garmin GARMIN DRIVE 52 Garmin Drive 52 and Traffic, GPS Navi (Open Box)

Update: I used my phone and the Garmin at the same time on my trip to SC and for the first three hours, both gave the exact same directions, but as expected, once I got to the part of I40 that was closed, my phone knew to go around the closure and the Garmin tried to send me directly through it. I had the map up on my phone and the Garmin and I could see the Garmin wasn't routing me around the section of I40 that my phone showed was closed. Before I pulled up the maps, the Garmin was showing a shorter drive than my phone and I was hoping maybe it knew something my phone didn't (sometimes Google Maps doesn't always send you the quickest way), so I skipped the exit my phone was telling me to take, but after that exit, it was just me and one other truck on the highway - everyone else had already gotten off the highway and I started to get nervous so I looked at the maps and took the next exit my phone told me to take, even though the Garmin was still telling me to stay on the highway. Even after I exited the highway, the Garmin was telling me to turn around and get back on the highway and it kept telling me to turn around for a while. By skipping the first exit, it ended up adding time onto my drive b/c I had to get back to the detour route. If I only had the Garmin, I'm curious where it would have taken me and what the route would have looked like. I turned the Garmin off once I realized it kept wanting me to turn around and get back on the highway and I only used my phone on the way back from SC and my phone worked perfectly. I'm confident the detour my phone sent me on was the correct way to go because it was a lot of one lane (each way) back roads and there was lots of traffic on those roads. Original review: I'm enraged right now. I have a last-minute unexpected trip coming up and my phone was spotty the last two times I needed to use it for GPS so I thought I would be better off buying an actual GPS unit. I'll be driving by myself this time and can't depend on someone else's cell phone like I did the last two times. Of course, I looked at a ton of GPS units and decided on this one partially because of the brand name, partially because of the reviews (on multiple sites, not just on Amazon) and in big part, because they make a big deal of saying it's ready right out of the box. That was important to me because a lot of the other/cheaper units I looked at needed a separate SD card and needed updates right out of the box, etc. This was an unexpected expense, and I'll hardly ever use it, so I really didn't want to spend a bunch of money, but in the end, I decided it would be worth it to spend more and go for a name brand unit. I thought it would be better quality and more reliable. So anyway, the GPS arrived yesterday, and I was excited to look at it and get it setup and make sure I was good to go for my trip. Imagine my frustration and honestly, panic, when I put my sister's address into the GPS, and it couldn't find it. What the heck. The sticker on the GSP says there may be updates available online, so I hook it up to my computer and look for updates and sure enough there is an update available. Great, I start the update. OH WAIT. NOPE. You need a micro-SD card bigger than 4 GB but no bigger than 32GB in order to do the update. WTF. I specifically looked all over the listing to see if I needed an SD card b/c so many of the listings for other units needed one. I didn't see anything that said I would need an SD card. So, I had to go to Walmart the Thursday before Christmas (might as well be in actual hell) to get this stupid SD card. Got the card, did the update, which thankfully was very fast. The update says it can take a few hours, but it only took a few minutes. I have no idea what the update did. It STILL can't find my sister's address. I used my hotel address instead and it found that, but I have to drive through TN to get to SC and the GPS is trying to send me through the section of I-40 that's closed because of damage caused by Hurricane Helene in September. Google Maps says that section of I-40 is closed until 2028. It's been closed for a while now, so how is that not updated on Garmin's maps. Thankfully I've made this drive a few times before, so I know the drive is usually around 5.5 hours and when Garmin showed me a route that was 5.5 hours, I knew that was the original route, not the route detouring around the closed section of I-40. Google Maps and MapQuest show 6.5 hours, so they're both accounting for a detour. So anyway, I absolutely hate this GPS and I'm panicking about having to rely on this for my trip, but I don't have time to buy something else. Maybe my expectations are too high since I'm so used to using Google Maps and haven't had an actual GPS in a very long time. On Google Maps, I love that I can switch between the map and reading the directions so I can get an idea of what roads to be looking for, etc. Obviously, I don't do that while I'm driving, but I don't see an option to do that on this GPS so that's frustrating. Maybe you can, I need to keep digging around. Also, the other person who wrote about the cord being extremely short is absolutely correct. The cord for the car is fine, but the one you need in order to plug into the computer or into the wall is extremely short and you can't use this GPS unless it's plugged in, so I had to mess around with it and look for different addresses and try to change my route, etc., while hunched over 3 inches away from the plug in my surge protector that sits on the floor. Very frustrating. I don't even know if I'm going to take this with me on my trip. I might be better off using my phone since I'm not confident in this GPS at all. At this rate, I don't see how this GPS is better than the $60 random brands.