New Garmin nüvi 1690 includes 2 years of free online services and lots of exclamation marks

GPS units are announced almost every day – but this newest unit from Garmin immediately grabbed my attention. It is the the first “connected GPS” unit from Garmin, which means the device has a built in cellular modem, allowing it to connect to the Internet and grab real time data, instead of relying on an (often outdated) internal database. Current Garmin units can only receive data in one direction.

The nüvi 1690 uses the new Garmin nüLink! (gotta love! names! with exclamation marks!). NüLink! provides access to online Google searches, traffic, weather, fuel prices, local events and whitepage telephone listings.

In addition to this, the nüvi 1690 provides some basic social networking using Ciao!, the new Garmin location based social networking portal.

Now, Garmin is by no means the first to introduce a connected GPS unit, but they are the first to introduce one that comes with 2 full years of free online service. After this, service is only $5 per month. Other units like the now defunct Dash Express wanted $12.95 for each month, so Garmin clearly did their homework picking the perfect price point for their service.

It is obvious that connected GPS units are the future – and at first glance, the nüvi 1690 looks like a true winner – its initial $499 purchase price is a little on the high side, but still in line with what most other high-end GPS units cost, even though this one contains a cellular data modem.

It is on schedule to be released in the fourth quarter of this year, which means it should be available just in time for Christmas.

TeleNav Shotgun GPS unit offers reviews on-the-go

Something exciting is happening in the world of GPS units (ok, perhaps I am the only one excited by it).

We are slowly seeing a trend heading towards connected GPS devices. A “connected” GPS device is a regular GPS receiver, with built in 2-way communications, and a host of services that can take advantage of being connected.

TeleNav is one of the newest entrants into this market, but anyone with a US mobile phone has probably seen their name pop up a couple of times. After offering their navigation software on mobile phones for several years, they released the Shotgun GPS device last year.

The Shotgun features the TeleNav navigation system in a sleek receiver, along with integrated cellular connectivity.

The initial release of the Shotgun offered Internet searches, online trip planning and instant traffic information. Today, TeleNav announced an update to the unit which enables business reviews and mileage tracking.

The business review feature allows you to read reviews of many points of interest, as well as the ability to add your own review right on the device, and share it with others.

With the business mileage feature, you can assign trips to a client, job or other category, and instantly view and download the information online. The feature even offers the ability to download the mileage information as a PDF of Excel file.

The TeleNav Shotgun costs $299, and monthly service is just $11.99 (or $129/year). The unit comes with a 3 month trial to the online services.

I’m convinced that the future of the GPS unit is “connected”, and anyone with their own navigation unit will understand how frustrating it is when you are trying to find a local point of interest, but run into the limitations of an old and outdated database. When your GPS unit is connected, you always have access to the most up to date information.

We’ll have a full review of the TeleNav Shotgun posted as soon as we can!