Mark's Tech Notes

Ever since using a relative’s GPS navigation system while visiting, I have been looking at getting a new Garmin navegation system.  We bought one for my Mother-In-Law for Christmas since she is pretty bad with directions.  It works great except for one HUGE flaw.  It is missing a huge divided provincial highway nearby (Stoney Trail in Calgary).  Now this thing took years to build and is super fast for us, but the navigator just chokes if you go onto it.

So, I reported it to Garmin and got a nice email back saying that they are aware that it is missing and it was delayed because they had to get NavTeq to add it in.  However, they go on to say that despite the fact that it is now in the NavTeq maps, it will not be in the next release and that hopefully (no promises though) it will be in one after that in July.  At that point it will be almost a year that the section near me has been open!  They are currently missing a section that opened Sept 2009 and more that opened Nov 2009.

So, right now, if I buy a Garmin, it will not be able to get me out of my subdivision for at least 4 more months.  Then it will likely work for about 6 months before they are closing a road nearby and I will have to wait another year for it to get updated.  And every time that I need an update, they are going to charge $60 to $100 for the update.

While Garmin certainly does not seem concerned about making sure that their products are close to up to date, they certainly know how to keep you paying.

For now, I think that I will pass on GPS navigation until I can at least get basic directions correctly.

Tags: Calgary, Garmin, Garmin map updates, GPS Navigation, NavTeq, Stoney Trail