi, audio and video playback, and 3 megapixel camera?
sweet
Copy it.. with all it's failings no thank you.
I have yet to see the specs of this phone but from the small amount I've seen, it blows the Iphone out of the water. But then again, thats not very hard to do.
gps is free when you bye a gps for your car no monthly fee's. i have a garmin 76csx for backpacking and use it in the truck to find about anything from the west cost to the east cost all the usa. and it's free after you bye the unit why would someone went to pay $19.00 a month when the best gps is free??????? from the satlelights. cell phone gps is not as good as satelight gps. I guss if you have not had a gps unit you would not know the diff.to bad the gps is not free i was going to bye this and keeped asking when it was comming out. but you can keep it. I'll just use my 76 csx and my pda.!!!!!
No, it isnt worth it... sometimes I really dont get how those things work... how can adding Cellphone capability to their GPS system tack on close to 2-3 hundred dollars more? And if you wanna go head to head against the iPhone, seriously just copy it as much as you can and sell it without the Apple markup and youre set no?
Especially when TV and movies tell us that "all phones have a GPS chip" that only the police from the Special Victims Unit can access. Riiiight . . . .
I get the iphone parallel, and while the hardware feature set sounds great, unless it's running the iPhone's OSX, it ain't worth it. Plus it's bringing a bad case of the ugly.
Law and Order is very careful with that. They tracked down a fugitive by finding a pattern of which cell towers his cell phone was using. When they ended up at the last cell, they needed to search for them in a small radius.
Also, the cell provider has access to it. They asked them to track down the cell.
It wasn't GPS. Technically, you can get a rough estimation of anyone's cell phone location easily if you have access to their network.
Ever wonder how the iPhone and Google Maps for phones does "My Location" and why it's not always accurate? Same concept, it's not GPS.
Yeah, I remember that one, but in a different episode, they mentioned "every new phone has a GPS chip in it, but the carrier has to activate it" and they mentioned that parents could use it to track their kids, but they were going to use it to track a perp and his captive.
I remember the episode you mentioned, but there was another one.
Now, if pedo's prefer Boost Mobile, they're technically accurate. ;)
It looks pretty nice here:
http://www.slashphone.com/media/data/796/pt-browser-lg.jpg
It runs Linux asshole.
@asshat
I hadn't heard of that distro.
A good GPS costs $350+, then add 3.5G, a 3 MP camera, a cellphone, and software, and you're easily up to $500
ya know, this is a good deal for unlimited internet, it would work well with an n810
Ryan Trevisol,
unfortunately i have not seen that episode yet. My mistake.
Maybe it was new and during the writers strike so they hired an intern to write it. blah. Stupid intern writers.
no.
Best comment. I'll spend $500 on a phone, but I'll be damned if I'm going to be forced into a "navigation fee" which you can get for free w/ every GPS on the road today (instead of Nokia, but even there's is way cheaper).
Anthony you are an idiot. When you buy an iphone,. you have to have a contract in order even use the ipod.. same thing pickle dick.
@asshat
Wrong, dipshit. You are not charged $20 a month to use the iPod feature of the iPhone. You pay once, and then pay monthly for the voice package. Having to pay extra to use a feature that is equipped in a phone, that would normally be free if it wasn't in a phone, blows...and furthermore, so do you...assface.
It's not too bad...over here Garrmin's GPS systems cost $500, but seems like just another attempt to steal some of the iPhone's steam
$300 maybe. And why do I have to pay a monthly fee for navigation? Does the GPS not function otherwise?
I also agree with this. I own a Garmin and love it, but I currently don't have to pay a monthly service fee. There is no reason to have such a fee seeing that the same company already makes devices that don't require a monthly service fee. This needs to be waved.
But the flipside is that your maps are always up-to-date, and you often get features that are only in the more expensive ($300-$400+) GPS units like traffic re-routing and spoken street names. I still don't think that justifies $20/month, but just saying you get some benefits.
Having the latest map is nice but these units turn into paperweights if you don't have data coverage. I used similar software on my Blackberry and if you don't have high-speed data coverage where you are at then the screen will also visibly paint, which can be irritating.
$500 for the phone and $20*12 months=$240 a year
That's wayyyy too much....
they totally went the apple way here
if you add the $19.99 data charge to any of ATT's voice plans you end up paying 1 cent less than a corresponding iPhone plan through ATT. Except the basic plans dont include any text messaging and the Garmin $19.99 just says Internet/Nav... so to get Text Messaging on the plan you have to pay another $5.00+ per month more than you would for an iPhone plan that throws that in there for you...
I say if Garmin adds like 500 Texts into their $19.99 fee... then its competitive and has an ability to compete with iPhone in terms of service plan offerings and rates.
i think Garmin needs to drop the price down at least to $299 depending upon storage capacity to keep competitive and not have this flop.
500 bones is a lot to pay when compared to the features of many phones already on the market. And I echo testdummy--will the nav feature not work if I don't pony up $20/month. Garmin, do Olathe KS proud and rethink this one.
@testdummy-agreed....i pay taxes.. therefore the nav and sattelite use should be free... wtf....
like normal GPS devices... y'know?
20 bux for internet? is there visual voicemail?
I have to pay for navigation subscription on a $500 device?
The tilt costs less and I can use the GPS without paying a subscription fee.
ATT can GTFO.
so media player is now considered a standard phone feature?
Does that 3 megapixel camera have a flash, auto-focus and macro? If it does that makes the Nuvifone one hell of an interesting device to me.
For now, I can kind of confirm that it has "zooming" options. Check this picture from their official site.
http://www8.garmin.com/buzz/nuvifone/m/g/sc-camera01-lg.jpg
I hope Garmin flops the big one on this and learns their lesson. I hope you guys ramp up production on a product for which there will be no demand so you guys lose tons of money!! $20, insane. Never thought VzNav would be a bargain at $10 a month.
Woops, X that, I misunderstood. $20 for internet and GPS isn't that bad, I initially thought it was for GPS service only. Compared to Verizon, VCast cost $15 a month, making GPS $5 a month. The current iphones data plan cost $20 without true gps so I would say its fairly comparable. I guess I should read the article more carefully before being all outraged.
i spend $20 a month on unlimited EVDO and GPS service...
on Sprint.
but the GPS part is only $5 more (internet without GPS is $15) and my phone doesn't have pre-loaded maps.... so i'm paying the $5/month for downloading maps with POIs etc.
sure i'd rather it be free, and it seems like a GPS receiver + Google Maps would be free, but whatever. all the mobile service providers are out to screw their customers as much as possible ($0.10 per SMS? that's like 75x their cost) so i suppose i shouldn't be surprised.
We need to see this thing in action before we say it's worth it or not.
The features sound amazing, and for $500 it really is a good price compared to many other smart phones that have half of Nuvifone's capabilities and power.
Also is there any information about storage capacity?
well....not worth...2yr contract...$500 for a locked phone...20 bucks for internet and "navigation". iphone(16gig) costs d same...both of them dont even qualify to be pda phones...dunno wat AT&T is upto.... wonder wat they'll do when they come up with Sony's xperia...will they offer it for 1000???
Droooolllll... at the moment I use the edge 205 cycling gps unit, and a seperate cell phone, combining the 2, and adding wifi would be awesome. I assume I could still download all my riding info to my pc, and adding gps tagged pics will be useful (yes I said it would be of use!) for sharing routes with other cyclists. Lets just hope someone at Garmin has written a nice application to show ride time, and so forth.
Pick up an Edge 705/605 instead.. depending on the type of cycling, you may end up destroying your phone... While sure, its not cheap, but it does offer far more functionality for sports then a garmin phone would.
When will we get it in the UK?
I'd pay £100 - maybe £150 - for the handset on a 2 year contract, and I wouldn't go much above £30 per month for 200 minutes, 400 txts, and unlimited internet. Including device insurance - which currently runs around £7.
It's gotta be one helluva good system. Personally I don't trust anyone to on their first try get this right and I'm not willing to be a guinea pig for $499+($19.99*24) = well over a thousand bucks with tax. You other people can do trap yourself into a thousand dollar GPS unit, let me know how it goes.
"...You would be required to have both a data plan that would include unlimited Internet browsing and unlimited Navigation for $19.99 per month and one of the standard voice rate plans for a monthly fee..."
Whoops. My math up top is wrong. So I'd be required to carry a voice and data plan on this GPS unit. Ummm, $499+($19.99*24)+($39.99*24) = $1938.52 without any sales tax or monthly taxes. 2 grand plus for my GPS unit. Yeah, I've already got a good phone guys that doesn't have bugs and another service provider.
i totally think the Nuvifone is worth it at the price it is, 400 woule be better but if u compare it to the iphone i honestly think its better, it has better features such as a 3 megapixel camera, full gps, it has everything else the iphone has. the 16 gig iphone is the same price and with both phones u still gotta pay the internet fees... so if u aint looking to join the club and hop on the iphone bandwagon than i think this might be the next best thing... heres the specs for both check em out
Nuvifone
http://www8.garmin.com/buzz/nuvifone/press_release.jsp
iPhone
http://www.apple.com/iphone/specs.html
rip off
What's the storage capacity?
damit !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i was hoping this phone wasn't going to be on at&t
this phone actually does a lot cool stuff http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtD4USzpoLI&eurl=http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=Nuvifone&hl=en&sitesearch=
but still i am not going to at&t for it
as for price though well my friend shelled 800 buck for his iphone with every thing don't see much of a diff
Yeah it seems like it's very feature rich.
I'd like to see how well the interface works.
Not a bad product at all!!
Hmmm... I think I will get one though without the data subscription.
I REALLY like the one touch here I am feature. That parking lot thing is actually not that dumb. As my wife says, "you usually remember, unless its an airport, but me that's another question." That single feature is wonderful for me...
Its one of those features where you would like, but once you have it, you never want to give it up.
How bad is AT&T's customer attrition problem if having the iPhone isn't bringing in enough new customers to cover it up? My answer: I'd pay $500 on Verizon or T-Mobile, but you'd have to pay me $500 to sign a 2 year agreement with AT&T or Sprint.
no thanks, ill take my chances with a real phone and a real gps
Not bad a Garmin with maps costs ~$400.00 It can even do location based google searches! I'm surprised at&t is offering data that cheep.
Why would anyone choose this on ATT if the IPhone is coming with GPS on ATT? Dis anynoe at Garmin ask themselves that question. I had been holding out on my plan and switching carriers for this phone. I say thanks Garmin for making my choice easy for me. SERO Plan with free Motorola Q 9c with ALK gps navigation. And still in time to get free text messaging. I'm sorry ATT I dn't care how many phones to masage from the makers "Nobody Loves You". I'm moreso just disappointed with Garmin on this one. Like another poster said, "I hope they fall flat on their faces, plus I'm thinking about getting the new TomTom One with the holder intergrated and then selling my Nuvi. I speak with my dollars. I could get an unlocked IPhone for this type of non-sense.
your comment made my eyes bleed. i hope you're drunk. if not, you should spent that $500+$20/mo on communication classes and English/grammar/spelling/life books.
spend*
Seriously - $500???
Would have to have a pretty sweet - and I mean sweet - total experience. At that price point - it can't just be features - the browser / email / voicemail /gps integration would have to be very innovative. I like the look and idea of it - but it better have a complete package...
T
The Garmin HAS real GPS on it... seeing as its a phone coming from a GPS manufacturer. The subscription for GPS is either for the turn by turn or map information, which the phone doesnt seem to have the memory built in to hold.
$500 is too much for a phone that may not have an extensible OS with an enthusiastic community of developers like Blackberry, Windows Mobile, Symbian or iPhone.
Give me robust ActiveSync support and I'll consider it :)
$500? With a 2-year contract? I expected it to hit at $700-800 without any contract and near-free ($100-200) for US buyers with a contract. Looks like someone thinks NuviPhone is way superior to iPhone...
Its a bad idea to compare a GPS navigation device with build-in phone and a media player with build-in phone and internet. They are just totally different things.
What would I choose out of two? Neither, I'd wait for 3G iPhone :)
My opinion - not worth it.
no; it's the contract that kills the deal. I am an iphone owner and I didn't really want to agree to the contract for it. I think I have a little buyers remorse I wouldn't do it again.
This was going to be my next phone because I love garmin GPS, but there is no way I'm paying $20 extra/mo. just to use the GPS.
its $20 for UNLIMITED DATA as well as GPS... what does any other data package get you? For the iphone, you need to subscribe to att just to use the ipod functions. IDiot.
Cool phone, poor choice of carrier...
Garmin is not trying to compete with the iPhone. Seriously, are you going to accuse every touch screen phone as copying the iPhone? Apple was not the first touch screen mobile phone -- IBM's Simon (1994) was...
Many Garmin Nuvi GPS models include most of these features already... My Garmin Nuvi 360 has GPS (obviously), an MP3 player, Audible player, picture viewer, and bluetooth handsfree calling (via a bluetooth connected phone).
Adding a built-in phone is the next logical step for Garmin. And while they were at it, they changed the form factor so it could be used as a handset phone.
The Nuviphone isn't trying to be the next iPhone. It's the next generation of Garmin Nuvi GPS devices.
"It's the next generation of Garmin Nuvi GPS devices."
So their next generation of Garmin GPS devices charge a montly fee to use the GPS?
I suspect the $20 charge for Data and Navigation is misleading. I am guessing the GPS will work just fine on its own, but there will be value added services, and those are what you will be paying for. TomTom on the pocket pc is the same, the GPS on my tilt works just fine, but for traffic and other added services, there is a monthly service fee. Having ATT (or whatever provider they chose if they get on board with another one further down the line) add that service charge in with the data, means the user does not have to deal with billing from different companies.
I took the same survey and for me it asked about $299 and $20/month.
This should be tough competitor to the next gen iphone. I'm curious as to how the music playing will work, as this might be a fairly serious difficulty as far as feature sets go. The next gen iphone (price?) should have the nuvifone matched in pretty much every other way from what I can tell. At $300, I'd seriously consider this thing. At $500, probably not so much.
As another comparison, look at the ATT Tilt combined with Garmin's own Mobile XT software package: Windows Mobile 6 + GPS + 3G + Wifi + Qwerty for a total package price of
Look folks, the $20 for unlimited Data is a steal considering it is the SAME as an iPhone.
And I don't hear anybody complaining about the iPhone's Data requirements.
The unlimited for this NuviPhone will be great, especially for those who are going to screw around with sending their location over data to their buddies.
The specs clearly state that this unit has built-in maps and a gps receiver, NOT an A-GPS (which would require the network).
a-GPS doesn't REQUIRE the network
How it works is the phone looks to see roughly what area it's in (from the cell towers) and tells the GPS it's in that area, the GPS then has less calculating to do. If there's no cell coverage it works like a normal GPS.
The iPhone ONLY has the first part of this, the cell tower rough area finding.
"does that ($499) sound reasonable for a 3.5-inch touchscreen cellphone with GPS navigation, 3.5G data, WiFi, audio and video playback, and 3 megapixel camera?"
Plenty of people thought it sounded reasonable for a 3.5-inch touchscreen cellphone WITHOUT GPS navigation, EDGE data, WiFi, audio and video playback, and 1 megapixel camera.
Like, er, the one in my pocket.
If Garmin can deliver a solid OS with it, Apple's iPhone 2.0 better have GPS, 3G, and a better camera ... and a similar price. If the Garmin's OS is ripped straight from the nüvi or something, forget about it.
Does anyone know what brand of web browser they use. Is it Firefox, minimo, Opera?
Hey, this thing has a built in GPS. I don't think there is a charge to use navigation. The charge is for the data plan to access the internet and things like traffic. If I'm not mistaken, navigation is what this thing is all about; that's what you spend $500 for.
Given that we pay almost that much for a satnav with traffic, seems like a bargain to geet a phone, browswer and camera in the bargain. Two thumbs up!
I think everyone is missing the point. The $20 is part of the voice/data tarriff which is needed to buy the phone. This is not a charge for the GPS, which is a feature of the phone.
I'd consider the higher price, would likely snatch one at 300 bones. I'm on AT&T with a Z9 and VZ with a 755p, and have a TomTom GO 910, and I'm a Mac owner. I like the hype for the 3G iPod, but it's all conjecture right now.
Real estate agents would kill for a device like a nuviphone, tho' they'd be missing that keyboard on their BBs, WinMos, and Treos. I could ditch my Z9 and TomTom and use the cash to buy a nuviphone - I frickin hate TomTom's crappy TeleAtlas maps here in the States. I like the AT&T Navigator better than VZ's version, but the maps take too long to get to the Z9 - I'm halfway there before it's telling me where to go and where I'm at.
It's simple to me. Play music, surf the web, use the phone once in a while, get an iPhone. Need a tool with some benefits, use the phone once in a while, get a nuviphone. If the nuviphone is made in Europe or NA, the choice gets easier for me....
Hey I work at latteland and that is on the plaza(kansas city) I would say 47th st. I work at the jefferson store.
Not bad, I'd bite. ATT has a leg up on Verizon in the phone market. I just wish all my friends and family weren't part of the Verizon network so I could make the switch. Hopefully this phone will be available when Verizon opens it's network.
I think Apple has way too much of a head start, and a much broader appeal than Garmin at this point.
People will buy the phone with the best experience and a separate GPS unit before buying the best GPS unit with an OK phone.
The iPhone already offers the user experience and content that the majority seem to want, with new applications coming through the API, and pretty soon 3G and likely true GPS.
Garmin has to get so many things right to even get close to Apple. In areas it has no real experience like Music and video they will probably partner with firms that have not managed to push Apple off the podium today, which leaves navigation as their only key offering.
Apple already has an interface with Google Maps, and as we can see Google is getting into Garmin's space in a big way by teaming with the likes of BMW and Mercedes. All Apple has to do to kill the Garmin is deliver a solid navigation tool in partnership with Google. It doesn't even have to be as solid as Garmin to start with.
Just my two cents.
$499 +$(20*24) + $(39*24). This is WAY OUT OF LINE. Prices should be coming down not going up.
I've looked at ALL the features of this device and AT&T with all it's way-to-expensive plans and you have got to be kidding me!
I'd pay $199 and if they included internet with the exorbitant $39 voice plan.
This would fly off the shelves, as it should, but not for $500 freaking dollars plus that extra data rip-off only an idiot would pay $20/mo. charge.
When are the smart people going to help the idiots get a clue and stop this rip-of madness the carriers throwing at us?
Any smart people out there? I suspect not very many.
$500 seems high; they are probably testing different price points via the survey.. gives the market research department something to do.
To me it looks like a rip of of LG's new VU phone that will be coming, and probally better since they have more experience in the phone industry. Any news of this phone comming to Canada?
I took the sam survey today and the price on my survey was $299. Still wouldn't replace my iPhone with it tho.
"You would be required to have both a data plan that would include unlimited Internet browsing and unlimited Navigation for $19.99 per month and one of the standard voice rate plans for a monthly fee"
This is a poorly written sentence that is throwing some people off... the $20/month fee is for UNLIMITED DATA and navigation. This makes sense, since you will be using the data network to do things like Google searches for 'pizza' and then using the navigation features to find your way to the nearest pizza place (for an example). The $20 fee is not to use GPS. The unlimited data plan for the iPhone is $20 WITHOUT GPS.
no, too expensive plus i already own garmin gps
I would only spend $500 on another iphone
"Unlimited Internet and Navigation $19.99 month"
I think that just needs more explanation. It will always work free as a navigator, just like the current models do. The difference is that they are (probably) going to throw in free map updates on some kind of set schedule, using the internet to download them, whereas you have to pay $75-$85 per year to Garmin for a DVD update of the maps on all the other devices. The DVDs are always at least a year and a half behind in the actual data as well. The 2008 Garmin map update has late 2006 data in it. Maybe the map updates to the phone can be issued in a more timely manner. At any rate, you are never going to pay anyone in the US to use our government sponsored GPS satellites. Just the map updates.
Hey retards,
The 19.99 includes unlimited internet browsing as well as the gps which auto updates for you.
If you had a standard device with ATT, the internet would be $15 monthly plus $10 for unlimited gps.
On a data device you are looking at $30-40 for unlimited internet plus $10 for gps.
It is not that expensive. If you cant afford it, then oh well!!
with VZW though you need to pay $40 for just unlimited internet, so add that to the $10 VZNav, and you got yourself a $30 charge over the cost of this.
I took that same survey and have a saved pic of 299.99.
Garmin getting into... phone?
The market is really heating up -but- I doubt Garmin has enough appeal for the average consumer.
The device has a gorgeous interface and will the easiest to use handset on the market, by far.
Get ready to eBay your iPhone... there seems to be a huge demand for them in South America.
Also, if you have any problem with this phone, Garmin has the best product support of any tech company. (If I may say so myself)
I was very interested in the Garmin phone until i heard the gps would be a paid monthly service. I expected the device to be a gps first with phone capabilities secondary and not a water down cell tower gps. very disappointed, i have no intention to purchase this product now. IF the phone had satellite gps (no additional cost) then I'd have no problem paying $500 or so for the phone and signing a two year contract for the cell phone services. I'm very pleased with my hand held and my car gps from Garmin and I thought this phone would be a great all in one product that gave me gps capability walking on the street, hiking or in my car but I'm turned off on the phone now. Sounds like its like every other cell, pda device that has gps features. I'll stick with my hand held and my car gps (from garmin) but I will go with a different cell phone and stick with someone like Nokia who specialize in phones for cell service. Very disappointed.