Portable vehicle navigation?
 

I don't carry a smartphone (on purpose) and find my tablet too cumbersome to mount in a vehicle. I'm looking at portable navigation units (like the Garmin Drive 53) to keep in my truck and move between rental cars on trips. Does anybody have recommendations?

GPS units have all but disappeared with the advent of the smartphone only place I really see selling them now are truck stops. OTR drivers seem like the only ones still using them, but their units are also tailored to their specific use.

We dint even use them in our Fire Apparatus anymore.

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Seems like it might be worth getting a used or clearance smart phone to use for this purpose. You don't have to use any other aspect of the phone if you don't want to. That also gives you the option of using any navigation app that you want, Waze, Google maps, Garmin, etc.... You can probably get whatever minimal service would get you what you want/need. You will need a data plan since the app will probably be downloading maps. But with a little research, there may be some app where you can download maps at the start of a drive for the drive via wifi, and then not have a plan, but rely on GPS only. I think these days most apps may require a data plan, but I'm not sure.

This is one of those threads that are intriguing simply because I would never think of an alternative to a Smart phone.

Interesting link:

https://www.pcmag.com/picks/the-best-gps-devices

Steve's correct, you would need a data plans to use those apps.

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I still use a Gamin GPS for my road trips. Out in many parts of New Mexico there was no cell service at all. The GPS was rock solid. Same for many parts of Arkansas.

The Garmin GPS works great and I enter the destination via my cell phone.

BZZZT! Thanks for playing. He wants a GPS because he doesn't have and doesn't want a cell phone.

Yes, I know the same buzzer applies to my post.

There are Openstreet and Google maps for offline use, but haven't looked into it.
Was going to try those on an old iPhone but it requires >OS11 iirc.

I have a collection of good paper charts and compass when I need to go off the grid.

It's an almost extinct skill

You can enter the destination manually, just easier with a cell phone. A GPS will work with no cell phone at all. I am just lazy, and prefer to use my cell phone to tell the GPS where I am going.

With my Blaupunkt stereo in the 91- I can use my cell phone as a GPS, and have it play music and directions both. I still prefer the stand alone GPS.

I still practice my count, 66 to 100m

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1699202441.jpg

Need to be aware when buying a new GPS as to if it has voice recognition for entering a destination.
The cheaper ones require using the touch-screen/keyboard, which is not as handy.

You must really not want to carry a cell phone. Mobile GPS is still around. Check out https://www.thegpsstore.com/GPS-Units/Automotive-GPS I've bought a few things from them in the past.

Let me explain my use case a bit better:

- I do carry a cell phone for voice/text communication. No data. No camera. It's a ruggedized phone without those features because I visit customers who don't want visitor cameras/data devices within their building but I often have to call work while on-site.

- I really don't want to carry multiple phones or deal with a data plan. I know that sounds irrational if I'm willing to carry a secondary navigation device so get over it.

- I do carry a wi-fi only tablet when traveling. I have tried a couple off-line mapping applications but found those messy to use while driving alone.

- I have zero problem with paper maps/directions and often use them while traveling for business, but also finding those to be inconvenient (especially when navigating alone at night).

- I am frequently in areas where there is no wi-fi / data reception.

And so a portable vehicle navigation device makes sense to me. The Garmin Drive series seems to be the best/reasonable I can find. I was just curious what others were using...

Portable vehicle navigation?
 

Garmin makes good stuff for every application. Our Cessna 182T has the G1000 system from the factory. It is amazing.

The gps I use in my 911 is just a better system than most phone based apps for remote areas. For around cities it is likely just a personal preference.

The car based gps systems come with lifetime updates. I update it often.

I used Garmin in the past, loved it.

I hooked it to a PC and preloaded all my destinations before trips.

Mine is many years old now, I haven’t updated it in forever, I have no idea what their current offerings are like.

I have a Garmin that’s buried somewhere in the center console compartment of my wife’s minivan. Haven’t used it in years…we like waze. Can’t believe how expensive they’ve gotten per Seahawk’s post. Prolly should dig it out and update just for fun.

My sister used to love her Tomtom gps units. Check Facebook Marketplace for some used ones.

I have and still use my Tomtom unit. It’s a couple years old and I can still get updates for it.

Not sure what units you can still buy, but try and buy one if possible that has free map updates as paying for them later can be expensive.

Hey, I know what that map is. I did orienteering two years in college.
Somewhere in the house is a Silva compass. I do not remember how many paces to 100m, and I'm sure it has changed in the last 40 years.

Navigation is better than it used to be, I bought the Silva not that many years ago because the GPS would say "Head South toward...", and I had no idea what direction south was.

I have an old Garmin in my bag, haven't used it in years, but I have had to use it in the last couple years. I should probably replace it with one that has lifetime maps. The last time I updated the map on this one I couldn't fit the entire US on the internal memory, and I think it would only accept a 2gb memory card, or something like that.

If you're in a spot with no cell service and want to start navigation to somewhere, android auto just isn't going to work. I still stop at rest areas and pick up paper maps every couple of years.

I have maps

We have a Garmin unit for our older cars. Works very well still.

Paper maps are fine for daylight driving on highways. They suck a lot in a rural area at night looking for the next turn. I was recently in middle of nowhere Missouri at night, and my GPS was wonderful, it told me the next turn was coming up and then as I got closer, it said it is right here.

I was slow to adopt the smart phone technology. I finally got a iPhone, and a few days later I drove over to a business I went to regularly. They had closed that location and moved to 1234 Grand Boulevard. Grand Boulevard in Oklahoma City was the original "ring road" that my grandparents used to take a horse and buggy to go around the city. Now it is a broken up by highways, road that can be just about anywhere. I punched in that address on the sign that said they moved into my iPhone, and I was taken right there.

I have not carried a paper map in my car in more years than I can remember.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1699295685.jpg

I have these maps framed and on display in my office. The Texas map is cool with no interstates, and the cities that are huge now are tiny.

One recommendation is to buy something with lifetime maps. You don't want to be paying a $100 annual subscription every year to get updates. Yes thats a thing.

Did you ever settle on a navi?

I did - I bought a Garmin Drive 53:

https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/1240929

It does come with lifetime maps and updates. The PC software for this isn't too intrusive and works well. It's small but readily visible when installed in my truck. I took this thing on a business trip to NY and it did a good job navigating me from Buffalo out to Canandaigua and back and all points in between. It has a great database of useful points of interest (fuel, restaurants, etc). It's pretty intuitive to enter and address and it provides reasonable directions. It does what I need it to...

Good! I was cleaning up my sister's stuff in my office and found the two Tomtoms I bought for her. Was going to send them to you in case you wanted them.

The Garmins are great. The right had of the screen pops up with three suggestions for a stop up ahead. I usually ignore them as they seem to be for people traveling with kids with tiny bladders and constant hunger pains and cars with a 5 gallon gas tank. Going through parts of southern New Mexico last summer that feature was blank, with miles and miles and no stops ahead for a while. No cell service, but the GPS was working.

The biggest feature they need to change or add is "keep me out of the ghetto" filter. It is happy to re-rout you right through bad parts of town if the interstate is closed.

That's a very generous thought - thank you! Perhaps there is another Pelican who can use those.

The Garmin Spot gives lots of functionality.
Used a lot in remote Baja California

They both work, but are not that fast. They have lifetime updates, but I don't think the oldest unit is supported anymore.

A number of gps apps (including free ones) allow download of maps to use with no data, just sayin….

GPS? Smart phone? How could I have possibly survived 80 years without either?
Map & compass..a road Atlas on long trips, and difficult as it is, asking directions...all work.

Now to my funny tale. Cindy was being placed in a Rehab center near the Albany, Oregon hospital. RN daughter took our car prior to check in, I guess to make sure paperwork was straight. Returning home, she said I might have trouble finding the place if I hadn't been there before, better let her drive...so, I did, listening (sort of) to her smart phone GPS, which sounded to my old ears like the garbled speaker at Mel's drive-in in the movie "American Grafitti".

What a wonderful tour of Albany neighborhoods that I'd never seen before that this unit gave us! Can't remember the number of directed turns from one street to another. Yes, I kept silent...hard for me to stifle my laughter. Finally, we found ourselves on Pacific Boulevard, a busy 4 lane, heading in the wrong compass direction. "Damn! I missed the turn", said my daughter. The turn she missed would have had us cross 2 lanes of busy traffic going the in opposite direction with no signal or even a turn lane to make the turn safer.

Finally, I opened my mouth: "Get in the right lane, follow the sign saying "to downtown", go under the overpass, get in the left lane, look for a Hospital direction sign, turn left there, go straight to the damned hospital...the rehab facility will be on the right."

Groan...the computer generation...she didn't believe me when I said I knew how to get there...how could somebody who has lived in a nearby town his whole life possibly know how to get to the Albany hospital without ever having used a GPS?

Her smart phone had turned a 1/2 hour 20 odd miles drive into a marathon taking about 1 1/4 hour. To top it all off, she got really pissed at me for laughing at her...pointing out that knowing the time and looking at the sun gives a compass direction.

I figure I've lived 80 trips around the sun without GPS...I figure I can make it to the finish line without ever having used one.

On my recent trip back from Palm Springs this summer, I fired upt the GPS and punched in my destination hotel in New Mexico. Before I could get on I-10 it rerouted me way south. There was a major accident on I-10 that some of the others I know said it was a several hour stoppage of traffic from an accident the closed the road. The GPS said it a was a 3 hour delay on I-10. That would have sucked sitting in the high heat for 3 hours or more.