TomTom GO 720 4.3-Inch Widescreen Bluetooth Portable GPS Navigator Review

I really love the 720. I have tried the Garmin Nuvi and just didn't like the software nearly as much as the TomTom. Entering addresses is really fast and you only see towns in the state you are looking in. This means no more having to scroll through 30 different Springfields to get to the one you are searching for. You can hide the keyboard to see a long list of close matches so instead of having to type out the full city or street name you can just hit the first few letters and then pick from a list.
Mapshare seems like it will be a huge advance in the world of automotive GPS devices. Is a street marked as open when it should be blocked? Just correct the error with a few quick taps on the screen and it's fixed. What's really the big advance though is the ability to share my corrections with all other TomTom owners. I connect the 720 to the TomTom HOME software and it downloads corrections that other users have submitted.
What you see on the screen can be fully customized so that if you want the status bar on the side then you can put it there or you can leave it on the bottom. You can also decide what information is shown in the status bar. You can show or hide the time of day, remaining time, remaining distance, current heading, and your current rate of speed. If you subtract items from the status bar the other items automatically get bigger to take up the remaining space. You can also select if you wantto show the current street you are on and the name of the next street you will be turning on to.
Text to speech quality is very good and will say the directions so for example it might say "in 250 feet keep right, then take the exit right, 204B towards Westview." Or "in 200 meters, turn right South West Madison Avenue." You can choose from multiple voices although I think the Dave voice sounds the best of the bunch. If you don't want to hear the "keep to lane" instructions you can disable this feature although I personally like to have it on. You can also record your own spoken instructions so for example you could have your kid's voice tell you to turn left in 200 feet. I haven't tried this though.
The screen is very bright and easy to see even when I have my sunglasses on. The 720 can be set to automatically turn the brightness down as it gets dark thanks to a built in light sensor on the front of the unit.
The mount is pretty clever and super easy to use. Just push it up to the windshield and it sticks right on. The 720 then just slides right on and is held solidly in place. You can turn the 720 in any direction to get it exactly where it's easiest for you to see.
With all the great features of the 720, I think what will really set it apart even more from the other GPS units out there is the Mapshare feature. Being able to fix your own map and download updates automatically to keep the map up to date is one of those things that is so fantastically great that you wonder why on earth it took so long to make to a shipping product. Whether or not it can live up to the expectations remains to be seen. Even if you took Mapshare away it's still the best car GPS I've ever used. With it, there's just no contest.
My biggest complaint is that there's no case in the box. You need to buy one separately although I've been using the plastic holder it shipped in so far which is OK.
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