Honest Question! Is Garnim still viable in 2026 or is it a unitasker or even a DECENT unitasker? Thoughts? I'm not completely AGAINST unitaskers, but they're not free, sometimes they're not light or compact, and SOMETIMES they're not even all that good at their ONE task. I do have SOME uni-taskers, a 15th century mechanical watch would be a good example but a GNSS (GPS) receiver??? UM......they're pretty ubiquitous, and from MY chair it seems like Garmins usually do stuff that everybody else does.....'better.' Thoughts?
LOL...your cellphone is "better" because it does more is like arguing you NEED one of these because it does a little of everything - but exceeds at nothing I'm guessing that when the millennials hit their 40's and start needing to wear reading glasses they may no longer be the cheerleaders for viewing the world through a myopic postage stamp sized cellphone screen window.
If the 1990s want theirs back too, they can HAVE mine. It's been useless since the week-number rollover in 2019.
I'm in the mountains a lot; so it does work better than a cell phone that doesn't work at all; unless you climb a ridge. Cell phone coverage has been getting better throughout the years; but they mainly cover the major highways and easy to access places. If you want to get off-grid and your not covered in tree canopy 360 degrees - my garmen works. PS; you can get a high-end used one on Ebay for around $30. Lifetime maps and traffic still works; thought traffic updates are slower if you don't link it to your cell phone. Budget a replacement battery; I've already had to replace mine twice. This is also cheaper than annual Toyota map updates; since it's tough to get your hands on paper maps now.
I'm seeing Garmins being used by the 'outdoorsy' type (inReach) for SOS comms......and I'm seeing some older gym rats use Garmin watches....but these are all things that cell phones currently do BETTER. One of the things that keeps MY company crapping their trou is the explosive developmental rate of Direct To Cell. SO.... There's a 'thing' in emergency Comms called PACE. Primary. Alternate. Contingency. Emergency. If you're in the weeds, or humping a ruck....WEIGHT MATTERS, and so you may just be good with just a primary and a backup, but because cell phones are NOT uni-taskers and they're light.....and cheap you can bring more than one. I use GNSS for HF digital comms - and so there "might be" times, situations, and places where you do not want to do the internet thing.....or the internet might be down. Garmin's good for precise time, right? Yup.....but for $10......
I was talking about the automotive Garmins. I've been looking at the inReach; but it's pretty expensive - then monthly connection fees. Most newer and younger ruck-sackers forget the backup battery and placing the cellphone into airplane mode then manually turning on the Bluetooth link to the inReach. Most kids tend to gloss over things unless it's on tik-tok. Then again; most newer high-end cell phones are emergency satellite compatible. I'm thinking a new satellite compatible phone will be the correct route for the long run; since I usually buy 2-3 year old unlocked phones and go with a very cheap MVNO plan. The high-end cell phones with screen burn are cheap. I just change them to "dark-mode".
I like the Garmin in my '26 just fine. Mostly drive with infotainment display off. Less distracting, more visible. Of course, not perfect routing, but navigates in cell-less areas.
I like the Garmin in my '26 just fine. Mostly drive with infotainment display off. Less distracting, more visible. Of course, not perfect routing, but navigates in cell-less areas. View attachment 302560
I like the Garmin in my '26 just fine. Mostly drive with infotainment display off. Less distracting, more visible. Of course, not perfect routing, but navigates in cell-less areas. View attachment 302560
Very soon Cell-LESS will not be cell-free.... I agree that a garmin that you already HAVE can be a useful unitasker, but I'm trying to divine some use case for getting and using one - and so far? "Cons: Some users mention that message delivery can occasionally be delayed or finicky" Nope.
I have a Magellan SporTrak handheld from 2004 that I still res up every once in a while to get the WAAS digits and other corrections. My ground position on the map has been steadily moving to the northwest along with plate tectonics. I no longer have a computer with a parallel port to hook up the mapping software to it. Still works though.
Before Garmin and Tom Toms, we had something called TripTiks. In 1990, I used them when I changed my duty station from San Antonio, Texas, to Anchorage, Alaska. (Brooks AFB to Elmendord AFB). It was a fun 4,200 miles drive up through the Alaska/Canada (ALCAN) highway. We, also, used TripTiks 5-years later when we drove from Anchorage down the ALCAN then eastward through Canada to Maine....our longest trek at 4,500 miles. Fun memories! (We camped in a big tent on the trip from Anchorage to Maine)
Our 10+ years old Nuvi was dying, it still works, but temperamental to turn on-and-off at random. I purchased a newer model to replace. I carry it in our car. But honestly, I have not turned it on for over a year now. It is a backup to the onboard Navigation system. For one thing, Garmin has no EV charging station information. That alone makes it not very useful in our BEV.
I've been a AAA member for over 30 years - and yes.....it appears that they still do Trip-tiks according to our benevolent AI overlords..... Thanks to the USN (and some small amount of common sense) I can read maps and charts for myself - although for some reason I carry relatively few of them. My CFO probably has a complete collection of North American maps at the house and I have a few nautical charts stashed away somewhere......
Ditto -- roadtripped all over the US by moto with paper maps just fine in '90s, and ETS move from East to West Coast was also sans GPS. It can be done Only thing I don't like about paper maps, is as soon as their published, they're obsolete. At least with virtual maps there are faster updates* than on paper (if frequently blowing smoke up your arse with accuracy via 4-yo plan views, a la Gargoyle Mops). --- * I do wish the pace of life were more 1990s-like... as in that era, a yearly update to your US map atlas wasn't going to trigger anyone's FOMO. But that's nae gon na happen
