Automotive GPS???

[The Annoyed Man]

Can someone recommend me a good automotive GPS?  I'm looking for a portable one that will get me reliably from point A to point B.  I don't need all the extras like a picture viewer, mp3 player, etc.  Looking at the Garmin line.  Any experience with these?

[Boomhauer]

Mio. Better than others such as TomTom, etc. Don't get the no-name unit that's on QVC late at night (my extended, not so smart family bought two of those last year. One was a Cobra, and the other was an Initial brand). We tried to navigate with them on a trip. Both FAILED miserably. Processors too slow, pathetic directions, etc.

I'm told the Mio have the SiRF star III chipset, which locks on fast and holds satellites with an iron grip.

Never used a Garmin automotive, but I rely on a panel mounted one in the airplanes I rent and I have a Garmin 12CX that has worked great. None of those have the road maps, though. I think the Garmins are a bit pricey, but they should work well.

[Lennyjoe]

I just purchase a Garmin Nuvi 200 for my daughter.  Circuit city has them on sale for $169.  I looked at Tom Tom and some others but liked the Garmin better.

Then again, I'm a bit partial to Garmin since I have 2 handheld GPS's and they are great.

[Boomhauer]

Then again, I'm a bit partial to Garmin since I have 2 handheld GPS's and they are great.

Yep. Garmins are good. If I had to choose a GPS based on brand...that's what I'd pick.

Circuit city has them on sale for $169

Well, maybe not as pricey as I'd thought...so they wouldn't be a bad idea.

TomTom gets all the attention, but I hate the name, and the commercials are usually annoying. Not "Head On" annoying, but annoying in their own right.

[Manedwolf]

Mio. Better than others such as TomTom, etc. Don't get the no-name unit that's on QVC late at night (my extended, not so smart family bought two of those last year. One was a Cobra, and the other was an Initial brand). We tried to navigate with them on a trip. Both FAILED miserably. Processors too slow, pathetic directions, etc.

I'm told the Mio have the SiRF star III chipset, which locks on fast and holds satellites with an iron grip.

Never used a Garmin automotive, but I rely on a panel mounted one in the airplanes I rent and I have a Garmin 12CX that has worked great. None of those have the road maps, though. I think the Garmins are a bit pricey, but they should work well.

Agreed. I have a Mio DigiWalker 310X. It uses the SiRFstar III chipset, and has a 400mHz processor, so it can't even say it's recalculating before it's ready again. Trip plot takes about 1-2 seconds. Fast little thing.

Also, the interface is a LOT nicer than the TomTom and Garmin look. While the latter two remind me of old Windows setups with lots of dark blue and rectangles, the Mio uses all rounded edges like OSX's Aqua, lighter gradient-shaded colors during the day, and a city-lights blue on black at night. 2D (highway) to 3D (local road) auto-transitions involve a nice spin-and-zoom that lets you keep your bearings if you're looking at it. The hardware shading is pretty impressive for a little device. It's very accurate, the voice is good, too, and when it says turn now, it's right on where you should turn. I like it.

There's newer ones out, too. Also, Mio is a European company, not a Chinese knockoff. They just don't have the mass market penetration here.

Literally the first time I turned it on, it had a satellite lock within seconds, showed the entire constellation it was locked onto and their IDs, and showed current location as "Circuit City, Daniel Webster Highway, Nashua". It's got a lot of POIs. I was rather impressed.

[Lennyjoe]

How much did you shell out for the Mio?

[MillCreek]

I recently bought a GPS for Ms. MillCreek as a birthday gift.  I own Magellan and Garmin GPS units for my hiking and bicycling, so that is where I looked first.  The important features she wanted included Bluetooth for hands-free calling, the ability to easily update the software, and a memory slot for new maps.  After reading lots of comparisons, I ended up buying her a TomTom 720.  What sealed the deal is I found it at Dell on sale for $ 349, when other stores had it for $ 450-525.  She is really happy with it.

PS: www.gpsreview.net was a great resource.

[Jamisjockey]

It won't be much help in your case, but I've got a Garmin Extrex Vista HCX.  It does everything from topo mapping to turn by turn directions.  With software, probably a sight bit more expensive than the automotive units.....

[Ben]

I have the Nuvi 350, which I got for Christmas three years ago. I really like it, especially as an "all in one" unit for Mp3s and stuff. It's great for business travel because I can plug it into the rental car and have navigation and my favorite tunes in the one device. That particular model has come way down in price since I got it and I think is great bang for the buck. Whatever unit you get, go for the street name turn by turn versus the "turn left at the next street" directions. Hearing the street name has saved me from wrong turns A LOT in cattywumpus urban areas where the streets are practically on top of each other.

Like probably most car units, the software always gets me where I want to go, though not always by the best route (from tests going to areas that I know well). No big deal though from my point of view.

[mgdavis]

Jamis, does it have text to speech and does it actually say street names?

The ETrex Series does not have any speech capability that I am aware of, unless the made some rather drastic changes since I got my Vista Cx. It's designed more for hiking, or as a general purpose unit, than strictly being vehicle-based. That being said, I mount mine in my pickup on occasion for driving directions. I've found that it's not the most accurate routing software, it has actually got me lost once or twice so I no longer rely solely on the GPS to get me from A to B.

[Jamisjockey]

Jamis, does it have text to speech and does it actually say street names?

No and no.  The turn prompts are a very loud beep.
This is the outdoors handheld type.  I found it to be a better solution for me, I can use it hunting, hiking, biking and fishing in addition to the car.
https://buy.garmin.com/shop/shop.do?cID=145&pID=8703

[never_retreat]

I have a Garman Nuvi 650 and love it.
Wide screen, Fast, not much fluff.
I think they can be had on the web for 500ish

[never_retreat]

Now I'm pissed
That thing is half the price it was 6 months ago.

And I thought only computers dropped that fast.

[Ben]

Now I'm pissed

Join the club. They're about to release the new Nuvi with voice recognition for $1000. I figure by the end of the year I should be able to pick it up for $99.95.

[MillCreek]

FYI, Costco has the TomTom GO 920 on sale for $ 299 ( $ 100 off) from May 14th to June 1st.  So buy it soon if you are interested: http://www.costco.com/Browse/Product.aspx?whse=BC&topnav=&prodid=11266614&ec=BC-EC877-CatHome&pos=14&lang=en-US

[K Frame]

My GPS cost me about $15.

It's called an Atlas with street-level maps.

[Manedwolf]

Check the processor speed on the TomTom. Most had horrendously slow ones. Average now should be at least 400mhz.

TomToms still have that ugly Windows 95 looking interface and choice of screen colors, too.



Mio is much easier on the eyes. Gradient shaders FTW.

[Firethorn]

FYI, Costco has the TomTom GO 920 on sale for $ 299 ( $ 100 off) from May 14th to June 1st.  So buy it soon if you are interested: http://www.costco.com/Browse/Product.aspx?whse=BC&topnav=&prodid=11266614&ec=BC-EC877-CatHome&pos=14&lang=en-US

Even better, Office Depot has the TomTom One V3 on sale for ~$130.

While I'm sure it's not as good as many others, we got one for my grandfather.  We did notice a bit of new construction not in the map - a highway exit ramp had been rebuilt differently.

I could punch in street addresses, look up stuff like restaurants, gas stations, and airports by name.  IE I want to eat at a popeye's, I can look up the closest ones.  It did take around a minute to figure out a route from Florida to North Dakota.

Mom did ask for about a 'return to origin' type function, which I did not find, but if you want to return you can always save the location as a favorite.  Street address numbers are good for the block, not the driveway(IE it put the turn into my parent's neighbor's driveway rather than their own).  It's also a bit enthusiastic about locking the presumed location of the vehicle to the nearest road, resulting in funny directions when in a driveway or parking lot.

Note, all these views are coming from a person who's sole experience with a GPS device was this one.

[Manedwolf]

The TomTom One has a painfully slow 250mHz processor.

[Firethorn]

The TomTom One has a painfully slow 250mHz processor.

Probably so, but I didn't have much problem with it, as noted, a route from FL to ND took it a minute.  Sure, a 400 mhz processor would probably drop that to half that, but still.

You also can't play MP3s on the thing, or use it for much other than navigation.

[MillCreek]

The TomTom One has a painfully slow 250mHz processor.

The TomTom GO 720 that I bought for Ms. MillCreek has a SIRFStarIII processor at 400 Mhz and 64mb RAM.  It seems pretty lickety split.  It seems to pick up the satellites much faster than my Garmin and Magellan outdoor handheld GPS units, although both of them are much older than the TomTom.

[WayneConrad]

I've got the Garmin Nuvi... 350, I think it is.  The lowest model that talks to you.  It's great.

It's fast enough, most of the time.  Now and then, if the turns are very close together, it will annoy me by not announcing a turn as quickly as I'd like it to.  I can just look at the screen to see where the turn is drawn, though.  It's only an issue because I've gotten used to relying upon the aural prompts.  It's nice to keep my eyes on the road and not on the screen.

The Atlas is pretty good.  It's updated every few years, and you have to pay for updates.  I think that's pretty standard for these things. 

It has a very complete database of businesses, as long as they're not too new (because the atlas is updated every few years, if you'll recall).  Most of the time, I don't have to type in an address--just a business name, and it knows the address.  That's very cool.

The screen is bright enough to see even in direct Phoenix sun.

The routing is very good.  It often finds routes better than I would have thought of.  Sometimes, of course, it finds silly routes that I don't like.  You can look at the route beforehand to see where it's taking you, and insert a "via" to modify the route.  It only accepts one "via", but that hasn't been a problem for me.  Usually I don't bother entering a "via"... I just drive.  If it tells me to turn on 35th avenue and I like 51st Avenue better, I just keep driving and turn on 51st Avenue.  It adapts.  Every time you miss where it wants you to turn, it says "recalculating" and makes a new route.

I'm more likely to go places than I was before.  Driving to places in traffic was just frustrated.  One wrong turn in the city while trying to wrestle with a map and read unlit signs at night, getting honked at because I wasn't going the obligatory 25 over, and I'm gonna be 30 minutes late to the party.  Too much stress for this boy.  The GPS made it all better.