Gps

[Magic Smiles]

I am thinking about getting DH a GPS for Father's Day. Since I don't know much about them, does anyone recommend a particular one. I have heard that Garmin's are the best and so have been looking at them. There are so many out there.
I do want:
'speech-to-voice', I think it is called. When it tells you "Turn left on Valley Road in 150 feet".
I have to be able to take it from one car to another as we will be travelling this summer with a rental car on the west coast of USA and a GPS would be invaluable, believe me.

Any suggestions?

[faline]

I got a GPS 760 for Christmas and think it's great! We took it on vacation with us and it was quite valuable to have. Additionally, I often attend meetings at new and unknown locations - it's been great at getting me to where I want to go. My GPS does announce. It also has traffic warnings so will tell me if there's traffic up ahead and will reroute me around the traffic if I want.

There are some glitches. For instance, it sometimes wants me to take a different route it thinks is shorter but doesn't seem to take into account that I know there will be more traffic that way that will delay me or more traffic lights with the same result. If I know where I'm going, I sometimes ignore the suggestions on how to get there!

[iDisney]

I too have a Garmin and love it! You can't go wrong with one. Just be warned: sometimes even the GPS gets confused. Mine told me to take a left turn one time... into a river! There was no road there. I just kept going straight and it recalculated and all was well. Even with it's confusion, it is a far better navigator that I am!

[Wayne]

I have a TomTom Go 720. Love it. The detail of the maps blows me away. I do a lot of driving in rural Northwest Georgia and Alabama and it even is aware of the dirt roads in those areas. It gets me where I'm going very efficiently. It has the capability for traffic warnings , however, they are not broadcast in this area.

[Itchy]

I have not had experience with the garmin but have seen the tom tom work and it worked well.

My verizon phone has the navigator feature which is like the tom tom and garmin and I am really happy with it. I does everything that the big boys do. I have the premium plan on my phone so it does not cost me air time. The premium plan also gives me Internet connection which is unlimited ( not broad band ) and unlimited text and photo features.

I the phone rings while I am using the navigator all I do is answer the phone and when I hang up it resumes the navigator automatically.

[jerrywilborn]

I prefer the Garmin Nuvi 750. Good price, lots of features, you can snap in a SD card with your music on it and supports FM transmitting.

[scoot241]

I rented a Garmin when I went to DL and was hooked. Take a look at the various models and determine which features you want; from there you can decide which model to buy.

I do highly suggest the text-to-speech feature. It's much easier to hear the name of the street instead of simply "turn right in 500 feet". Some have Bluetooth for hands-free cell phone usage; some have FM transmitters to play the voice (and music) through your car stereo.

[Magic Smiles]

Thanks for the replies. Costco has the Garmin Nuvi 855 portable on sale this week. It looks to have lots of features. Might have to check that one out closer.

[VWL Mom]

You might want to check out Amazon for the Garmin Nuvi 360 and then compare the 2. I have the 360 and have been happy with it. Also, for $119 ($99.00 at Costco) you can update your maps 4 times a year for the life of the unit.

[princessjojo]

I bought DH a TomTom 9??series (not quite sure of the model number) and we love it. We have used it to drive all over the East coast and it's gotten us there every time, even when we were told not to rely on it for accurate directions. When driving along highways and you come upon an interchange, it actually provides you with an image of the interchange, signs and all, and arrows with the direction to go. It also tells us pretty accurately how long our trip will take us, even when we stop. It has definitely been one of our smartest purchases in a long while.

[MickeyandTink]

I bought a Garmin a couple of years ago and it is very user-friendly. However, if you are travelling in areas outside of major cities, the maps are not the best. For example, my neighborhood is 5 years old, yet none of the streets exist on the Garmin map, even though I upgraded to the 2009 maps. There are also several places nearby that the GPS tells me turn onto where no street exists.

[scoot241]

You might want to check out Amazon for the Garmin Nuvi 360 and then compare the 2. I have the 360 and have been happy with it. Also, for $119 ($99.00 at Costco) you can update your maps 4 times a year for the life of the unit.

I have the 360 and it's very nice; however I believe it is discontinued.

[Magic Smiles]

Well I just ordered the Garmin Nuvi 855 portable from Costco online. None of the stores around me had it. I like the feature where it tells you what lane to be in. Since we will be driving in Los Angeles this coming Aug, I would imagine that it will help us. If we try it out at home and find out that we don't like it, then I will just return it for another model. I need it for Father's Day and time was running out. Hopefully we will like this one. There are so many out there that it was mind boggling:goodbad::crazy:

Funny what MickeyandTink said about the streets not being there. A few years ago I started looking into buying a GPS but gave up. At that time the only brand to have our street was the Garmin. Our street had been in existence 8 years by then. I guess there are good and bad about all the brands.:goodbad::crazy: