Nextar X4B 4.3-Inch Bluetooth Portable GPS Navigator Review

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(More customer reviews)This is my first GPS. I wanted a unit with TTS and a 4.3" screen. I was looking at the TomTom 720 and the Garmin nuvi 750 when I saw the great price on this unit. I decided to take a chance on a unit costing much less than what I was planning to spend. (In fairness, the TomTom and Garmin have a few additional features like an FM transmitter.) So far, I have not regretted it.
The unit powers up and locks on to the satellites fairly quickly if you have a clear view of the sky. Setup and navigation are fairly straightforward. The onboard stylus is useful but you can use your finger as well. Nextar does not show as much info on the main navigation screen as some others (e.g. signal strength) but I haven't found that to be a problem. It does have a volume control on the side, which some more expensive units don't seem to provide. It comes with the usual complement of chargers and mounts.
The TTS feature works well and the voice is clear and unaccented. I do not have a Bluetooth phone so I am unable to comment on that capability. I will say that both the Nextar and Garmin manuals spend many pages on Bluetooth setup, so it certainly seems to be a technology that isn't plug-n-play yet.
I initially set up an itinerary for a trip from Austin to Pittsburgh. The Nextar came up with a better route than MS Streets & Trips. I was able to easily add stopovers and it recomputed the route fairly quickly. Although having "only" 1.6M POIs, I was able to find most of the hotels and restaurants I was interested in for the trip. I used it around town over the weekend and it responded well to real-time course changes when I took streets that weren't on the route. No lockups or reboots. The unit successfully navigated in and around Memphis and other cities and stops on the route. There were some mistakes, mostly in whether connecting roads were right or left turns. I'm sure this is due to mistakes in the Navteq maps and not anything peculiar to the Nextar.
On a trip to Long Beach the unit also worked well in navigating from the airport to the hotel and then to other POIs. It did have our hotel on the wrong side of the street but I'm sure that's an error in the map.
I loaded some MP3s onto a 1GB SD card and the MP3 player played them just fine. One glitch is that it doesn't have a shuffle mode. I hope that will be added in a later upgrade. I did not try to load/view pictures. A USB cable is provided but has no function yet as there is nothing on the Nextar website to update. The unit was built in July so there is probably little need as yet.
The manual could be better, especially for GPS newbies like me. It has taken some experimentation to figure out how the various features work.
All in all, I am very satisfied. It doesn't have all of the features of more expensive units, but it is a great value for a 4.3" unit with TTS. I lost the slip case and tried to contact Nextar support. After a week I have not had any response.

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The Nextar GPS X4B mobile navigation system assures that your days of getting lost are over!Finding an address or any of 1.6 million points of interest such as the nearest gas station or restaurant is a snap anywhere in the U.S. or Canada.Just enter information in the X4B's 4.3 inch touch screen and let the voice prompt and detailed map guide you to the destination. With the latest TTS (Text to Speech) function, street names are clrearly pronounced in English.The X4B's built in MP3 player will entertain you with your favorite tunes while en route. Just copy your favorite play list onto an SD card and insert into the slot.The X4B moves easily from car to car using the convenient vent mount.A recharageable lithium ion battery assures that the unit stays active. Other features of the X4B include built-in maps of the 50 United States and Canada, 1GB built in Flash Memory, built in Bluetooth for handsfree calling, 2D or 3D map viewing mode, day and night mode, small case design with rear speaker, Navteq Map on board, Intel processor, and a built in SIRF III receiver. With all these capabilities, the Nextar X3 will provide you with worry free navigation on even the most complex routes!

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