Auto GPS Units

[boatfixer]

Looking for a GPS for the wife, looking for user friendly and reliability. Garmin, Magellan, TomTom???

[Macgyver55]

If you read up on them, Garmin seems to load the most data on their units. I have nothing but praise for mine. As far as user friendly, my 85 year old dad figured it out in minutes. I also have a buddy that hauls all over the country. He actually has both Garmin and Tom Tom, and he says the Garmin seems to be a better unit for him. Sorry, I dont personally know anyone with a Magellan though.

[zamboni]

I have a Magellan Roadmate. My dad has a Garmin Nuvi. I have borrowed his before, and I personally think the Magellan is more user friendly. His Nuvi got us lost the day we bought our camper from a guy by Terrill Iowa that lived on a farm. That was the last time we borrowed it.

I got my Roadmate at Radio Shack on clearance. It was a $200 GPS marked down to $69. Couldn't pass it up

[Down2Earth]

The wife has a Garmin Nuvi that she says she likes. Men don't need directions.

[delcecchi]

Speak for yourself. I got a garmin to take to San Diego and it saved me a couple of times. On the other hand, the update I got didn't cover the new Hiway53, which drives it crazy. But I know how to get from Cook to Virginia so no problem.

[deadeye]

I got a Garmin and I like it. I'm not so worried about directions but I like to see where I'm at on a map.

The couple times I have used it for directions it has worked pretty good.

I like that you basically have a yellow pages with it. If you want to find something and you don't know the area you just type in what your after and it tells you where to go.

[The_Duckslayer]

I ahve a Nuvi and when I was out in Boston doing stores it took me to the front door of all of them. I have had real good luck with it! Nothing fancy but it gets me where I am going and does it every bit as well as the big expensive ones! Oh, but they can change the voice sound ;-) Take care and N Joy the Hunt././Jimbo

[SimilarIsland]

On the other hand, the update I got didn't cover the new Hiway53, which drives it crazy. But I know how to get from Cook to Virginia so no problem.

That's funny, my Garmin always goes crazy on the way to Canada between Virginia and IFalls on 53.

[delcecchi]

It should only go crazy between virginia and cook, where they moved the hiway a mile or so over. So the GPS thinks you are driving off road and says "recalculating" every 5 seconds....

Eventually, if you update the data in the GPS the problem should go away. Unfortunately they charge for updates after the first.

[SimilarIsland]

Yeh, that sounds about right. No big deal. Just a little annoying.

[superbee]

Have a Tomtom and it works great, good investment for the money. I think the biggest thing is just getting used to the unit you purchase. Mine shows I am off the road on 53 as well.

[Kirsch]

All of the companies mentioned make good options. It all comes down to user preference, and what else you want to do with it. Garmin has the most maps, period, of any company both from Garmin and 3rd party map manufacturers. For instance, you could get topo, fishing, trail maps and much more and load them up in a Nuvi. There are some limited options for other maps but not nearly as good as Garmin. I would vote for a Nuvi personally.

Also, the settings on the Nuvi can be tweaked if a GPS is getting you lost. By default they are pretty good but an example is if the GPS is set for Biking vs automotive, good luck getting to your destination.