Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I was probably among the very first consumers to own a GPS unit when they first appeared on the market several years ago. I was completely turned on to them thanks to renting an AVIS vehicle with their included "never lost" GPS unit. I ended up buying the Magellan Roadmate 700 because it so closely resembled the unit in the Avis vehicles. Over the years the RoadMate 700 has become less reliable for me due to the fact that it takes about 15 minutes for it to acquire a satellite signal. Other than that, I have completely loved the GPS unit despite the fact that Magellan is a difficult company to deal with when it comes to upgrading and customer support. I work in a job where I am constantly on the road and need to find my way to new destinations. You can imagine how much I need to rely on a GPS unit. When I had enough of the RoadMate signal problems, I decided to look into purchasing a new unit. After all, that Magellan GPS unit was about 7 years old. Everybody says Garmin is the better GPS unit. The reviews on consumer sites such as this are glowing with raves about how accurate Garmin directions are and how accessible upgrades and customer support are. Well, thanks to reviews like those, I bought into the hype and purchased the Garmin 760. I don't know if most of these people ever had a GPS unit prior to their Garmin, but as a person of "experience" I think this a huge step down from the Magellan brand. SETUP Out of the box, the Garmin is easy to hook up and immediately use. On the plus side, the unit acquired a signal (and continued to do so) within a few seconds. The included suction cup is plenty strong. I feel confident it would serve well on the toughest road conditions. On the down side, Garmin skimped on including a case, AC charger and manual for this product. When you are paying $400 for a GPS unit they should give you everything. ENTERING AN ADDRESS Entering an address on the Garmin 760 has been completely mismanaged. Most GPS units will blank out letters and numbers as you complete the address entry, making the user feel more secure that they are entering a reliable destination. This is not the case here. Sometimes I had to type out an extremely long street address before the Garmin had it confirmed within its database. The entire process is done so much better on the Magellan series. MAPS The one thing I really like about the Garmin units is its more "catoonish" map which you can customize with a vehicle of your choice. Your selected vehicle (be it a tank, motorcycle or dude on a sled) coasts down the designated road. This is a nice step up from other GPS units I have seen. I had the opportunity to use my Garmin over the past few days on local roads that I knew. I was a bit dismayed that the GPS tried to put me on toll roads rather than take back roads that would have gotten me to my destination in the same amount of time. This made me feel rather uncomfortable about the reliability of this unit to give the best directions. Worst of all, I programmed the unit to take me to a local Post Office which I selected from its enormous POI database. When it told me I had arrived at my destination, there was no Post Office to be seen. I had to actually stop in the bank and ask for directions. The Post Office was actually .5 miles further down the road. The Garmin was not able to lock onto a simple highway address accurately. On several other occasions, it also told me my destination was on the LEFT when it actually was on the RIGHT. I was fortunate to be using this GPS on local roads that I knew. I am petrified to take it out in the real world and have to rely on its accuracy. BEWARE! BEWARE! I knew about this in advance of buying my Garmin, but I wanted to see how bad it was for myself... There is no chime to indicate you are at a turn. This is the worst omission that a GPS unit could have. So many times during its use I missed my turn. Though the unit warns you of an upcoming turn, its distance is not correctly shown. The little moving car on the map is further away from the turn than you actually are. It's incredibly easy to go past a designated turn. I know many have been complaining to Garmin for years about the lack of turn chimes and all these complaints have seemed to fallen on deaf ears. I even wrote a letter to Garmin customer support and got a standard reply of "we are forwarding your concerns to management." Another HUGE problem here is that unlike the Magellan GPS units, the Garmin does not split the screen at turns and show the actual route maneuver. You have no idea how useful such a function is until you don't have it anymore. Voice commands from the GPS were very good with great text to speech accuracy. The big problem is that the volume is fairly low compared to other units. I could not play my radio loud and hear the GPS unit at the same time. The speaker is very tiny and the volume will not rise above a noisy vehicle. BLUETOOTH Setting up bluetooth was simple. I was able to instantly pair the 750 with my iPhone. It also stayed paired whenever I got in and out of the vehicle or was away from it for a few days. My iPhone database never seemed to upload to it. The calling function is pretty bad. I called my answering machine to test it out and upon playback, it sounded like I was in a tunnel. This is not the perfect solution for those wanting hands-free calling in their vehicle. CONCLUSION I am not particularly happy with this Garmin product. The problem is, there is no perfect GPS. Magellan truly has the better GPS functions, but their customer support and product upgrades fall far short of Garmin. I also continue to read complaints about Magellan products acquiring satellite signals in a reasonable amount of time. That being said, I would risk going back to Magellan for several reasons. First, it seems that their accuracy of destination is miles ahead of Garmin. The fact that you get a chime that alerts you at the point of turn is something no GPS unit should be without and I promise you that this Garmin will cause you to overshoot those turns. Finally, the split-screen turn maneuvering on the Magellan is a godsend to have. The Magellan Maestro is also cheaper by a $100 or more with the same features as the Garmin plus a case and AC adapter in most cases.