Review on Garmin Nuvi 57LM GPS Navigator: 5-inch Display, Lifetime Map Updates, Direct Access & Speed Limit Displays by Born Waheed

I got this to replace my almost 10 year old Garmin StretPilot 2720 (which, surprisingly, is still sold by a few retailers). The Garmin StreetPilot 2720 was a top product in 2006 and I was pleased to see the cutting edge technology of 2006 now applied to the 'budget' range of today's Nuvi models. It's amazing that a sub-$200 GPS can do so much more than a $1,000-plus GPS of 9 years ago. For those wondering, YES, in 2015 there are still reasons to own a standalone, dedicated GPS. These causes include (1) smartphone battery drain. GPS on a smartphone tends to drain it then you have to have a cable that goes up to your knees or a windshield mount and I find that a big problem, you know what. (2) You don't need cellular coverage or, more importantly, data coverage. This isn't a problem if you never leave New York or San Francisco, but for those of us who live out of town or do some sort of ministry and travel all over the world (big and small cities), there are still places where My phone cannot receive 3G or find a data connection. You don't need any data to use your "real" GPS. That's the main reason I have a real GPS in 2015. there is nothing worse than being unable to use Google Maps due to a lack of data signal. (3) It stores all my favorites more easily, which is nice when I have 100+ clients that I store in the device. I went for the 6 inch screen but the 5 inch model (57LMT) is the same but smaller. I also went with lifetime maps and traffic. The traffic function is powered by the antenna, which is the power cord itself (no external antenna is used). It seems to work well, but not as fast as crowd-sourced traffic like Waze. The instructions are very precise and if you connect it to a PC and download Garmin Express you can get alternative voices and vehicles. If you don't mind dragging and dropping files directly to the device's file system, there are websites with hundreds of custom vehicles, which is cool, but I won't go into that process here. I like the school zone warnings and the light. A red tint on the speedometer indicates when you are exceeding the speed limit. As with all other data, there are rare cases where the GPS speed limit does not match the actual speed limit when adjusted in recent years. The new turn-by-turn instructions work well, especially with the supported "real language" voices, you can say "turn left at the traffic light" or "turn left before CVS", which is nice. Of course, the built-in voices do text-to-speech and say things like " I was able to export my old 2720 favorites to a program called MapSource. from Garmin, but that program couldn't see the new GPS, so I exported the MapSource database and installed a program called Garmin's BaseCamp. I was able to open the database file in BaseCamp and drag the favorites into the new GPS. THEN I installed Garmin Express, the current software, and from there you can save your favorites to a file. This thing collects satellites many times faster than my old GPS. I've found that the only two things I'd like to change are (1) always have a north indicator (red arrow or letter N with a pointer) on the screen. My old GPS had this. In the bottom right corner there is a box you can use it for, but that brings me to (2) that only one additional data type can be displayed. In the lower right corner you can enter arrival time, time, remaining time to destination, driving direction, etc., but no more than one. I'd like to donate a little more screen real estate (which is plenty) to be able to display two fields. But in general this is not a big problem. I would recommend it to anyone who still wants a "real" GPS. I've found that the only two things I'd like to change are (1) always have a north indicator (red arrow or letter N with a pointer) on the screen. My old GPS had this. There is a box in the bottom right corner you can use it for, but that brings me to (2), that only one additional data type can be displayed. In the lower right corner, you can view arrival time, time to destination, driving direction, etc., but no more than one. I'd like to donate a little more screen real estate (which is plenty) to be able to display two fields. But in general this is not a big problem. I would recommend it to anyone who still wants a "real" GPS. I've found that the only two things I'd like to change are (1) always have a north indicator (red arrow or letter N with a pointer) on the screen. My old GPS had this. There is a box in the bottom right corner you can use it for, but that brings me to (2) only one additional type of data can be displayed. In the lower right corner, you can view arrival time, time to destination, driving direction, etc., but no more than one. I'd like to donate a little more screen real estate (which is plenty) to be able to display two fields. But in general this is not a big problem. I would recommend it to anyone who still wants a "real" GPS. but that leads me to (2) i can only display one additional data type. In the lower right corner, you can view arrival time, time to destination, driving direction, etc., but no more than one. I'd like to donate a little more screen real estate (which is plenty) to be able to display two fields. But in general this is not a big problem. I recommend it to anyone, who still wants a "real" GPS. but that leads me to (2) I can only display one additional data type. In the lower right corner, you can view arrival time, time to destination, driving direction, etc., but no more than one. I'd like to donate a little more screen real estate (which is plenty) to be able to display two fields. But in general this is not a big problem. I would recommend it to anyone who still wants a "real" GPS. I'd like to donate a little more screen real estate (which is plenty) to be able to display two fields. But in general this is not a big problem. I would recommend it to anyone who still wants a "real" GPS. I'd like to donate a little more screen real estate (which is plenty) to be able to display two fields. But in general this is not a big problem. I would recommend it to anyone who still wants a "real" GPS.