Garmin Tread Powersport Navigator with Group Ride Radio

Not a fan of this at all. The demo mode is incredibly annoying and interferes with the initial setup. Mine won’t stay connected to my wifi or my phone. It also crashes whenever I try to change the vehicle type. The UI is pretty clunky. I sent it back since customer service said I had a bad one but the new one does the same. Maybe they just sent me the same one back? Anyway I’m over the frustration. I had much better luck running my Inreach with a tablet. I bought this for dual sport trips and thought it would be a good solution since previously I’ve just used my phone and Gaia. But I think I was wrong.

We invested in these as a more functional alternative to Ride Command where you need cellular for the buddy tracking to work. This is my first garmin device and I've found it to be a lot less intuitive than some of the phone/tablet based apps. That said, I do believe it is probably superior once you learn how to configure it to your liking. I purchased it primarily for ATV riding. 3 in our group had them and we were excited about the group ride functionality. It is a little clunky/aggravating to get going. but once running it is pretty cool. The range is better than expected and worked reasonably well down on the hatfield mccoy trails this spring. Once you go around a mountain you are going to lose signal, but it is better than nothing and really pretty reasonable. ... MoreWe invested in these as a more functional alternative to Ride Command where you need cellular for the buddy tracking to work. This is my first garmin device and I've found it to be a lot less intuitive than some of the phone/tablet based apps. That said, I do believe it is probably superior once you learn how to configure it to your liking. I purchased it primarily for ATV riding. 3 in our group had them and we were excited about the group ride functionality. It is a little clunky/aggravating to get going. but once running it is pretty cool. The range is better than expected and worked reasonably well down on the hatfield mccoy trails this spring. Once you go around a mountain you are going to lose signal, but it is better than nothing and really pretty reasonable. Don't expect to split up and be able to use it to time rendezvous...you might get snapshots of where the other person is but not likely to have constant tracking. I did have the 18" antenna and I think that helped. No leaves on the trees yet though so I'm sure in summer that will hurt the range. We didn't use the voice communication yet, but at some point we will try to get the PTT working with our cardos for extended range. Pros: Bright screen, route planning, group ride Cons: battery life when not connected to power, limited range for group ride, garmin learning curve, "freezes" requiring a restart, relatively heavy radio mount (not an issue on sxs/atvs but would like it sleeker for moto).Example...We had a group of 7 vehicles. I was in the lead with a tread (+18" antenna) and another was in the tail. 4 vehicles made it to the trail head, but the other 3 went missing. I didn't have a current location for the tail vehicle, but the last known location showed we they were at least on the right trail. Turns out one SxS had a flat. We didn't have the ability to communicate that, but at least I knew they weren't lost and I could likely backtrack and find them easily if needed.

Designed with group UTV use, but I chose it for Dual Sport motorcycling and others. Its rugged with a screen of unmatched clarity in daylight. No more leaning in to view your route. For my use, I separated the charging block from the mount to eliminate the hand mic and battery connection and use a short USB cable to ports on my machines. I do wish however, there was available a cradle or mount with a Ram ball and just power.