Garmin nuvi 255W Car GPS Receiver

I bought my Garmin Nuvi 255w in August, 2008; my first car GPS. It has been an invaluable tool in getting me through unfamiliar territory. It's easy to use (I'm not the swiftest with technology, so that's saying something) and the screen menus are fairly intuitive. The voice commands are very helpful, and easy to turn off if they become annoying (we've nicknamed her, "Sally"). It's also great to be traveling the highway, and to be able to punch in the location and distance to the nearest rest area, or restaurant, or gas station. You can even type in specific names of stores or restaurants...for example if you wanted to find the nearest "Costco" big box store. We've also used it to locate public parks where we can stop to rest, or run the dog on long trips.


 I've found the speedometer and mileage to be slightly innacurate. If you're travelling at 75 mph, it will display 72 or 73 mph. And if your car odometer tells you you've just hit 100 miles on your trip, the GPS will only read 98. I've done enough experimenting in different cars to determine the GPS is innaccurate, not my cars.

That, however is a minor problem, though it could trip you up if you get popped for speeding because your GPS said you were going 2 or 3 mph slower than you actually were!

It does have its limitations. It occasionally won't recognize the street address of a business, and has sent us on bizarre journeys to wrong places. For example we wanted to visit a Red Wing shoe store in Red Wing, Minnesota, -- which the unit located and displayed as a Red Wing retail outlet, but it steered us to a residential neighborhood. That kind of thing has happened more than a couple times....so the lesson is to bring along a Mapquest map or other backup so you aren't SOL if the Garmin fails you. Likewise, its maps sometimes aren't accurate. On a stretch of I-496 in Lansing, MI it believes you are on a side street, and keeps telling you to turn.....which, clearly would be a bad idea on the highway!

Finally, although mine is set to find the "fastest route" to a location, it often uses roundabout routes. This becomes obvious when you're in a familiar place and know enough to ignore the directions....but if you're lost I'm not sure it matters whether it costs you a few extra minutes, as long as you get there.

The mounting bracket and power cord are easy to use and the wide screen version (that's the "w" after 255) make it easier to read. It's also kinda neat to see the map scroll by and see what rivers, lakes, and side streets you're passing by but don't usually notice.

I should also note that it seems to connect very reliably to its satellites even in remote places or in bad weather.

I purchased, separately, the MSN Direct realtime traffic transponder and a one-year subscription. It is completely worthless -- doesn't alert users of long-term highway closures for construction, and the realtime traffic bears no resemeblace to reality. Save your money on that.