TomTom - XL 1.0 Review

My husband and I were gifted a TomTom Xl 1.0 when we moved from WI to WA. Since we had not actually asked for this gift we had not done previous research on the type or brand we wanted. Luckily for us, it has still turned out to be a daily life saver. I have heard bad reviews about TomTom since we've had the product, BUT I have mostly good things to say about it. It is easy to read, the function buttons are pretty precise, 98% of the time I get the correct directions (sometimes it will tell me to turn left into an intersection where there is a boulevard, or it has told me on 2 occasions that an address on a street is nonexsistant when mapquest or someone specifically gave it to me. In that case I've imporvised and found my way to the street and then found the actual address on my own.) I like that it has a list of interests, so some major grocery stores or major shopping places such as Target and Best Buy are preprogrammed and will take me to the closest ones, with farther options as well. But it also includes parks and beaches, other things that you would not think of. It gives me a 2 mile warning for my exit on the freeway, which I like, although sometimes even thats not enough to get over in seattle traffic. I do suggest downloading the program offline for your computer for updates and such. My biggest con is sometimes it takes awhile for the GPS to pick up the satellite signal, but I do live in the rainiest state in the US, so I can't complain too much, it has held up in some pretty severe storms. Overall I really like this product and while the people that I know who own Garmins will fight me about it, most people whoi know who have a TomTom would recommend them as well.