RE: GPS Software
I have no experience with Garmin software but have spent quite a bit of time
with both Microsoft Streets & Trips and Delorme software on my laptop.
Without going into a lot of details Street& Trips beats the Delorme software
hands down.  Major issues are the incredibly bad user interface in the
Delorme and the far greater amount of detail avaiable in Street & Trips.
BTW, I'm using the Delorme GPS reciever with both.  With Streets & Trips the
Delorme serial emulator is required for the receiver to work with Streets &
Trips.  If doing it over again or starting from scratch I'd just buy Streets
& Trips with the receiver in the box.

Another point.  Use of a laptop is great IF you have a navigator, someone in
the right hand seat.  But not very practical for a solo driver.  Because of
this I've spent a couple of hours at the local electronics store playing
with the stand alone automobile GPS systems.  What I found was great for use
in the city, very poor coverage once off the beaten path.  I used two remote
places I'm familiar with, one in Washington and a ghost town in Arizona for
a test.  Only with expensive upgrade mapping software did any of the current
crop of GPS units find either one.

One good test of the software is to use the search feature and find out how
well it works.  I've found that Streets & Trips does a great job of finding
things even when misspelled or the description is incomplete or formatted
differently from what is in it's database.  Delorme can't find anything
unless you specify what you are looking for exactly as it is stored in the
software.  And the database of campgrounds, public and private, is far, far
larger in Streets & Trips.