Review on 🚍 Garmin RV 785 & Traffic: Advanced GPS Navigator with Built-in Dash Cam for RVs, 7" Touch Display & Voice-Activated Navigation by Chase Hosea

Edit - Added photos of the homemade Garmin mount to mount on my F150. I owned an old Garmin device for several years (before it was pulled out of my newly smashed car window) and loved how it worked since mobile phone navigation was still in its infancy at the time. This unit was purchased solely for navigating a conventional 30ft trailer. I like the magnetic base which didn't drop the device for the first 500 miles of the ride. The passenger can simply remove the device from this base and find or adjust routes as needed. And it is convenient when you leave the car for a short time. So far I've liked all the extra features. Connectivity with my traffic and weather bluetooth phones is great. The device seems to take me right away from unfamiliar roads and low bridges. It warns of roads it doesn't know are suitable for your tractor (if you're driving them). Thus, it offers a level of comfort to reduce driving stress. However, I'm still double-checking my itinerary with FlyingJ's $10 road atlas before heading out. It also tends to hold you up on the major freeways to and from your destination. Therefore, the route generation feature is a must if you don't like this type of navigation. Sometimes I prefer the old state routes, especially when they're the most direct route to the destination. The division also tends to go straight through major cities when a freeway is available. I prefer to take a detour to avoid traffic jams and endless lane changes in heavy traffic. The route building feature sometimes gets stuck at 80-90% completion and apparently this can be caused by choosing a road that your rig size conflicts with. However, simply aborting the calculation and restarting it seems to work well. However, this module does a few things that are very annoying. The device tries to guess your location as you enter it in the address field. But that doesn't make it easy to get into the state you want to find. Out of Ohio comes Ohio, Indiana, and Pennsylvania by default. You have to jump through hoops to get the unit to consider Michigan or Kentucky. Finding specific small campsites is cumbersome as they just don't always count on the first or second round of the unit. Even with a new map update, the unit could not identify the Indian Springs camp in Indiana. Entering the address directly didn't work, and like my old Garmin, it fiddled with the names of county roads, streets and streets, etc. Even searching on the map was useless as he just didn't want to accept this place. . Instead, we chose the nearest gravel pit and examined the last piece. Once we get there, the squad will find the camp again. Eventually, the device moved the camp to an open field 20 minutes away, based on its database of campgrounds. When I arrived and connected to my home internet via Wi-Fi, after a few quick downloads it reported that it was up to date. TO DOWNLOAD MAPS AFTER THE DEVICE IS FULLY CHARGED, YOU MUST CONNECT THIS DEVICE TO THE USB CABLE. NO MATTER WHAT THE INSTRUCTIONS SAY. No matter how hard I tried, the device would not download maps over Wi-Fi. And like most products, that first map update takes several hours. He's not ready to get out of the box. The map downloads also seem to be old. We've been covering seemingly changed roads (roundabouts and such) for a while, but they're not included in the updates. So 4 stars is the best I can do and the 4 star is mainly to make sure I tow a trailer and worry less about my rig's track capacity.