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Anybody here use GPS, and if so which one? I'm about to move my business phone to an iPhone, but as I understand it the iPhone is not a great GPS system.

I recently had satellite TV installed and the installer was from out of state. He said he punched in the address and it brought him to my door. I then decided that I can't live without GPS for those customers who don't know where they live.

Garmin Nuvi - get the simple basic one and update the maps every 2 years if your community is growing.
Use mine all the time and love it.

I use a Garmin. I've owned mine for over 2 years and it works flawlessly. The only thing I don't like about them, is that they don't necessarily have the latest roads or developments installed with them and even with the free updates for the first year I believe it was, they are not always there either. After that, you have to pay something like $139 each time you upgrade the latest maps. So far, I've not upgraded mine at all. I figure for that price, I might as well just buy a new one as they have come down in price A LOT since then.

Mine is this one which is now discontinued. https://buy.garmin.com/shop/shop.do?pID=385#

But, here are a bunch more to check out. https://buy.garmin.com/shop/shop.do?cID=134

Personally, I prefer a wider screen. Easier to see even though you can listen to it tell you where to go, (similar to what our spouse might do when they are angry at us) turn left on such and such street in 2.4 miles it is nice nonetheless to turn down the volume at times and simply watch the street close in as you approach it instead of listening to the constant blabbering of it.

Garmin NUVI....excellent GPS

Is there a down side?
Arranged to meet my partner at a clients home and arrived early.
Got the Garmin to locate a coffee shop and went there to take a break.
Partner calls and asks where I was.
Told him I was at the coffee shop.
He says where, I will meet you.
I could not tell him - had to go to the car and fire up the Garmin to get the address so that he could program his to find me.

I've used Garmin for years. I carry a road atlas for back up but rarely have to use it. It's a great time saver and worth the money ten times over. Make sure not to leave it visible when you park to prevent theft.

Issues: I wish it had a QUERTY style keyboard for easier entry. Rarely it has taken me to the rear gate of a subdivision (no access without clicker) and I have to figure out where the front gate is. Sometimes it will take a short cut though a gated subivision (the gates were probably added later)

I don't use one. Maine is the most heavily forested state in the union and in many areas GPS simply doesn't work. A cell phone, good memory, maps, and as a last resort .. the P.O. all work well, and the maps, memory, and P.O. don't need batteries and don't get stolen.

(the post office knows where EVERYONE is)

It looks like Garmin owns the market, which may explain why Tomtom is coming out with a real app for the iPhone. The tech geeks are saying that this may be the beginning of the end for stand alone GPS units. They also predict it will put heavy price pressure on them and drive the price down.

I think I'll wait until its out for a month or so and see how the Tomtom iPhone app works.

I've also found that UPS and Fedex drivers know everybody. After I put signs on my vehicle people were much more willing to talk to me, since I was clearly not a "revenuer".

I use the one my cellular phone company offers. It works very well, most of the time. It won't work if I go into a roaming area though. I would have to have nation wide service for that which I don't really need. It does seem to know all of the streets, even the newest ones. It can't seem to accept an address that has a letter in from of it though, like E1255 or N1366. It will only take the road name and get me to that road but that is good enough. It also doesn't know about roads closed due to construction. It usually does give the shortest route which may not be the best route. It doesn't know that dandy shortcut may be on a snow and ice covered road or that side street it wants you to take has speed bumps on it. Otherwise, it works great.

Garmin and Magellan are the 2 big names in GPS, I've heard mixed reviews on the rest. I own a Magellan Roadmate 2200T I got about 4-5 years ago for around 400$. I love it and can't live without it. I overview the whole route if the ETA looks suspiciously long since it does not always give you the fastest or shortest route and other times the actual address may be off by 50 yards or on the opposite side of the street. I hate paper maps, looking for non existent road signs or numbers and having to get directions from a customer, the GPS is a godsend.

My Garmin suddenly quit working today! It was only 18 months old and had been reminding me I needed an update. I still had another tuning, so I ran to a Wal-mart and bought a replacement.

Bob,

Did you try to do a reset? Mine did the same thing, but there is a way to reset it by holding the "On" button to the left for a specified period of time.

I got my Garmin Nuvi for Christmas from my wife last year. I've been using a map program for PDA called Mapopolis for the last few years. I like it because it feeds of my contact database. All I have to do is select to contacts and it will give me a route from one to the other. Unfortunately, they are no longer supporting this program, and I think they're out of business. The Garmin turned out to be a timely gift. It is extremely helpful, especially when one doesn't want to have to think about finding where he's going. Once in a while it will take me on really weird detours, like leading me off the freeway onto an exit only to lead me right back on. Overall it gets thumbs up.

Thanks for the suggestion, Dave. I tried it and no luck. It's completely dead. I stopped at a gas station, and it wouldn't come back on when I started the car.

Bob,

That happened to mine, too, but I was able to reset it. I was convinced it was dead, but I called my wife at home, and she was able to tell me how to reset it from looking on the Garmin website.

Dan
I just recently purchased an iPhone, and downloaded an app called "G-Map U.S. West" It was only $35 to download, and there are no other additional charges. It has voice turn by turn directions. G-Map U.S. West contains states from Illinois west. There is also an "East" version. It works great for me, it is a little tricky to figure out initially though.

Ryan Hassell
Hassell's Piano Tuning
Farmington, MO