I want one with a QWERTY interface, that speaks English. for my car. I have an iPad, but I don’t like the map app. Any suggestions? Also, if you post the best place to buy one I would be grateful. Thanks.
I have a not-recommend, if that’s any help. My Garmin is from the UK with QWERTY (Roman) IME. It works fine with a Taiwan map (that is, it navigates and shows road names in Chinese), but you can’t actually enter road names, either in Chinese or English.
I like my Garmin Nuvi GPS. It works well and cost about $3000nt. The menus and turn-by-turn navigation is in English, but has the limitation that the maps are mostly in Chinese and you cannot enter in addresses without knowing Chinese. However, I have a couple workarounds for that problem.
A) It comes with a subscription to MyGarmin when you register the device. You must register and update the maps for it to be useful. It uses either the satellite or cell network (not sure which) to be able to have some connectivity to the internet to find places. To find places with the connection you can do one of 4 things. 1) There is a google search that allows you to say search for a place by name. Enter in “Giant” for example to search for Giant bike shops. 2) It has a phone number search. If you want to go somewhere, and you know the phone number for the place you want to go, you can enter in the phone number and it will use the phone number to find the place that way. This option works about 70% of the time in my experience. 3) You can use google maps on your computer to find a place before you leave your home. Google maps has an option to send the address you find on your computer to your Nuvi GPS using the MyGarmin service. 4) You can load places onto an SD memory card that the Nuvi can read.
B) There are alternative maps available from openstreetmap.org/. There is an map of Taiwan in English, but it’s not complete for all streets and it’s not perfect. You also have to store any alternative maps on the device’s SD card.
I also have a Garmin Nuvi and it’s a mixed bag. Pretty much perfect for what i use it for though. I usually program in my destination at home using GPS coordinates or grab approximate GPS coordinates on google maps. Sometimes I use paper maps and work out the roads while traveling. It would useless for me to find anything using only the GPS though mostly due to the Chinese interface. I’m sure I could do a few more things with it but I really don’t need to do more than that.
I recommend also Garmin, even the maps are only available in Chinese, but I can either use their website for the coordinates (www.garmaps.appspot.com), use the POI or search by Phone Number for POI’s.
You can buy also an English Map from Garmin, even its very outdated (v2010.30) but still helpful for some areas
go for Sygic, download from your app store and try it for free. If you like it, purchase map of Taiwan for few $. Works for me, never got lost in Taiwan. Drive by Sygic, walk by G-maps…
Do the Garmin GPS HAVE to be hooked up to a power connector? Can I charge it at home and use it while riding the bike?
you might want to consider this type: http://www.retrevo.com/samples/gps-with-long-battery.html rather than the large screen ones used in cars…
Oh wow, those wrist-GPS type’s can be very handy indeed
Considering buying a Garmin Nuvi40. Question, it is not clear to me if you can update the map for free ?
I think Garmin is king in Taiwan. I’ve tried a couple others, but none come close.
iPhone… then get Garmin Application… english menu but chinese maps…
Garmin works well only if you either type in chinese or somehow know all the different ways the Garmin spells street names over the local forms of spelling.
Garmin users in English are often rewarded with no results found when searching for street names as they are entering local spellings, but the machine differs.
This basically means that you have to know where you want to go in advance, then using your finger to point at the location on the map. The machine can only then find the quickest route.
I’ve tried countless systems, both stock and non stock in a plethora of different vehicles. What’s the best navigation system in my opinion? Google maps on a reasonable Android device.
I have Sygic for Android and I’m more than happy with it. Now, some of the romanized address look awkward to me. But it’s good enough for making me feel bad for having it illegally 
Taiwan maps are always free for updating on a Taiwan Garmin Unit
I got the Nuvi 42 and I like so much the possibility to use google maps and send directions to the GPS ! So convenient…
Don’t know if they still do it but both of my garmins were taken to the hq here in Taipei and they changed the map to a pinyin version… Mapping extras such as 3d buildings and snapshots of junctions were no longer supported after the map change but was certainly much more useful… Now I’m wondering if they can change the garmin map in my volvo or not…
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Can you please check which map version is installed in Pinyin?
The map versions are both old, because I did the change a while back. I remember at the time of the change they were pretty much up to date, but I don’t use them anymore because my car has gps in it. Btw I forgot to mention that garmin did the change all for free and in about 15min, just need to go there.
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