Sat Nav or Phone?

basill

I've been using my work Iphone 7 and less often my own Pixel for Waze. The phones are both in cases and do get pretty hot while charging but run much cooler when the battery reaches full charge. I do have a good charger capable of more than 2 Amps charge.

Its a trade off, I don`t like not using things in case I wear then out.

Don`t forget to shut down the navigation app when you arrive, if its left running in the background you will have a very warm pocket and a flat battery in no time :-)

B

ChrisK....._3

Phone
7 years ago I said to my smart phone "Navigate Red Veil" (not even approximate location)
Google prompted me for 3 choices, the Top choice being the Red Veil Indian Restaurant in my home town where my wife had called me wanting a lisft home
I clicked that choice
Google maps popped up and told me where to drive
As I pulled up outside Google Maps popped up a picture of the Red Veil and told me I had arrived
and alllllllllllllllllll for free
I chucked my Sat Nav in the bin and never looked back

Typhoon2000

I use mine mainly for traffic so I can divert and take another route. I have tried them all- Garmin, Tomtom, Waze and google. TomTom wins by far for traffic, work seemingly on all roads, no matter how small. Waze is also good but on larger roads and where are more Waze users ( London). TomTom traffic comes from multiple sources including mobile phones.
Garmin and Google mainly for main road.

missile

I have sat nav built into my car which is very convenient, but often find my iPhone easier and quicker to use.

Clive_Woody

I have built in SatNav in my car but also Android auto/AppleCar. I tend to plug in my phone and use Google Maps or Waze and can still use Spotiy and make calls all through my car stereo and controls mounted on the steering wheel.

It's a Skoda so nothing too flash but has a decent selection of bells and whistles.

Marvel1

I use a TomTom never let me down.

If I use my phone, i assume my battery wouldn't last long, unless i use airplane mode and use maps offline, saving data too

System

Arklight wrote: »

What you tend to find is that a phone will get pretty hot running live maps, maxing out screen brightness, running GPS, polling data between mobile towers in a moving vehicle, playing music via Bluetooth and all the background apps. If you have it in a holder on the dash it can get very very hot.

If it's plugged in you may well find that the power drain is too much for the USB charger and the phone will need to draw on the battery to make up the difference. It will then be discharging and charging simultaneously, which creates even more heat, directly in the battery.

All this heat spells death for Li-ion batteries and if you toast your phone in this way regularly you'll be rapidly ageing yours.

For that reason if it's a phone you care about I would avoid using it as an all in one, at least on long journeys. There is a reason why 2 year old windscreen fitted Sat Navs can barely hold a charge.

Completely disagree. I drive a truck, mine can be in use up to 15hrs a day, 60+hrs a week. My Galaxy S7 is over 2 years old and the battery life is fine and it doesn't get flattened when using a cig socket USB charger.

My previous phone, a Galaxy S5, was used the same way and my lad who also drives a truck now has that phone and uses it himself the same way just fine so that must be over half a decade old.

Arklight

Tarambor wrote: »

Completely disagree. I drive a truck, mine can be in use up to 15hrs a day, 60+hrs a week. My Galaxy S7 is over 2 years old and the battery life is fine and it doesn't get flattened when using a cig socket USB charger.

My previous phone, a Galaxy S5, was used the same way and my lad who also drives a truck now has that phone and uses it himself the same way just fine so that must be over half a decade old.

If your phone is plugged in 15 hours a day you aren’t going to be getting a very representative view of the battery condition. And that’s not recommended either.

A Li-ion battery will degrade by 8%-12% per 350 or so full discharge cycles. Even doing nothing to it at all it will degrade over time.

A 5 year old phone isn’t going to have a battery that’s anywhere close to its original capacity.

Anyway, phones are meant to be used, but heat will degrade the battery as it causes corrosion. If yours doesn’t heat up being an auto media centre then don’t worry about it. But all the phones I've owned do.

Nodding_Donkey

Svein_Forkbeard wrote: »

The problem is see is using Spotify and taking the very odd call (hands free) at critical moments could be an issue

Calls coming in at the wrong time were the main reason I bought a TomTom. Google maps is ok for occasional use I think but if you use a sat nav all the time then calls can become a real problem.

Madbags

Personally I just use my iPhone X for my satnav. I am not the kind of person that gets bombarded with calls or texts so it seems fine for me.



My partner used to navigate while I drove if we were going somewhere different of a weekend for example, but she was useless haha! "Am I still on the blue line?"... "Yes... oh wait a minute... we're not anymore!".. "whaaaaa I asked you if I had to turn you said no!!" Needless to say she's been sacked.



I bought a half decent holder and that was it, seems to work really well and if you're going down a dual carriageway or on a motor way the screen goes off after some time to save battery and wakes up when you need to know something.



Haven't had any issues with it at all so far.