GPS Choices

"Dave Butler" wrote in message
...

I think I paid $400 for the "auto kit" for the 196. I'd say it's marginal
utility for that price. I like it as an aviation GPS, and it's OK in the
car,
too, but not worth the extra $400 I paid for the car kit.

List is $349. MAP is $299. I paid $269 at Avionics West.

The auto database is quite out of date, and several roads I use regularly
are
not in the database. I just got an offer to purchase an updated database,
so
maybe that will take care of that issue. The database doesn't carry a
"current-as-of" date. The road datebase upgrades are fairly expensive.

Hasn't been a big problem for me, but I'll probably upgrade. The only big
shortage is all the subdivisions that have gone in around here in the last
couple years (based on what is there, it appears the data was from sometime
in 2000). The wife uses the car mode more than I do, and that was part of
the argument for getting it -- it wasn't just a toy for my flying.

The auto-routing in auto (i.e.not aviation) mode has a tendency to send me
down
a certain dirt road nearby. There seems to be no way to configure "ignore
unpaved roads".

The routing rules are obviously based on some general assumptions about
roads and average speeds for those roads. So sometimes it makes choices
that I wouldn't choose knowing the road. I find doing the routing on the PC
lets me tweak the route -- it's pretty easy to get what I want with a few
well chosen "via" waypoints. That doesn't help when I'm out somewhere and
start looking for an address, but then I'll usually take what help I can
get.

Not sure whether you can cobble together your own "car kit" for a lot less
than
$400. IIRC the kit consists of a sort-of bean-bag mount that sits on car's
dashboard, a 64M flash card, and the database CD. You might find another
way of
mounting, find the flash somewhere else cheaper, and buy the database
separately. As I said, not sure whether this is feasible.

It also includes the USB card programmer, so the kit is a few bucks cheaper
than the piece price. Problem is the flash is proprietary and Garmin won't
sell the City Select CD alone.

The 196 is great in the plane. In the car, it's as good as the StreetPilot
III except it doesn't do voice prompts -- it just chimes and displays a
pop-up message. Works fine for me and the wife is happy with it.

Gerry