Sat Nav

Richard53

facade wrote: »

Have to admit I'm a bit of a luddite though, I still can't get on with this 3d view, I like the 2d map with my car going up the screen.

Old-school, not Luddite. 2D map, track up, every time. Oh, and turn off the spoken road names and numbers. I find "turn onto the B three thousand five hundred and thirty-six" to be distracting compared to 'B three five three six'. And don't get me started on its pronunciations of Welsh place names. I have sometimes nearly crashed through laughing at those.


I enter locations by lat/long all the time - by far the easiest way to get an accurate plot. If the new ones won't do that, I reckon I won't bother to upgrade.

System

Sue11 wrote: »

Firstly I would like to wish everyone a happy healthy new year.

My old Tomtom which we have had for many years has now died.
I need a new one but am totally confused by all the mod cons that come with them and hopefully someone can help. We also have a Garmin Nuvi which was purchased as it has TV but has never come up to the standards of Tomtom regarding directions and points of interest. Our total needs are map updates, full Europe maps, enough memory to add points of interest camp sites etc.

Sue

Got an android phone or tablet? Either use Google Maps if you've got a half decent mobile data allowance (as a truck driver doing 300-400 miles a day even 1GB was far more than needed to use it full time on every journey for a month) or install the free HERE Satnav app which allows you to download offline maps for the entire world if your device has enough storage. Tomtom has nothing on Google Maps when it comes to points of interest or re-routing due to traffic (no need to pay for realtime traffic on Google Maps) and as your added POIs are stored online there is no limit to how many you can add.

firefox1956

Well I have had a sat nav for years TomTom to be exact.
After readin a post on here the other day I decided to download Navmii onto my android phone to give it a try.
Blooming great.....& free !!
Don't thing I will be bothering with a stanalone sat nav any more.
HTH

Richard53

firefox1956 wrote: »

Don't thing I will be bothering with a stanalone sat nav any more.
HTH

I've been using my phone and Google Maps as an experiment, and it works pretty well. It feels a bit like eggs in one basket to me, though. I tend to prefer things that have one purpose and do it well over things that do a lot of things fairly well. Given the way that satnav prices have dropped lately, I'm happy to stick with a separate satnav for the time being.

gilbert_and_sullivan

Check out a TT before you buy, newer ones are not as easy to use as older ones in my experience.

My now very old personal Garmin has been good, but it does have the odd glitch tried to send me across a field once.

If you want Traffic, Garmin models come with free lifetime traffic, and the newer digi traffic is better than the previous version but not infallible and not as quick to update as say Google Maps.
Handily despite what Garmin technical might say, digi traffic can be used and does work, as before, without a destination being entered, this can be a useful feature, better in real world use than traffic with a destination entered, and is the only reason i use the company provided satnav at all.

CKhalvashi

Richard53 wrote: »

I've been using my phone and Google Maps as an experiment, and it works pretty well. It feels a bit like eggs in one basket to me, though. I tend to prefer things that have one purpose and do it well over things that do a lot of things fairly well. Given the way that satnav prices have dropped lately, I'm happy to stick with a separate satnav for the time being.

It's fine until EE's internet signal decides to go in the centre of a city you've never been to before, when you're in the wrong part to ask someone for directions.

This has happened to me twice now and in one case I didn't speak the language to be able to ask someone, compounded by the fact I couldn't find anyone who spoke a language that I speak. Ended up calling the client I was meeting, which doesn't look very professional at the best of times.

Have a Garmin as a backup device (car has integrated nav) as I can't stand the newer Tomtoms.

w00tmanUK

I personally went with my smartphone (WaZe is my app of choice) when I was on the road for work, and still use it that way now. I had a 2016 Golf GTD and the sat nav in that was absolutely awful.

For those worried about loss of signal/data, you can get apps that you can download the whole map onto memory - I believe anyway, never had occasion to use them.

WaZe is good because of the "crowd source" aspects - it gets real-time reports from other road users of traffic, police, hazards etc. I've found it to be very reliable.

jimmy_cricket

I got a new tt after my old one died last year. Not sure of model but think it was the 550? Anyhow, it has free map updates and a SIM card in so that it gives real time traffic. Great when on busy roads. The new software takes a bit of getting used to but I'm fine with it now, just different. I would recommend just for the real time traffic.

motorguy

Richard53 wrote: »

I've been using my phone and Google Maps as an experiment, and it works pretty well. It feels a bit like eggs in one basket to me, though. I tend to prefer things that have one purpose and do it well over things that do a lot of things fairly well. Given the way that satnav prices have dropped lately, I'm happy to stick with a separate satnav for the time being.

I've been using a standalone satnav for years, however for comparisons sake i thought i'd rig up my Note 4 on to a dash mount and run WAZE.

My Garmin has free traffic updates.

On the pretty crappy journey i make home from the airport every friday night (1.5 hours through city traffic and motorways) i've noted the following :-

• Running my phone as a dedicated NAV eats my battery.
• WAZE gives more detail and better real time messages but both predict the journey time to within a couple of mins and update with the latest traffic info.
• The WAZE screen display is much nicer and makes the Garmin look clunky
• The dedicated NAV can be integrated semi permanently very neatly.

Each to their own i guess, but i'm probably still happier with the dedicated NAV.

forgotmyname

When i had the Galazy S2 the manual stated using a standard USB to lighter adapter that only provided 500mA would deplete the battery with the NAV and bluetooth etc running.

It would obviously put some power into the battery but noy as much as it was using.

The proper Samsung charger put out over 700mA.