Garmin Zumo 550 Review:
The Garmin Zumo 550 is powered by a 20-channel, SiRFstarlll high-sensitivity GPS receiver and all maps of North America are preloaded on the device. Operation is even simpler than with the TomTom Rider, but as always, we recommend that you really familiarize yourself with the Zumo 550 and its features before hitting the road.

From the Garmin Zumo 550’s main menu, you are presented with two large and clearly marked options to begin navigation–Where to? and View map–as well as several items along the bottom of the screen, including a phone icon, a musical note icon for the MP3 player, and a tool icon for the Settings menu.

Navigation features are on par with the latest portable navigation systems. The Garmin 550 gives you turn-by-turn text- and voice-guided directions, plus it has text-to-speech functionality, so the system will actually speak street names. Other navigation features include automatic route recalculation, detours, and a healthy POI database.

You can view maps in 2D or 3D mode with day or night colors. The colors automatically switch to the night setting at sundown.The map screen is very simple and displays your speed, estimated arrival time, and the distance to your next turn. On the top of the screen, the next turn and the street name is displayed, and there are also plus and minus buttons to zoom in and out of the map. If you touch the speed tab, a slick, trip information screen comes up displaying your direction, speed, max speed, and a fuel gauge. The last feature will only show when the unit is connected to the motorcycle mount.

The Garmin 550 has a built-in MP3 player. You can load a bunch of songs onto an SD card and listen tunes for hours via a Bluetooth headset connected to your helmet. The Cardo Scala Rider FM worked like a champ with this unit. The experience was actually better on the Zumo than on the Rider because it never dropped the Bluetooth connection.

With the Garmin Zumo 550, you cannot change elevation/zoom from the main nav screen, you can only adjust it while in map mode searching for a destination. The second you go back to the main navigation screen you loose the elevation you chose and go back to a default level of zoom, which for me is real irritating.

Another annoying feature is the keyboard for text input does not offer a QWERTY layout. I have not had to type on an ABCDEF style keyboard since the invention on the PC. In fact, I have a Garmin IQue 3600 that’s 4 years old and it has a QWERTY keyboard?

Also, the search function on the Garmin 550 is relatively slow at times. I once waited 4+ minutes while searching for a popular restaurant. It found it eventually, but for a while I thought the unit just froze up. I happen to be sitting in my driveway so it was only a minor annoyance, but if you were parked on the roadside with cars buzzing by it would seem more like an eternity.

One other issue, the built in hard drive is pretty much full with maps right out of the box, which isn’t that big of a deal with the open SD slot. The SD slot lets you slip in a SD card for expanded memory capability (MP3 storage etc.), but when loading routes from your PC (which is a great feature I’ll touch on below) you must save the data directly to the units hard drive in order for the Garmin Zumo 550 to be able to read it. Well, that’s going to be an issue when the hard drive fills up from firmware updates, etc.

While I’m at it, I think the icon that marks your position on the map is annoyingly large. It makes your car or bike look the size of a lake, or some other large map detail.

On the plus side, I believe that all of the issues I mentioned are correctable via a firmware update and a few bugs are to be expected to some extent given this is the 1st generation of a new model. Although, you can also argue that with the price this thing sells for combined with the experience Garmin has building GPS devices there is really no excuse for the Garmin 550 lacking anything.

A nice feature, which is common on Garmins top units, is that you can map out routes on your PC, load it to the Zumo 550 (again, on the built in hard drive though not the SD card) and away you go. This comes in handy if you’re in sales for example and need to hit a few clients on a particular day or if you’re going to be cruising on your bike and have a bunch of places you want to stop at during the trip. Rather than having to wait and program destinations one at a time as you make your stops, you can knock them all out the night before on your PC so you’re entire trip is planned before it’s even begun.

Also, the Bluetooth feature is sweet and works flawlessly. Pairing the Garmin Zumo 550 with my Blackberry was a breeze. The Zumo 550 was able to read my address book and displayed the contacts on the phone screen so there was never a need to touch the Blackberry once paired. When in the car, the speaker worked well and people on the other end seemed to have no trouble hearing me. I disagree with the one reviewer that said the mount looked weak. I think the mount would successfully support a cinderblock on rough road.

Installing the Garmin 550 on my ZZR1200 took me about 30 min. It takes some time to run the wires and connect to the battery. You will need to crimp connectors (that are not supplied) on the end of the wires that go to the battery. The Ram mount is real solid. The Zumo 550 does not move once you’re locked in and on the road.

The Zumo 550’s system acquires satellite signals very quickly, the menu structure is intuitive, the touch screen works very easily and is easy to read even in bright sun and from behind a dark visor, the audio volume was excellent even at 80MPH on interstate and the turn by turn instructions are well timed to give riders plenty of time to adjust lane positions and riding speed. You can give it your estimated gas mileage and at end of a tank it will present you with a gas pump icon which, when touched, lists the nearest gas stations to your position. Touch the gas station you want and it will route you to it. The Garmin 550 was great support and a joy to use during my ride. I found only two very minor “quirks”. If you add the optional SD card as I did, you will need to format it as a FAT32. I formatted as NTFS and the MP3 files were not recognized although my personal POI file was recognized. Also, when you load additional maps, I loaded some US TOPO maps, the Zumo 550 defaults to its internal City Navigator and it “flashes the Topo to let you know that it’s there. To get the Topo map you have to deselect the City Navigator. Neither of these “quirks” was covered by reading the owner’s manual.

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