Thanks for all the posts...


Well I finally went out and bought the garmin nuvi200w. had a bunch of points saved up on my loves card and they had it on sale from $300 down to 250, and after I used my points I got it for around $210. They sure charge a lot for the wide screen! ($100 more than the regular 200) It doesn't have a lot of the extra bells and whistles, but as far as finding the place, I think it will do just as good as the other models. HAPPY TRAILS!

Good choice! I think if I were shopping for a new GPS, that would have been my choice as well. You got a super deal too! I hope you like it, and hope it serves you well.

Mine has helped at times when I have routed myself, only to find a road closed or a ramp shut down for construction.

One time I was in New Jersey, (Carlstadt) during a humongous rain storm. Some areas were flooded half way up the homes. Roads were closed all over the place. It was amazing I was able to keep my schedule. I made my drop...and even the place I delivered to was flooded in places. I got out of there just in time, before the Fire Dept. closed the road I came in on. Then I had a pick down by Perth Amboy. That whole day I was facing closed ramps and roads everywhere.
Needless to say, I had a lot of luck that day, but also my GPS got me out of areas that were not meant for big Trucks, by constant detours.

The GPS female voice (Ms. Garmin) also soothed the savage beast growing inside me. She always talked to me in a calm sexy voice. I was always apologizing to her for my immature behavior. Had she not been there to talk to me....I might have snapped or something.
She did start to give me disappointed eye rolling and sighs...I think.
But I think she was happy for one day, I wasn't constantly asking her recalculate THIS...or asking her personal stuff. :?

use the nuvi 350 in the truck and a nuvi 360 in my car
the differance is the 360 has bluetooth.
gps is fast to find "a" route to the next stop but you still need to use good judgement as to bridges and road restrictions....

I use Microsoft Streets & Trips with an add on template called the Truck Stops Plus 08, which I bought last November on the Internet. It more or less transforms Streets & Trips into trucking software. While it still won’t do truck specific routing, which is not nearly the big deal most people think it is, the template has links to web pages you store on your hard drive so you don’t need Internet access and when you click on them it brings up restricted routes and low clearance web pages on your computer display so that you can check your routes for restricted routes and low clearances very quickly and easily. If it is easy and fast, you are more apt to check your routes instead of taking a chance. I used to sometimes forget to check when I still was using the Motor Carrier Road Atlas.

The template also contains thousands of trucking specific points of interest including all of the major truck stops and thousands of independent truck stops, I think like 1500 super wal-marts, all the rest areas, turnpike service plazas, parking areas, and most of the weigh stations. I never use truck stop guides any more. I love this thing! To it since I had it, I’ve also been adding all my consignees and shippers and I also indicated whether they are drop & hook, live load, or live unload. My job gets easier and easier all the time and my DM can’t figure out how I can plan my trips so fast.

The best thing about this thing is the Find Nearby Places feature, where you can click say your present location or a location you anticipate being, and it brings up an alphabetically ordered listing of every trucking specific point of interest within a 50 mile radius, divided into categories like truck stops, wal-marts, rest areas, etc. When you open up the categories, the individual points of interests are listed from nearest to farthest. It’s pretty neat. Man…I find truck stops nearby all the time that if I were still using a truck stop guide I would for sure miss. Then to go to a truck stop or a wal-mart or a shipper or whatever, all you have to is right click and click add to route, then click get directions and then bam, you are already ready to drive. It’s pretty damn cool. A hundred times faster than doing it the old manual way.

I had a stand alone Garmin for a while but I gave it to my wife, because the maps were too small and it just took too long to plan and route my trips with it, plus with the laptop I can multitask. For instance, I can open up several instances of streets and trips that I can use without interfering with my current trip to, for instance, decide whether or not to accept a preplan, to check how many miles it is from my present location to a particular truck stop I’m thinking about stopping for the night, or to reroute myself from time to time. I also use the Drivers Daily Log for doing my logging.

I tried and returned CoPilot because the maps sucked big time, plus it was much harder to use and it routed me down restricted routes and where low clearances were all the damn time. So much for truck specific routing! I also have Delorme Street Atlas, but again the maps suck and it’s also the devil to use. Hence, I never use it. I’ve found that Microsoft Streets & Trips has by far the most accurate maps, plus it’s very intuitive, as I still to this day never have read the directions.

I’ve come to the conclusion that there will never be a reliable product that you will be able to rely upon 100 percent to do truck specific routing, since everything is subject to change and nothing ever remains static. Indeed, if you get in trouble going down a restricted route or hit a low overhead the onus will always be on you no matter what and certainly not your GPS supplier. Not to mention that I also have friends who are using that new WorldNav GPS navigation unit that is supposed to be for big trucks and they have all told me what crap it is! Hence, that’s why I love this Truck Stops Plus template with Streets & Trips, besides all the trucking specific points of interests it contains it also gives me the ability to verify my routes are truck legal right from the convenience of my laptop screen in just seconds.

No GPS. I have a bluetooth (came with the phone), and I don't even use it.

Nine years. Atlas, a little trip planning on my laptop if it's a place I've never been before, and I'm good to go.

I also use Garmin on my laptop...Everyone fails to say that Garmin does NOT indicate TRUCK ROUTES!!!!

I've gotten into some hairry situations because I've relied Only on the GPS.

Experience tells me now to also use the Update Rand McNally trucker edition

Last week I had to take another truck while mine was in the shop. So, I grabbed my Garmin nuvi 200w out of the car to use. Never again. It came up with some utterly STUPID routes to take the truck across.

ROFL! I used TomTom, and I had a few different customized voices on there. I would have arguments with my GPS, something along the lines of:

SCENE: In an urban area, on a good sized road, there is a turn around area for cars
GPS: "Make a legal u-turn when possible"
ME: "I'm 70 friggin foot long, what the heck are you thinking!"
GPS: "Recalculating route"
ME: "Better be good"
GPS: "Make a legal u-turn when possible"
ME: "I just told you no!"
GPS: "Recalculating route... In .5 miles, make a u-turn"
ME: "I am going to throw you out the window"
SCENE: .6 miles later... Passing a residential area
GPS: "In .2 miles, turn left" : Scene: A small residential block
ME: "Screw you!"

LMFAO

I had to turn off the voice prompts on mine because I do the exact same thing!!! Nothing like arguing with a piece of electronics. My wife saw me do it when we went on vacation and just sat there and laughed her ass off at me.