time for me to buy a bigger SD card

A mate of mine has that. I borrowed it for two weeks and found that driving in larger cities with somewhat big buildings it looses the plot and takes you around in circles, or gives up completely.

Tomtom or Garmin is what I hear are the best ones.

/E

We love our Garmin (I think it's the C340) I've used it all across the country and haven't had any problems.

I'm gradually starting to infer that you prefer the TomTom.

We did check a variety of sources before buying, and I'd want to do a little more research before committing to the 910:

http://tinyurl.com/np3yd

over the Nuvi:

http://tinyurl.com/mp8qg

I've got the Holux/Mapopolis combo as well for my Cingular 8125, and I've been happy with it, given that I've heard over at the xda-developers site that a lot of people have been having problems with TT5 and WM5. Plus, $99 beats $150, and if they do a map update before my 1-year is up, I get the update gratis.

Is it "mom-friendly"? Maybe not. But then again, I'm not my mom. I don't really need a 3D view or to have John Cleese tell me to turn left in 0.5 miles.

After looking at the prices of these things I'm now understanding why the rental companies charge so much for them. I was thinking of getting a PDA version for a trip to the US where I'll rent a car for a few days but rentals seem to be the way to go.

They are a little on the pricey side, but then again, think of all the technology TomTom/Tele Atlas has stuffed into these little boxes!
If you rent a lot, maybe you can try out both types of portable GPSs, a TomTom and whatever else you can get your hands on. That would be a great way to "try before you buy".

I own Garmin C550. Very good.

You might want to take a look at magellen's 6000T which is coming out in a couple of weeks. Pronounces the upcoming manuver as well as the street name (this sounds like auseless feature, but it allows you to keep your eyes on the road rather than the GPS, BlueTooth (for handsfree phone calls), MP3 player, Live Traffic, and Sirfstar3 chipset (quick lock on to position, and unlikely to lose lock even in downdown canyons)

I was all in favor of Tom Tom, and specifically waited to purchase the new models. However, they have changed the mounting bracket for them which has flawed them in my experience.

On the x00 models the Tom Tom sits essentially on top of the mounting bracket. The connection is on the base and it swivels around there.

On the x10 models the bracket now "hooks" into the back of the Tom Tom and the connection is made there. It looks like a more elegant connection and I didn't expect any problems.

However, while driving down the road, I would notice the Tom Tom occasionally turning itself off on its own. I finally traced it down to that there is enough movement where the connections are made that it apparently occasionally senses a disconnect which causes the Tom Tom to power off. It doesn't require a really bumpy road, but just the right movement.

I tried 3 different units from Best Buy (910 models) before I finally threw in the towel on them. (As well as a blistering arguement with Best Buy that they were defective, as one Store Manager wanted to argue that the turning off on its own feature wasn't a defect, thus they should charge me the restocking fee )

So buyer beware... If anyone else has the 910, would be curious if you have experienced the same.

Have you tried calling TomTom's customer service? I'm sure they'd be interested to hear about that and may be able to lend a helping hand.

On a slightly different tack, I found out that you can make your 910 play movies, which I thought was pretty cool. I haven't quite found the hack, but I saw someone who post a movie about their TomTom being enabled to play movies!http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v7...06-06_2114.flv

I've had the Garmin 2720 for about a year. It was my first GPS and can't believe I waited that long to get one. The 2720 is fantastic.

Hopefully it's not against the rules to mention other sites but I found lots of useful comments from folks on amazon. I searched for various models I was considering and then looked at user reviews. All of them have some naysayers, but, there's some good nuggets of info. Here's my other comments about the 2720 from my review on that site:

I've used the 2720 for one cross country trip and lots of local navigation. Basically it's just fantastic. I take it whenever going to a new location. I occasionally override it's route but not often - and that's easy to do when needed.

It doesn't always pick the fastest route even though I request that. This happens when a high speed limit road has lots of stop lights compared to a slower or longer route with no stop lights. I don't downgrade it much for that - it's never failed to get me there. I don't think any other navigation aid would have maps with lights and programming to know how much time that would add.

It has found new routes to places I've gone to frequently that were better than what I'd chosen using MapQuest or poring over a printed map. And, I'm pretty handy with maps. That really impresses me. That offsets the occasional routes over roads with stop lights.

I was very reluctant to get one initially. Now that I've had it for awhile I can't imagine not having one. Perhaps other models would be OK, but, certainly this 2720 is fantastic.

I've never seen one of these with traffic lights listed. That's cool!

And, the 2720 doesn't show traffic lights either. Sorry I wasn't clear enough. I had said it chose some less than optimal routes when actual traffic lights it wasn't aware of (usually on fast roads) impeded my calculated route. That said, I don't think any other GPS system could figure out stop lights either, hence, I don't downgrade the 2720 for not handling that situation.

It will CHANGE your life.

The key advantage it has over Tom Tom is its portability. You would be hard-pressed to slip a Tom Tom in your pants pocket (at least without attracting attention). The Nuvi is about the size of a smartphone. I charge it in the hotel room each night and it runs on batteries all day. I just place it on the center console or in the cupholder when I get in the rental car and off I go. I'm zipping around cities I've never been to before like I'm a local.

Oh, yeah, it's also an mp3 player. But, isn't everything these days?

Only a couple of hitches in my Nuvi experience ...

- When you start up the unit in a different state than it was last used in (i.e., fly somewhere, get out, and power up the unit), it takes awhile to find the satellites (maybe 2 minutes)? I just factor this into my time and turn the unit on as soon as I get out of the terminal.

- I love that I can type in the name of a business (i.e., "Best Buy") and see the closest matches. But, every once in awhile, the Nuvi will lead me to a location that closed down, or never existed at all. Conveniently, it also has the phone number for these listings, so I just make sure to call before I press "Go." (There may be some sort of software update for this to download from the Garmin site, but I haven't figured it out yet.)

Best of luck in your search.