Which GPS Should I Buy & How to buy a GPS?

One thing that is missing from those articles is that the prospective buyer should decide upon the intended uses of the GPS.

The PC magazine articles assume that the buyer will be using the GPS for driving navigation and only for driving navigation. Accordingly, the discussion deals only with the choices available for road use and the factors that might influence that choice. IMO, this is a valid assumption for almost all people, but there are a certain percentage of the buyers who are interested in off-road use of a GPS.

For those people, TomTom is no longer a viable option. If off-road use is intended, Garmin is the primary choice, followed by a few other companies that have a small part of the market. (I own TomTom myself, so this is not a comment from a Garmin fanboy.)

However, not all Garmin models are suitable for off-road use, so the buyer should do some research to determine if his/her needs can be met by a specific model. It may be that the best choice is a GPS from one of the smaller companies in the market.

With best wishes,
- tom -