There are things I like about the nav system, but other things that I find difficult to use. With my Garmin, I can locate a point of interest (POI) by specifyng whether it's near my current location, on the current route, near my destination, or near another city/state. On the Prius, if I am looking for something that isn't near here and I haven't programmed in a destination already, I can't find a way to specify another location. Is there a way? Also, it's almost impossible to know what categories to use. For example, how do I find a Costco or Bed Bath & Beyond? Using voice recognition, what's really annoying is when she thinks you are saying a different category from the one you meant. If she can't find anything that fits the category, she'll say nothing fits and just cancels your request, making you start over from the beginning. She doesn't give you a chance to go back.
+1 Complete sympathy here. I hate that you have to start over when she mis-hears your request. And I'm still working out how to find POI's as well. Today I wanted to make a bathroom stop and get a cup of coffee... figured the nearest Dunkin Donuts would do. Couldn't find one through the nav for the life of me... and as I was fooling with it on my third try, I watched one go by right at the end of the exit ramp I had just passed. Pissed me off. In this case I think the failure was that it hadn't read the DVD right and actually didn't have ANY poi's loaded. Anyway, I guess this is a useless reply, since I don't have an answer. But if nothing else, at least you know you're not alone
Choose Near center of city. choose city then it will find points of interest near your chosen city. It's different form Garmins of Delorme, It took me a while for figure it out. I kept thinking it was looking for the city not setting the search area.
Works if you know the names of the cities along your route and you don't mind reversing course sometimes. But if you don't (unfamiliar stretch of highway that you know the endpoints of, so you didn't set a route, for example), then you might not know the city name. I just got in the habit of always setting a route on longer drives so that I could use the 'along route' option should the need arise.
I'm not sure how to set a route if I haven't a specific address to go to. How do you just enter a city or something? What I finally figured out though is if you aren't moving, you can can enter a POI by name - i.e., type in the name -- and you can then set the city/state where it's near. The voice recognition works pretty well for addresses, but sucks for entering POIs, especially if you're moving,which is when you're most likely to need it. I like the way it gives you "command list" as one of the commands you can say, but then won't give you the list if you're moving.
The only thing I can tell you is that you have to make sure you switch to the correct region. I was trying to find an address in CT and the NAV was set to NJ, PA, and point south GRRRRRRRR
