I have a Garmin Zumo 550 GPS unit that I bought in summer of ‘07 for my trip back to Colorado. It’s really a great unit — it does the GPS thing, obviously, and it also plays MP3s, so I have about 2 gb of music loaded on it with a plug running from the headphone jack to the input on my Harley’s radio. It also does Bluetooth for a cell phone or for helmet speakers if I had them, but I get enough crap from the guys for riding a Goldwing as it is. I like to joke that between the fairing, the speakers, the cup holder, the cruise control, the GPS, and the heated vest, all I need now is cable TV.
Aaaaanyway… So I got the Zumo back in July of ‘07 and it’s been great. I use it every time I ride the bike, and it came with a separate car mount so I can use it there too. It’s been great. Until recently, when it went haywire.
The touchscreen started acting up and got worse and worse until it was virtually unusable. So I called Garmin and found out that they warranty these things for a year, which was great, only I had bought mine a year and a half ago so I was six months out of warranty, which was bad. But the guy on the phone said they’d cover it anyway, which was great again. So I shipped my Zumo off to them, felt naked without it for a week or so, and they sent me a “new” one back (I don’t know if it’s new or refurbished and I don’t care) and now I know where I’m going again.
So that was pretty cool. And the coolest part is that on top of them covering it even though I was out of warranty, the new unit also had the updated maps for 2009. Score!
Garmin gets two thumbs up from me.
