Oh, my! That sounds much like my most recent experience. The Never Lost babe kept telling me to bear left, but the road signs (and the NL map) indicated I needed to head slightly to the right before bearing left. The drivers behind me were not amused with my left-right-left-right maneuvers as I tried to decide if I should believe NL or my own eyes.

I use NeverLost most of the time, but she sure gets confused when going over water, she seems to lose where she is. A lot of times the NeverLost hasn't kept up with road changes, so it can be a challenge when they are telling you to turn and you can't.

Overall, NeverLost is great.

I've only used it once (it just happened to be in a car I rented) and I was very happy with it. I made sure to add it to my reservation for an upcoming rental where I'll be doing a lot of driving on the East coast.

Slightly OT - but has anyone seen the reports on KNBC (los angeles) where they test a GPS with real-time traffic updates against a courier and someone listening to the radio?

The GPS has come in third each time.

Garmin Nuvi-660 - http://www.knbc.com/investigations/11010753/detail.html

Magellan 2200-T with real time traffic - http://www.knbc.com/investigations/11139003/detail.html

Total time difference less than 5 minutes and one run conducted. Very interesting, but hardly conclusive. I bet that more of these tests are on the horizon. Thanks for the links

I think it would have been better if they had compared all of the real-time traffic GPS units against each other. Does anyone know if any other news/technology organizatons have done this?

I like the experiment, but one run of a 35 minute trip that took everyone at least three times that is hardly conclusive about anything except that traffic in LA is awful. You need more runs over more courses and yes against other units as well as controls. I like the expriment though, and I would never give up my GPS. I also thought that it was funny that the non gps driver was allowed a phone call. Why?

Different Never Lost question...
 

I know on the full size rentals, when I've had NeverLost, it's been a Taurus or something similar - as far as I could tell, MSP didn't put NeverLost in any other make.

Do they spread out the NeverLost over the makes in a class, or will the NeverLost basically guarantee you a certain kind of car? I will be renting a midsize, and I'm hoping for the Corolla instead of the Kias I usually get.

Thanks in advance.

Have it this week in a Hyundai Sonata.... ("Upgrade" in ORF)

There have been a few threads about this in the past year.

Taurus is generally the most common vehicle that has NL in it, so it isn't that unusual to find one in your spot when reserving a car with NL. In fact, I'd say that my track record for a midsize with NL results most often in a Taurus.

That said, there are lots of other vehicles that have NL. In addition to the Prestige cars, others with NL I've rented include:
- Camry (though you can't reserve one)
- Sonata
- Corolla (rare to see)
- Town Car
- STS
- Ford 500

I received a Corolla with NL (requested) when I rented at ORD two weekends ago. FWIW, I actually like NL, and I like the Corolla since it gets great mileage compared to the other mids and full-sizes. I was a bit peeved when I arrived to my stall a couple of weekends ago in CVG to find a 2-door Monte Carlo when I requested a Corolla. So they put me in a Taurus. Acceptable, I guess...

Noah,
Thanks...I'll double-check the search; I had missed those threads the last time I searched.

I did call the station in question - the agent had only ever seen one Corolla with NL. I tried to request one, but the agent said that it was impossible to request. Granted, this is a smaller station (BTR), so that would explain why.

Given the new Taurus' gas mileage (17/24) vs. the Corolla (32/41), you can guess why I'm not as much of a fan of the Taurus...

Agreed. I thought I read somewhere on the Hertz web site that all Prestige cars came standard with Never Lost. I basically banked on that this weekend in SFO and did not bring directions to my destination. Needless to say my Lincoln MKX did not have it nor did any of the other cars available. I ran into the manager of the area and asked him about it and he said many of the newest Prestige cars do not have Never Lost installed.

Speaking of the MKX I traded out of it in Oakland the next day for something with a 3rd row rear seat. I got a Subaru Tribeca with leather and sunroof and other than it's lack of power I preferred it's drive to the Lincoln.

I read that Lincoln/Ford made it a goal to get the Lincoln close to the class benchmark being the Lexus RX350. The last RX330 I drove was a 2004 and I think in comparison they missed it.

Damn, ive got an MKX reserved at SFO in a few weekends and really would love to have the NL. Im arriving later in the night (10pm) and if the gold desk is not busy, maybe i will go hassle them and try to get something with NL....

I've just reserved a car with NL in Spain. Anyone have any experience with these in Europe? I'm hoping it's reasonably reliable there.