sat nav

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5 Aug 2006
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Derbyshire
ok so i like to drive, but i hate maps as reading them at the wheel is both dangerous and illegal, not to mention having to find where you are on the map before it is of any use. As im now at uni and friends are all over the UK and also with business trips i find myself more and more often driving into unfamiliar territory.

So, i want a sat nav.
seen the tomtom one for 145quid new and 180quid for the europe one. any recommendations? i seen another online retailer selling the medion sat nav for 60quid is that good?? (its an easter offer and its out of stock so geting it is v.unlikely)
Do sat navs have free updates? as i know tomtoms use sd cards do i have to buy new ones as the years go by? ive used a tomtom one UK and i have to say overall its good but it doesnt always send you the best/correct way

Not user if Ok sell sat navs will have a look now
any comments please :p
 
A large competitor of OcUK are selling the TomTom One GB for a ridiculous cheap price on the net but I can't link but you'll know who. You can then Upgrade with maps from ebay for a lot cheaper than buying the Europe one outright.

Do you own an MG? If so, thought about a retrofit satnav?
 
I recently got a Snooper Syrius for £260 and i'm very pleased with it. My parents have a TomTom 510 and the Enigma Camera database is far superior on the Syrius and the Syrius just looks nice and compliments the dashboard ;)

One example would be when we headed up to a known camera spot and the TomTom told us about the speed camera even though it was facing the opposite direction thus it didn't effect us and the Syrius just showed it on the screen. Also the Syrius tells you what type of Camera it is. It will say for example "Warning Gatso, Check Speed, Limit 50 mph, whereas the tomtom just makes a warning noise.
But as for the actual navigation they both direct you exactly the same way so that NAVTEQ mapping tech ( Syrius) is just marketing BS and is not better than the software used by TomToms in my experience.

The Syrius also has a significantly better POI list than the TomTom although they both have some POI that the other has not.

If you want a decent GPS & Camera detector i'd recommend the Snooper Syrius.

Also I pay £5 a month to update my Syrius but the first 6 months are free.
 
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I can't really fault the TomTom software.
I've got the Dell Axim, Bluetooth Sat receiver, TomTom software route (I already owned the PDA and Sat receiver before I decided I wanted to sort out Sat Nav so it made sense going that route).

It's never sent me on any silly routes nor has it attempted to send me anywhere I couldn't go.
I can't really comment on other setup's as I've not used them - just cannot fault TomTom.
 
I originally had tomtom 3/4/5 on my ipaq doing the sat nav thing. It was ok and did the trick if you don't mind cables trailing over the dash.

I now use a tomtom one gb v2 and it's pretty good. Does everything my old setup did plus a couple of bits more. Got it for £158 and I'm pretty impressed. I did want a 910 but really when it came down to it all I really needed was a sat nav, not an all singing all dancing gadget.
 
Robdav said:
I originally had tomtom 3/4/5 on my ipaq doing the sat nav thing. It was ok and did the trick if you don't mind cables trailing over the dash

Thats a fault of your choice of equipment not the PDA route. I can run my PDA GPS system with either zero cables over the dash if I'm on a trip of under 3 hours, or just one cable if I want the unit to be powered.

Just like a bulky, overpriced TomTom unit.
 
TomTom have had huge success with there stand alone sat navs & have swallowed up a large chunk of the market. I have 2 TomTom's, my old GO 300 which I'm going to eBay soon & my new TT One Rev.2 Europe which I got for £175 through an online retailer.

The GO 300 has some advatages over the One Rev.2, it's much easier to take off the windscreen mount (I do wonder if the One and it's screen mount are supposed to be seperated reguarly??) & it comes with a protective pouch and screen cloth.

The One Rev.2 is about a quarter the size of the old GO 300 so I saw it a worthy upgrade, plus I got the latest maps including Europe (not just GB) & free speed camera's to try out over the pocketGPS ones. Plus the price was very good :D considering I paid £370 for the GO 300 a few years back.

I would go for the new TomTom One Rev.2 it's a good little sat nav. :D

Oh yeah should mention that I ordered a 2 GB SD card to go with the new sat nav to be the 'working' muck around card, turns out the new TomTom One Rev.2 has 1GB internal memory so I could have just done a pre-muck around backup to the PC and then burnt that to DVD & just used the internal memory then as the 'working' copy. Doh! :rolleyes:
 
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mglover070588 said:
....
seen the tomtom one for 145quid new and 180quid for the europe one. ....

IIRC (on these forums) someone said the TomTom with the Europe maps have a better map of the UK than the UK only units. The maps are supplied to TomTom by different companies.
 
Tomsk said:
IIRC (on these forums) someone said the TomTom with the Europe maps have a better map of the UK than the UK only units. The maps are supplied to TomTom by different companies.

I would have thought thats unlikely. I'd imagine if that was true and common knowledge then they'd hardly sell any GB only models. But maybe I'm wrong. :confused:
 
I use the rac routeplanner if i've gotta go unchartered places, much easier than listening to some box, half the directions you don't even need.

Give it a try before investing in a satnav thing.
 
Had my Garmin C310 for a few years now and it's still awesome, speed camera updates are free online and the maps are still up to date.

It's a bit big though (old school tomtom ONE side) so I plan to upgrade to something slimmer soon, the new ONE widescreen looks slick so maybe I'll ebay my Garmin and move onto the newer model :D

It's a darn sight better than any printouts or maps though (I've used both).

I much prefer the Garmin trip computer though, shows lots of various trip stats that the TomTom does not.
 
[TW]Fox said:
Satnav rocks for overtaking old people in Rovers - you can see where the straights are ;)

Wouldn't have helped me yesterday - stuck behind a flat-capped old geezer (yes, even older than me :p ) in a 3-series compact. Every flippin straight bit was full of sunday drivers and tourists, for a good 15 miles, and of course he was the sort of old git who does 35 in a 30, 35 in a 40, and so on - if we'd got to a dual carriageway or motorway I bet he'd have done 35 there, too :rolleyes: .

Ah, the joys of driving at easter :)
 
Gojira said:
Wouldn't have helped me yesterday - stuck behind a flat-capped old geezer (yes, even older than me :p ) in a 3-series compact. Every flippin straight bit was full of sunday drivers and tourists, for a good 15 miles, and of course he was the sort of old git who does 35 in a 30, 35 in a 40, and so on - if we'd got to a dual carriageway or motorway I bet he'd have done 35 there, too :rolleyes: .

Those sort of muppets tend to do 90 on dual carriageways.

So you spend 15 miles carefully overtaking all the tards then you get to a dual carriageway, set the cruise to 75 and they all go storming past ready to hold you up the next time there is a corner :confused:
 
Another vote for the tomtom one :)

Upgraded to it recently from the original 'large' version. Much better now you can pop it in your pocket :)

Does everything you could want really, chuck on the camera database & your chosen POI's & you really can't go wrong.

Absolute bargain at the price :cool:
 
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