**Tesco value tablet - The Hudl**

Caporegime
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A Garmin Nuvi is £100 and will be a better sat-nav than a cheap tablet running some mapping software. For a start they are designed to have things such as screens you can see in sunlight, GPS receivers aren't an afterthought etc.
 
Soldato
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Brother in law is selling his gen 1 Nexus 7 for £90 - what would be a better purchase? This or his Nexus? Wouldn't mind a tablet for when we go on holiday in November.
 
Soldato
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Personally I'd say this over the nexus, sure it wont get updates anywhere (if at all I guess) like the nexus, but everything else seems better to me, microsd, hdmi, higher res better cpu? will see how many Tesco vouchers ive got next time around but should be around the £20-30 mark
 
Soldato
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The more I see the more I like. Wonder if the Mali 400 is fast enough to run the 900p screen? Its a tad quicker than the note 2/GS3 so it should be good enough.

Have you seen anything that suggests this will be receiving software updates? Bearing in mind that it's cheap and made by Archos.

It all depends on Tesco bloat I guess, Archos/Rockchip have got a few similar devices out already so stock updates should be quick? No idea what Archos are like though, Oh they all have 2GB too! Fingers crossed! :D

I don't think it's 3G-ready, so you'll need to use another device as a hotspot - either an EE phone as they allow tethering or a MiFi.

What's wrong with offline maps?

A Garmin Nuvi is £100 and will be a better sat-nav than a cheap tablet running some mapping software. For a start they are designed to have things such as screens you can see in sunlight, GPS receivers aren't an afterthought etc.

The screen looks good, it should be fantastic in a car. The GPS might be crap though, best wait for a few reviews.
 
Soldato
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Nav-free is shockingly poor. The google search is a nice feature, but other than that it's not robust enough a sat nav, as I found out on my recent European tour.

Sygic is probably the best Android Sat Nav at the moment. The TomTom app lacks features there available on the Nokia app in 2006/7.
 
Caporegime
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Real time traffic is totally worth having. We travelled to Belgium recently for the GP and had a TomTom with full European mapping and traffic, so for whatever the cost of the device was we had live traffic for the entire trip. Saved us a lot of time.
 
Soldato
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I have Navigon, Tomtom and Co-Pilot. I previously used sygic.

To summarise:

Navigon is best for long distance traffic on A-Roads upwards and voce directions. It includes TMC traffic and some flow information with a range of about 100-150 miles. Routing can be strange and ETAs are generally overly optimistic (i.e you'd need to drive well over the speed limit to make the times they say). It also has a function to read out traffic info (giving location, reason and expected delay).

Sygic is the prettiest and voice directions are decent but routing and ETA is poor. They have been promising an update to use Tomtom's IQRoutes for about the last year but I wouldn't hold my breath. I haven't used Sygic since they changed the traffic from Inrix to Tomtom though. Traffic uses the same info as Tomtom but without the IQRoutes info, it's less comprehensive.

Co-Pilot is the most customisable. You can set your own road speeds etc to optimise routing to your driving style. It uses Android's native TTS though and this is nowhere near as good as Sygic, Tomtom or Navigon. Traffic is similar to navigon, with a shorter horizon.

Tomtom is very solid for the money. The voice direction is a little functional compared to Navigon but it does the job. Routing and ETA are about as good as it gets, the best I have used on a satnav. ETAs are typically within minutes for several hours driving (they use measured rather than assumed road speeds). Traffic is more detailed compared to Navigon or Co-Pilot, in that it includes B Roads and some other 2ndary roads , plus traffic jam positions are often accurate to tens of metres. Live Traffic is generally excellent but has two main flaws. One is that it doesn't include all TMC info that you'd get from RDS-TMC on a standalone TomTom or Garmin unit (Navigon and Co-Pilot do). Say you've got a trip over the pennines with potential snow on A roads. Frequently Navigon or Copilot will know the road is closed but Tomtom will send you happily towards it unless there's a big jam building up. This is inconsistent, depending on location. Tomtom traffic is fine for Highways Agency Trunk roads but closure info from local authorities is very hit and miss. The other flaw is the range. For traffic flow and general incidents the range is 40 minutes. For road closures it's 160km. 40 minutes can sometimes mean it's too late to select the best long-distance alternative by the time traffic is detected.

Overall I would recommend Tomtom or Navigon. Tomtom for traffic avoidance in commuting and medium distance journeys, routing and accurate ETAs. Navigon for superb voice direction, that's so good you usually don't need to look at it, and better info on road closures on A-Roads and Motorways.

If data's not a worry, I'd say the best freebie is M8. That's free, includes the same live traffic service (free) as Navigon but it all runs online.

If you don't have a data connection, there's not much wrong with Navfree.
 
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Soldato
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Had a play with one of these tablets last night,not to bad as it goes,couldn't get much time to play as the stand is right out in the open in my store in view of the managers but will have another go tonight.
 
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