Garmin DriveSmart 86, 8-inch Car GPS Navigator with Bright, Crisp High-Resolution Maps and Garmin Voice Assist

I was annoyed that dodge expected me to pay an additional $600 to turn on the navigation system. I like the idea of having a good camera in a 200 mph car. My years of experience with garmin in my semi trucks already had me convinced. The frontal collision and lane departure warning functions both work. Those are improvements in computing power made more recently. Automatic incident recording is an absolutely invaluable tool. All data and video from three minutes prior to the crash are saved even if the device is destroyed it is likely that the video can be retrieved from the SIM card. Insurance companies get upset when expensive vehicles get wrecked or stolen. The video camera can be left running while you are parked to record anything going on around the car while you are out of sight. The front camera has nearly 180 degree coverage even near the car. It is high quality video that will stand up in court because it’s satellite linked and location and time identified. The camera can easily be removed post incident and will definitely record any incident and several minutes prior immediately into permanent memory until you erase. If the device is destroyed in a crash the information will still be there on the device. The garmin is easily removed from it’s factory windshield suction cup mount with a simple click. I have literally had suction cup mounts go over 100,000 miles in a bouncing dirty semi and never came off the windshield. It accepts voice commands just like a cars internal navigation system will. If you are a traveler who likes using their own navigation system the device is easily portable from vehicle to vehicle. Don’t forget it or you’ll cry. 😢

For those of us with older vehicles that did not come with nice displays and cameras the DriveCam 76 is an indispensable tool. The first one I purchased had technical issues and would not connect up to the Garmin camera I had on the rear of the vehicle- bluetooth connectivity issues. The replacement however is working great. This 7” display is perfect for my use, mounted just under the rear view mirror it’s easy to view when driving either providing navigation, keeping track of my lanes, speed, and warning me of proximity issues. The voice commands work well to bring up or hide the rear camera view. Easy to update software and maps via WiFi in the garage - no need to pull the unit out and hook up to the computer. Integration with the Garmin Drive app provides additional function but I rarely use it and your phone can be integrated for making and receiving call if that is needed. Probably the last Garmin with dash cams and newer technology integrated with phones seems to be taking over. Glad to have this unit as it addresses my requirements.

I got this to upgrade my very old Nuvi model. On those old GPS displays, the touch screen is SO frustrating and you have to really press and wait for it to recognize each tap. The old one was also frustratingly slow to recalculate the route if I detoured for something like a rest area or exit to get gas. The voice saying "Recalculating" becomes a running joke on long road trips. So, enough about the old one... the new Garmin models have a much more responsive touch screen just like cell phones. The processor in there is a lot faster to recalculate if you're doing a detour (and without the annoying voice telling you about it). It also supports extra nav systems besides GPS which seems to help it be even more accurate (with 10 feet is usually what I got). The old one would sometimes lose signals in valleys or downtown between buildings and might show me a hundred feet away, but this model does a great job of showing where I really am. The voice navigation is amazing. It was so cumbersome to type in addresses on the old one but with the nice touchscreen, that's a breeze, but what I really loved was being able to say "Okay Garmin, go to Walgreens" or something and then pick which one I wanted to go to from the list. I don't know how thorough the database of locations is, but on my recent 3500 mile road trip, I rarely asked it for something it couldn't look up. Fast food and gas stations are just fine, I even asked it to go to a Verizon store when we needed a new phone and it pulled up the nearby locations. My one gripe is probably about the connectivity to my Android phone. The Garmin Drive app works, but the GPS keeps wanting to change the volume of my phone on its own. I also connect to my car radio over bluetooth to play music, and I've setup the Drive app and GPS appropriately for that case, but it seems like when the GPS connects it wants to lower the volume of my phone (and thus how loud it plays music to the car stereo). I can turn it back up, but that only lasts until the next time I get going again. Very weird. I also had problems where the GPS would keep showing "Galaxy S8+ disconnected" over and over. I think that was the power savings on my old phone putting the Drive app to sleep... maybe? I disabled it from being able to sleep, but I haven't driven long enough after that to see if it helped, and then I updated to a newer phone anyway so the jury is still out on whether that's still an issue. That doesn't concern me too much because when I'm driving, I don't really need the GPS linked to my phone although, if I understand correctly, it can get data through that phone connection for even minor things like weather updates or road conditions that maybe the traffic data doesn't get? Or using that tether for software updates too if I'm not within range of my wifi (which really only happens when it's parked in the garage anyway). Overall I'm very happy I splurged for the update. I miss my old Nuvi 1390's ability to connect to the ecoroute module plugged into the OBDII port so I could see the real time gauges right there on the GPS, but I do have a bluetooth dongle for OBD that I can use to see that on my phone. It was just handy because I'd use that whole ecoroute stuff on the GPS to keep track of my gas usage between fillups and it would show my MPG. I got an app for that now, it just means manually putting in my mileage instead of having the GPS already know that. It'd be cool if Garmin added a gas tracker app directly on the GPS... shouldn't be that hard?

Nice 7” unit. Works well as my previous Garmin gps. I like this size

On top of purchase price you then have to purchase at great cost NZ Maps.

Muy bueno, no tan intuitivo en su manejo como los viejos Nuvi y es algo difícil de registrar el dispositivo y actualizarlo via Wifi, yo lo hice todo con el cable USB conectado a la computadora y con la aplicación de garmin (garmin express). SI TRAE MAPAS DE MEXICO. 100% recomendado.

No anuncio do produto está descrito que o adaptador 12V teria DUAS SAÍDAS USB e recebí um adaptador com UMA saída... O resto do GPS está OK.

This is full of features and might be a steep learning curve if you’ve never used Garmin before. Camera is great and I paired it with a bc50 rear camera. Also added 128 gb card for recording as supplied card is too small.