Review: Garmin Street Pilot i3 sat nav device

Not much larger than a tennis ball, the Garmin Street Pilot i3 is the cheapest of the units in our group test and has a screen that measures just 5.6cm diagonally. That is a little bit of a limitation, but not, it turned out, as much of one as we imagined.

The mapping data – stored on a tiny Transflash card, rather than the SD cards used by other units – has support for full seven-digit UK postcodes, which is the quickest way of finding somewhere; the scroll wheel moves you through the alphabet and a click on it selects a letter. There’s a select/back key and the power switch, and that’s it.

Even so, we found it quite straightforward to use and get to grips with, even without resorting to the manual. The use of standard AA batteries means you can take it just about anywhere, but, most importantly, the spoken directions are loud and clear. Additional Points of Interest (POI) can be downloaded, including speed camera information.

We did have some niggles; trying to find an address by scrolling through street names was pretty slow at times, so you just have to sit and wait while the Street Pilot catches up; and when you try to find an intersection, it doesn’t restrict the choice of the second street, which slows you down again.

There were also some annoying Americanisms, such as referring to the GMT timezone as ‘Western Europe (WET)’ and hiding things like railway stations in a ‘transit’ category in the POI database.

But, if you’re on a limited budget, and you don’t mind the small screen or the other niggles, this is definitely worth looking at. If you’re a regular business driver, there are better options, but for the casual driver and occasional user, price alone makes this unit highly attractive.

This article is part of a group test of satellite navigation systems. Others are:
Intro and Editor's choice
Blue Media BM6380GPS
Evesham Nav-Cam 7000
Garmin Street Pilot i3
Magellan Roadmate 300
Medion Go Pal PNA350
Mio 268+
Navman ICN520
Novogo A30
Tom Tom One
Viamichelin X930
Top-of-the-range options
The choice between all-in-ones or PDA add-ons
Europe's GPS constellation