Ok fun fun stuff LOL. It's good to know there is some hope this gps isnt somehow defective. Thanks for the comments. I'll post you all on the results of my testing over the next few days.

Until I drive test this thing minus the hongkong/macu/guandong maps for an hour without freezeups, I cant be convinced of anything.

I'll also be using that SD Formatter 3.0 - thank you for that! I didnt know there was a special program that could be better than the default formatter for windows!