GPS rental with car

My first suggestion would be to purchase a gps with Euorpe Maps built in such as the tomtom 920. I have the predecessor to the 920 (the 910) which also has the Europe maps preloaded. You might find a good deal on the old 910 model if you check on ebay or other sites. It worked great for us in Euorpe. Garmin has several models with Europe maps already loaded.
If the cost to purchase is just too much you might check on renting one here in the states and take it with you. Maybe rent it a day or two prior to leaving and get use to it before you arrive in Italy. I googled up gps rentals and came up with the following link. Check it out and see if that would work for you. It is a Magellen. I have never used Magellan but I would think it would work just fine. Looks like it would be $12.95 per day and that should be cheaper than renting a car with a gps.
Here is the link:
http://www.gps4rent.com/product-view-334.html

Good luck.

Hi Dorothy... This past May we rented a car in Venice and drove for 3 weeks through Tuscany and Umbria. Our car was through Auto Europe, which is a consolidator. The actual car rental was through Europcar. When we picked it up we were excited to see a GPS. It was very useful after we had someone help us change it from Italian to English. Now the car we rented was a midsized automatic. We were not thrilled that it was a bigger car, but the GPS was a big help. We did not have to pay extra for it. We dropped off the car in La Spezia which is fairly hard to get around in and the GPS took us right there to the car dealership.

Jane,
What rental car company did you use? I called avis and they will not do it. I checked into purchasing GPS and it is hard to justify for just the one week of Europe use.

Dorothy... Our AAA travel agent went through Autoeurope. It is a consolidator. When we arrived in Venice , after staying 1 week, we picked up our rental car at the Piazza Roma. The actual car company the the consolidator got us was Europcar. We had rented a midsized car and we wanted an automatic. We got a Volvo Wagon which we have here in the U.S. and although it was pretty big, we got a good rate and it had a GPS in it . The never mentioned paying extra for it. The only problem with the GPS units in Europe are that they are set in the language of the country. When we stopped at our destination outside Cortona, a D utch couple helped us set it in English and showed us how to use one. It was very easy, but it does help to be familiar with one. We just returned from France and rented a car from here and picked it up at Orly airport.They wanted to charge us for our GPS and we said no. When we picked up the car the guy said it was free in larger midsized cars. This was Hertz.

Using the search feature will yield quite a few discussions regarding various pros and cons of GPS usage, makes and models.

If you are fluent in the language of the country you are renting, then rent a local GPS, otherwise BYOG(PS).

We bought and used a tomtom 920 ($399)for our xmass trip to Germany and Portugal.

I did NOT want to spend the money on this, but after I saw what some of the rental agencies wanted for one, it made more sense to buy my own....and I had time to learn how to use it here.

After I used it, I found it to be one the best things that I have ever purchased.

We have driven all over Europe over the years, and just used a map and a compass, but many times the driver and navigator got into heated discussions.

Well, this thing ended those discusssions. Yes, I didn't pay attention to it, or missed a turn, but who cares? In less than 10 seconds it would plot a new course for me. I would throw it in my pocket when we got to our destination. I just loved it when it would display and talk me thru the correct exit on roundabouts.

The Garmin nuvi 270 has European and North American maps pre-loaded. I ordered mine from Amazon for $314.00.

I have to agree with the others. We purchased a TomTom 910 (now a 920) with Europe maps here in the US. (Check out Costco- $100 off retail) and learned how to use the device here in the US. It has US maps too. So when we got to Europe, it was breeze to use. We still use our TomTom for all over the US, so it was a worthwhile expense for us.

They might say that you can't rent a GPS in such a situation but we did TWICE last summer. In both of our rentals we picked up at one place and dropped off at another and had GPS systems in both cars.