Thinking of getting a portable GPS
 

My 330xi doesn't have navigation and I'd like to have a portable GPS unit, especially since I'm taking some road trips this summer to New Jersey. What are the good ones? Which brands are reliable? What about a TomTom? Which systems have the best map coverage?

Garmin Nuvi 350 or 360 if you want the best of the best.

http://www.garmin.com/products/nuvi360/

In my opinion of coarse.

The best part is the interface, you have no buttons, just a touch screen. I have never opened the manual, it's that easy to figure out. It's about the size of a deck of cards and just as thin, fits in your pocket. TomTom is at least 2-3 times as big and does not say street names in plan english. The Nuvi will not only give you the distance to the turn, but the street name as well.

I got a used Ipaq pocket pc off ebay and between me and two friends we bought the tom tom navigator software and a bluetooth gps trasmitter, I think all together it came out to be around $400, and this way you have a fully functional pocket pc also.

Check this thread. I bought a Garmin Nuvi 350 for the X5. It's excellent.

http://www.kevinsfreakyfriday.com/nuvi/nuvi05.jpg

If I remember right - the Tom Tom's use Tele Atlas. Garmin uses Navteq. Of the two - Navteq is more complete and accurate (just an opinion).

There are several good Garmin GPS's out there. Enjoy.

Tom Tom or Garmin Nuvi. can't go wrong.

I'm liking the Nuvi.. I think I'm going to order one tomorrow.

Garmin is the way to go, see if you can find a streetpilot 2610

I ended up getting the Nuvi 350. We also got one for the A4. I'll post pics tomorrow. It's amazing.. it works better than the nav in the X5 or the Volvo. It speaks street names, it has 3-D view, a built in dictionary, currency conversions, travel guide.. Its great! Very easy to use. It also has a trip computer that's better than the built-in BMW one. It tells you your GPS-measured speed, distance traveled, distance to destination, overall avg. speed, moving avg. speed, max. speed, time moving, time stopped, overall time.. It's great. I highly recommend it.

I've had my Nuvi 350 for about 2 months now. The portability of the unit is its strongest asset.

Make sure you log into the Garmin.com website and download the latest firmware update to get the most out of your unit. It's a simple process - the patch is stored onto the unit's HD microdrive. When you start up the Nuvi, it automatically looks at the HD for the firmware update and self innstall it. Current Nuvi350 ROM version is 3.30.