Help choosing a car GPS system

(or a similar product) I and almost everyone I know now uses a smartphone for car GPS purposes. There might be reasons you have considered and rejected that option, but it's becoming the norm in my anecdotal experience.

I have the 2455LMT, which seems to be the smaller brother of the 1450LMT. I put in 14k+ miles with it in the last year across the country, and it's served me well. The traffic updates are really handy in some places, and almost worthless in others. In Washington DC, NYC, LA, Houston, and San Francisco, the updates are fantastic. The traffic works in other places, but not quite as well. In fact, the other feature I love, which my cheaper-than-the-1450LMT has, is the Exit Services feature. It's really nice to be able to push a button and know what kind of gas station/restaurant/park is available at the upcoming exits.

I have the 1490 with lifetime maps and traffic. In Toronto's notoriously snarly traffic, the traffic is useful, as it can route you onto something moving (often slowly) away from something that's stopped entirely. Lifetime maps are also good, although Garmin is often years behind community maps like OpenStreetMap.

This is not specifically regarding the models under your considerations, but general things I learned from my mistake. - Make sure you get lifetime free map and traffic updates. Map updates cost about $50. Although not many things change, its always good to have latest maps. You won't spend this amount every year or two. Just not worth it. - My Garmin 1390 (or something that I paid about $180 then) is so stupid that keeps me sending on different highways for small stretches as a mile. There Google maps excels but I do not rely on phone for this purpose. Instead, my next GPS will be able to import my planned route. I found this feature necessary when I go to new / crowded place. - Consider lane assist feature, really comes handy. http://forums.gpsreview.net/ these guys are expert in this business. Take their opinion.

I bought a 50LM about six months ago and really like it, so much that I got my girlfriend one too! My only complaint is the lack of traffic information, which can be a little annoying at times - instead I just use my smartphone to check traffic before I get on the road. I'll also add that while using a smartphone with maps/navigation apps is a good option for short trips, I personally think a dedicated GPS unit is much easier to use while driving - not to mention that it'll still work if you enter an area with poor cell coverage. Well worth the extra money if you spend a lot of time behind the wheel.

Nthing lifetime free maps, otherwise the map update prices are ridiculous. I have a smartphone but feel that Garmin's interface is superior, and prefer not to burn data and battery while I'm navigating.

Garmin seems to have the best vehicular GPS product (True?). Broadly speaking, there are only two major road geo-databases: Garmin and TomTom. (And Google now too, but read on.) Any other provider is licensing one of the two. So Garmin or TomTom is your choice. I've found Garmin better here in Europe, YMMV. I've also used a smartphone / tablet as a GPS/Satnav. It's certainly doable, albeit sometimes rough around the edges. And you want to have a decent size screen you can read from the drivers position and a mount for your phone.

I learned from Black Friday 2012 to never buy a TomTom product. I know you are looking at Garmin products, but I just wanted to make sure. The TomTom I purchased said "Merge onto Interstate Two West Five" for I-205 and that was the first sign it was a bad product. It only got worse from there, and was returned to the store the next day.

Thank you very much for your suggestions and feedback. JujuB, Zaxour Thanks a lot for the links to the traffic update apps and the GPS review forum. The GPS forum looks awesome (I was wondering if something like this exists!). I'll dig through it before I pull the trigger. Based on what I am hearing, I suspect I am going to end up buying the 50LM (I'll update this post). Forktine - I have primarily been using iPhone based Google map. It works fine. But these days I drive quite a bit in new/unknown cities for work and over time found the clear audio instructions available in GPS systems (in rental cars) incredibly convenient and superior to the smartphone based GPS (besides my cellphone coverage sucks in parts of Dallas Fort-Worth area).