Tom Tom vs. factory navigation

There are a lot of people out there that think its crazy to pay $1,500 - $2,000 extra for a new car that has a factory navigation system.  I am one of them but I did it anyways.  I gotta tell you it was one of the best decisions I ever made.  Not only because it cleaned up my car from all of those mapquest printouts, it makes showing a house a whole lot easier.

I am the type of person who overresearches everything.  I decided to go with a Honda Accord with Navigation.  Not just because I liked the car the best, it had to best navigation unit.  It has all the usual navigation features, but it also allows you to use them while the car is moving.  That may seem like a small deal to be able to make a quick change to you route while in route, but it can be embarrassing when someone is following you to have to make a few stops on the side of the road to change something. 

The first Accord I bought with the navigation was back in early 2005.  I recently won a Tom Tom portable navigation at a stag so I decided to use it in my pickup truck.  I have never been so annoyed at anything.  First off, it keeps falling off the windshield when I use it.  The unit I got is one of the newer ones that has the suction cup attached to the unit.  It is designed like that so there is no empty suction cup attached to the windshield when its not being used (prevents break-ins from thieves who see the empty cup and break in your car to steal the unit).   So when I use it it sits in the cup holder, but its hard to see since the screen is only 2.5" big.  However, the more annoying part of the Tom Tom is that when you turn it off it forgets where it is.  It can take almost 2 minutes to find the satellite which is annoying if you have people following you to the next house. 

I feel that a Tom Tom is a great alternative to using a map but when it comes to new car shopping, don't not get a factory navigation unit thinking it is the same as a portable.  In most cars the navigation unit is not only a map, but it controls the radio, climate control, and in some cars even tell you the weather and traffic.