Can you recommend a Sat Nav for France

flimsier

I usually use my phone, but I don't want to drain the battery quickly, and the in-car charger doesn't work very well...

...so I need to buy a Sat Nav as we are driving down to Montpellier.

But there are such a wide range from £50-£thousands. I'm sure it must be easy to pick one up on gumtree or whatever that will do the job.

I need something fairly functional, that is easy to put an address in, and works in France.

benjus

Cheapest and most effective option is probably to get a better car charger for your phone... does your phone support any of the fast-charging standards? There are car chargers available for most/all of these. If not it may just be a matter of getting a car charger with a higher output current.

It's also worth pointing out that if you're planning on using the motorways it's not really hard to do without a sat nav at all.

If you have your heart set on getting a new sat nav, personally I felt most at home with the TomTom models. I had a fairly basic TomTom One which I bought for about £100 with Western Europe maps, and that worked ok in France, although putting in addresses is never as easy as it is in the UK, since France doesn't have postcodes that identify a small area like we do here.

Bear in mind that it's illegal to use speed camera warnings in France, so you should turn this off.

knightstyle

We are in France and use a Garmin drivesmart 50 which cost under £100 new a couple of years ago. Make sure you update before coming as speed limits changed a couple of weeks ago. Plus set the speed monitor to kph

benjus

Personally I think having speed limits on a sat nav is a bad idea anyway. It tempts the driver to rely on the sat nav to know what the current speed limit is, and the sat nav is only as good as the information it was programmed with, which could be incorrect or out of date (even if you update frequently, you can still miss changes, then there are things like temporary limits). Also, if you're in a speed limit that can vary under certain circumstances (e.g. French motorways have a lower speed limit when it's raining) the sat nav may give misleading results.

z1a

I agree with "benjus", Satnav not needed to get to your destination city, then use phone for final address.

flimsier

I'm back, and I agree the motorways are fabulous, but for those who might be doing something similar soon, a Sat Nav was essential - even around Montpellier, getting to the airport would actually have been hard without it - particularly as I don't speak French!

cubegame

I always find in car chargers wanting. Get a power bank instead.

agrinnall

flimsier wrote: »

I'm back, and I agree the motorways are fabulous, but for those who might be doing something similar soon, a Sat Nav was essential - even around Montpellier, getting to the airport would actually have been hard without it - particularly as I don't speak French!

Satnav can't be "essential", how did we all manage before they were invented? I drove around Montpelier in 1996 without any great difficulty.

NineDeuce

The one that has all the preset routes to the ferries heading out....

flimsier

agrinnall wrote: »

Satnav can't be "essential", how did we all manage before they were invented? I drove around Montpelier in 1996 without any great difficulty.

Fair point, to an extent.

But since they've become ubiquitous, things like spaces where you can stop and look at a map have been taken out of service as they are not used.

Gloomendoom

I get my wife to navigate while I concentrate on driving. It's particularly effective abroad.