Satnav Advice

jockwav

jockwav

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Ok,i am having a look around at sat nav,s,never having had one before need some advice on what to look at.
I do know i want one with the full uk 7 digit postcode,i had a look on the halford site but in some of the small print you have to pay online for some sort of upgrades.:shrug::nono:
All advice welcome:)
 
Got a tomtom one has the 7 digit post code & worked straight from the box , wouldn't be without it . HTH:) Also has map share so upgrades for free.
 
If you like car parks and "take the next exit and then over the roundabout and join the same motorway again " get a Tom Tom, if not buy a good wide screen Garmin.
 
mr bizzare said:
If you like "take the next exit and then over the roundabout and join the same motorway again " get a Tom Tom,
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Lol, mine does that at Chorley!

Whichever one you get make sure you don't put your exact home address in it just in case anyone ever steals it. Then they know where you live! One cunning member here puts in the local Police Station as a home address and that's not a bad idea!
 
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I would say TomTom too. I am on my third or fourth now and I guess it's more for the fact that it is nice and easy to update and customise to a certain degree.

Maps are readily available and for a subscription will be overwritten every few months. You can now have lane guidance (for motorways and dual carriageways) and IQ routes which mean you should be able to use good shortcuts with a little local knowledge thrown in it seems this coupled with a traffic transmitter should get you past those jams. Then there is those horrible speed cameras and the red light cameras, Easy to update simply by overwriting the old ones to help you to save your driving licence points. As for the Garmin I have no knowledge of this system so maybe a quick Google to see if this is better would be the best advice. I'm sticking with what I know and although TomTOm has let me down a couple of times (heading down cobbled lanes eeek etc.) It is 99% accurate and that does me fine.

HTH
 
AliB said:
Lol, mine does that at Chorley!
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If that's the M61 / M65 junction it does it for a very good reason you jump part of the queue if the road to the M6 is solid.

I have a Garmin and the Eco routing system works quite well if you aren't bothered about getting their quickly. The Garmin I have also has free traffic on it :thumbs:
 
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No, it's the junction at Botany Bay, it diverts me up the sliproad, over the roundabout and back down the other side and back onto the same motorway!

It's mental! :)

I really need to change it to the male voice so I can just ignore it;) lol
 
Thank you all for your input,i think i am liking the sound of the tomtom one,i take it thst the full title of that one no model no. or anything.
I dont really want to pay for anything else once i buy it,so will have a look at this one.:thumbs:

P.S.Mybe a silly question i dont know,if i can get any extra maps from someone,i take it i can just load them on,job done?.:)
 
Unless you go to Europe you should not need any more maps. The One ships with full UK mapping so all you need to do is plug it in and off you go :)

Navigate>Address>Postcode is as complicated as you need to get going and if you set a local point as your home address all you need to get back is Navigate>Home.

Even I can use it! ;)
 
Sorry i should have said i will be driving to europe in 2011
 
Travelling in the car is the only time my wife speaks to me - and me to her when we are lost :D

Stick to maps and have a ball.

Graham
 
Another vote for TomTom. I use one all day every day in my work, and after many years of use I am on my third one. Select the model most suited to how often you are going to use it, but in my experience, the RDS option isnt worth while the extra cost, its normally out of date by too many hours to make it of any use. My personal one is a GO 730 but for day to day work I use an XL. The 730 has a much improved display and well worth the extra IMO. There are more recent models out now but I havent looked at them so cant pass an opinion.
You can buy and download extra maps direct from TomTOm. I have heard of people using copies from some source and downloading them from bit torrents or from friends, but I haven't seen this in use so dont know how it works/if it works.
Good luck with your choice.
 
Thank you.:):thumbs:
 
jockwav said:
Thank you all for your input,i think i am liking the sound of the tomtom one,i take it thst the full title of that one no model no. or anything.
I dont really want to pay for anything else once i buy it,so will have a look at this one.:thumbs:

P.S.Mybe a silly question i dont know,if i can get any extra maps from someone,i take it i can just load them on,job done?.:)
Click to expand...

This is the one i have
http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/...rtNumber=165087&storeId=10001&ddkey=ClickInfo

Although this might be worth the extra as it looks a better screen
http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/...rtNumber=157662&storeId=10001&ddkey=ClickInfo
 
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Thanks for that,deffo need the uk-europe maps:):thumbs:
 
Another vote for tomtom, the basic Tomtom will suffice, as long as you get the one with Europe maps instead of just UK.

If you want to use it as a MP3 player, and a bluetooth handfree kit for your mobile then you need to look at the more expensive models-I have the 520-which has handsfree/mp3 but only covers UK.
 
Yep there is no sat nav in corfu,but i need it here for a year then drive over.:)

I think i have now decided i will go for the tomtom one with uk & europe maps,thanks all.:):thumbs:
 
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TomTom do the best maps but get the cheapest you can find, no point paying for widescreen etc since the road you're on is the narrow little strip in the middle and you won't be looking at it 95% of the time anyway, just listening to it.
 
Just a note on the tomtom one UK maps model... my father has this and I took it to france so thought about adding maps for the whole of europe as he was also looking to go to Austira. However, the TTone didn't have enough built in memory to add everything, so I was only able to add France.

May be worth opting for the Europe model even iff you can get maps, or a model with a separate card slot.

I know use the GO550live... it's great for me as a commuter (in and out of Manchester everyday) and the "live" feature does save me time by highlighting delays along my route and recommending alternatives... but of course, one does have to pay for this priviledge!

Still, the TomTom map layout and screen are clear, and lane assist is also good.
 
I have a Tomtom 530 and can't fault it at all, it's very reliable. It pairs with your mobile phone too and enables genuine total handsfree answering of calls. I use the speed camera database fom Pocket GPS World which is cheap as chips compared to the Tomtom option.
 
Thank you all for taking the time to add your thoughts,i dont use mobile phones or want mp3 player in it.
So i think the uk+europe map tomtom one is the baby for me.:):D:thumbs:
 
I find some of the POI's a bit random
the wife as telling me how her friends satnav had taken them to some random farmhouse in the back of nowhere when they were trying to go to Maccy 'Ds.
how I laughed.
then today we put in to go to KFC. imagine my humour when the wife pointed out the farmhouse that it had guided us to that was the same one as maccy D's
 
Steep said:
TomTom do the best maps but get the cheapest you can find, no point paying for widescreen etc since the road you're on is the narrow little strip in the middle and you won't be looking at it 95% of the time anyway, just listening to it.
Click to expand...
i think on the wide screen you can see ahead better to decide if the machine wants you to go a silly way, and any information down the sides of the screen will not get in the way of your map. I have had 2 Tom Tom and 4 Garmins and i find the wider the screen the better.
 
tiler65 said:
why do people use sat navs on the motorway?
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So that if it's a motorway and route they are not familiar with, they get told what junction to exit at. Get yourself on to the M25 and you could be on there forever if you don't realise it goes round in one big circle (as actually happened to one old duffer, who completed three circuits before he recognised that he had crossed the Dartford bridge before).
 
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CT said:
I have a Tomtom 530 and can't fault it at all, it's very reliable. It pairs with your mobile phone too and enables genuine total handsfree answering of calls. .
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I went for the 730 for the same reasons and so far I can't fault it either:thumbs:

Trev4 said:
They wake you up and remind you when to turn off, better than sleeping past your exit :D
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Good point well presented :thumbs: :D
 
tiler65 said:
why do people use sat navs on the motorway?
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I wondered that before I got one.

It lets you know how far away your exit is so you know if you have time to overtake the long line of lorries in the inside lane.

I got a Garmin Nuvi 255.
Less than £100, full postcode mapping of europe, small screen but not as much a problem as I thought it might be. Took me to Reims and Alsace in France then to Bernkastel in Germany then to Calais via Belgium with no problems.
 
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Suvv said:
I wondered that before I got one.

It lets you know how far away your exit is so you know if you have time to overtake the long line of lorries in the inside lane.
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If you need a sat nav to do this then you should not be driving.
 
Halfords are doing a good deal just now,going tomorrow to have a look at the garmin nuvi 1240 which they are doing cheaper than argos at the moment,i have provisionary reserved it.:):shrug:
 
Personally I just use my phone; Samsung Omnia running Windows Mobile using Google Maps (was testing it at the time due to the fact it was free, but there are many other options out there, including Tomtom software).

I even pitted it against my friend's Tomtom a couple of times on a trip to Coventry and another to London. Both times my phone told him to go the way he was going to go anyway when the Tomtom was telling him to take wrong exits off roundabouts and detours that'd take him off the motorway at one exit and back onto the same motorway further along the road.

The Omnia also has an TV Output too, so if you have a portable DVD player in your car, or built in LCD in your dash, with AV input you can use it with that for a larger display. Do you have an iPhone or Windows mobile phone? Had you considered that an option?
 
Thanks for your input,i dont use mobiles at all,so a sat nav is my only option.:):thumbs:
 
Went to halfords this morning & got a great deal on the garmin nuvi 1240,set up & drove home,love it.:):thumbs:
 
No i always ended up in newcastle.:lol::D:)
 
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