[AT] OT: Garmin Car GPS

[Larry Goss]

Not all GPS units are created equal, Al.  My SIL in Ohio is on his third one, and is reasonably happy with it after unhappy results with earlier ones.  My son (in Poland) has a combination unit (GPS, cell phone, email, web cam, web surfing, texting, music, etc) that works anywhere in the world where he wants to go.  The unit is not cheap, but its small size makes it possible for him to take it with him everywhere.  It's light enough that he hangs it by a lanyard around his neck.

I bought an El Cheapo Magellan unit from Office Depot when it was being sold on clearance.  It was marked down to around $100.00 from the regular retail of around $250.00.  It does what I need, but there are times when the choice of route could be a little more flexible.  It only has "Shortest route", "Fastset route", "Most use of freeways", and "Least use of freeways."  It would be nice to program it via a specific route, but to do that, I would have to break the route down into individual programs where I had a reasonable expectation that a particular route was the only one that would be chosen.

Last month, I was in North Carolina when I-40 got closed.  I pushed the "Home" button, and the GPS unit did its best to get me to follow the closed road for nearly 100 miles.  It finally gave up and went back to silent operation when it recalculated and found that it was closer by simply continuing ahead rather than turning around.

When you buy one, take the time to download the latest maps (should be free), but don't expect all the latest changes to be there.  There are two miles of a local expressway missing from my curreent  map, and there are around 70 miles of US 30 missing across Ohio.  When a group of us went to dinner while we were at the Arden, NC, show, the GPS unit was the only thing that could have gotten us there.  It was only 10 miles from the show grounds, but the route on I-26 is not exactly a cakewalk.

If you have contact with a bunch of students, ask them about pros and cons of the various GPS units.  They already know the idiosycracies.

Larry

----- Original Message -----
From: Al Jones <farmallsupera at earthlink.net>
Date: Saturday, November 7, 2009 20:32
Subject: [AT] OT: Garmin Car GPS
To: Antique tractor email discussion group <at at lists.antique-tractor.com>

> I'm thinking seriously about getting a GPS for my truck.  
> Several instances
> of poor/inaccurate directions on Mapquest this summer have sort of
> "convinced" me to move into the 21st century..... ;) 
> 
> I looked at a couple last night at Wal-Mart.  There was a 
> $129 unit that
> looked like about what I needed.  Is there anything I need 
> to really look
> (or watch out) for?  I don't want to spend a whole wad of 
> cash on a tip-top
> of the line model, just want to be able to find my way 
> around....I'm not
> really that brand-specific either, it's just Garmin is the brand 
> I have
> heard of the most.
> 
> thanks,
> A
> 
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