Entertainment Electronics 1st Gen Most liked posts in thread: Which GPS?

Use a smartphone. Never pay for updates, get a new one every so often, and you don't have to worry about it cooking in the car over the summer.

The GPS on my Droid has been very reliable. My Nuvi hasn't been out since I got it and I don't have to pay $150 for a map update.

 

Yep...Click Me

 

I love my Garmin (I call it ScottScott b/c of the TomTom commercials). It works well, is easy to update, has pretty accurate coord readings for geocaching (usually within 10 feet or so). And you can get an ecoroute app that will read your car like a scan gauge. For the price, I think it's a great device.

 

My wife uses a veeeery basic Garmin 1300LM. Personally i use my Droid w/ Google Maps, which has proved to be more useful and up to date then the Garmins.

 

MIne came with a MINI branded Garmin nuvi 360 that has been working great. I am thinking of upgrading to a model that supports the EcoRoute app.

 

Yeah, the problem with smartphones is when you accidentally drop them while walking to the car, more than the battery cover flies off :blush2:
Altho, googlemaps is very much cooler than the little line drawing bits.

 

That is a possibility, but ive done far worse things to my phone then drop it. If you NEEED to have a GPS, get a cheap one, so that if i vanishes, no big deal. The Garmin 1300LM is just that, and the LM stands for Lifetime Maps. I think i only paid something like $130 for it.

 

I like the Garmin for a couple of reasons, I like the Ecoroute option with the gauges and the ability to read and clear codes, and I like the interface, it's pretty easy to use, although not perfect. The 1390LT will do all of that for under $200, and has lifetime free map updates.

Also they're a local US company, and I like that......and I know one of the principals, Gary Burrell - the Gar in the company name. I don't know his partner Min Kao, the other half of the company name, but I know they worked together for a long time and have done great things. I even have a block of the company's stock, so I guess I'm a little biased!

I've had 3 Garmins over the last 7 years, we still have the first one which cost over $700 (severly discounted too! :eek6 I bought the exact same unit less than a year later for $325 - I recently gave that unit to an elderly friend of mine who lost his in a bad car wreck and he still uses it, and I bought the 1390T so I could get the Eco route and gauges - I paid about $250 for that one last year and now those are substantially less....it's pretty amazing what these little computers will do for so little money.

However, I think eventually someday the phone apps will supplant them, in the meantime - it works for me!

 

I have the Garmin 720 and Emily (the Brit female voice) takes very good care of me. I have never tried the other brands, as this is my first GPS. If I am going to a location in one of those industrial parks, sometimes it will only get me to a cluster of buildings, rather then the exact one. I can understand this and I can just look for numbers at that point. It works great in any state except northern PA, but I don't think PA puts half of their roads on any map.

Jim

 

Go to the Garmin website

Garmin | Follow the leader

You can view and compare all of the models against each other.Pick the one you may want and go to amazon.com and read the reviews.

I now have the 350 with 2011 map update but am considering a 3750 because of some of the new features. I don't want the traffic feature because it dumps a bunch of pop up ad's all over the screen. (The price of "FREE")

Once you get the Garmin you can get the Mini of your choice to install from Nate on this forum.

:beer

 

I use a Garmin too because I could customize it and put on the MINI Splash Screen and Mod the car they show to look like mine. I've tried smart phone based nav but the one time I needed it the most I was chatting away on the phone. I missed a few turns. With that in mind I'll stick to the phone for apps and conversations, the Garmin for nav.

 

What ever you get, I would not get the unit this couple had:

Travelers warned not to rely only on GPS - Yahoo! News

 

Scott,

Nother' Garmin guy here. There are soooo many choices. I'd research online and go to a retail location to put your hands on it. The first one I bought online and while it functioned great (still does, take it on business trips) the screen is pretty small. If I had put my hands on I prob would have got the one I have now. I also like the ability to program in a route which my current does and the small screen one did not.

And why o why can't they allow you to import created maps easily from Google Maps, MapQuest etc? We can save that for another post

 

Funny how when something is overwhelmingly one sided, it is suddenly fanboy time instead of one *actually* being better than the other...

Congrats on your purchase. I have NO allegiance to Garmin, just happened to be the one I bought because of a similar overwhelming support for it when I asked the same question. Mine has been dormant since I got my Droid...

And on a side note how the heck does ANYONE get "lost" in the continental U.S. for 48 days??? Hiding for 48 days, I could see, but not finding a track or a trail or a homestead or another traveler for 48 days??? I find that damned near impossible to believe...