Sat navs..

[denicholls2]

The product is as good as the map after the base technology (this is not typically proprietary but a licensed chipset) is taken into account. I find the Garmin maps have minor issues where roads have been mildly rerouted, but it's fun to drive "across the field" or to see where the road used to go. Note that your vendor is likely to have a better map for its own country.

As to right turns on motorways, one common issue is synching to the road either underneath or beside you. There's a distance algorithm used for this, but remember that on crossroads, the system is essentially two-dimensional.

I've used three different kinds and all were about equally accurate. Common annoyances:

- Listing the town or city twice, once followed by "twp". The person writing the map code didn't bother to reduce these to one place (which they are) so you sometimes have to search both for your road. Ditto for spelling variants Marlboro vs. Marlborough and similar stuff.

- Annoying off-route behavior (Garmin's is good)

- Inability to know how to avoid accident traffic.

- Nobody yet seems to have issues like road restrictions (e.g., no trailers) built into their algorithms.

In the U.S., Delorme is a mapping company and has excellent maps. Unfortunately, their product is really cumbersome to use.

My ancient Garmin Quest is still my favorite 'cause it works well in the woods and on my bike. I wish I could find a replacement battery for it.

[CBUEB1771]

what's with the Mr. Pelly business, respect for the aged?
I'll let you call me John, provided you go down on one knee when doing so
I suppose it's nicer than being called a Mo??is Dancer though

John, (yes I bowed deeply) I am aged myself, just trying to set an alternative tone to some of the recent rants on airbox clearances and dipstick failures. Honestly I don't understand the Morris Dancer issue. Here in the colonies we have troupes of Morris Dancers out in the spring and fall, not minutes away from where General George Washington had his headquarters during the Revolutionary War and where notable loyalists were imprisoned. The dancers are fun to watch and seem to be quite innocent. If I ever get the +2 and Elite back together I may try the dance. Sir Twincamman should get a kick out of this!

[GrUmPyBoDgEr]

what's with the Mr. Pelly business, respect for the aged?
I'll let you call me John, provided you go down on one knee when doing so
I suppose it's nicer than being called a Mo??is Dancer though

John, (yes I bowed deeply) I am aged myself, just trying to set an alternative tone to some of the recent rants on airbox clearances and dipstick failures. Honestly I don't understand the Morris Dancer issue. Here in the colonies we have troupes of Morris Dancers out in the spring and fall, not minutes away from where General George Washington had his headquarters during the Revolutionary War and where notable loyalists were imprisoned. The dancers are fun to watch and seem to be quite innocent. If I ever get the +2 and Elite back together I may try the dance. Sir Twincamman should get a kick out of this!

I raise my hat to you Sir; a good start to my day. which should be a good one anyway.
I'm going to the BMW shareholders meeting to listen to them give the management a hammering.
Sadism lives

[r.agnew]

http://www.independent.ie/national-news ... 38375.html

Maybe you should bring a few eggs with you like this guy !

[GrUmPyBoDgEr]

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/eggthrowing-pensioner-------unrepentant-after-attack-1738375.html

Maybe you should bring a few eggs with you like this guy !

I'd have been very much on my own there, talk about a rose coloured glasses management report & not one soul screaming or shouting.
So everything's fine & dandy. Mr. Brown would be proud of 'em.
The free sandwches & coffee were nice though, so the day's not been all bad

Really sorry about this daft hijack.
Cheers
John

[alaric]

Love my TomTom 910! The only issue I had with it was the polarisation of the screen; I tend to use polarised sunglasses when driving to avoid reflections, but the TomTom 910 is quite dark unless I rotate my head slightly. Dear old engineers must have missed that requirement in the spec of the anti reflection screen. Otherwise it's great. The newer versions are much smaller. I'd suggest testing the polarisation in the shop.

Sean.

[Rob_LaMoreaux]

As far as maps pretty much all the GPS units use either NavTeq or TeleAtlas data, so the data is very similar or identical. Navteq is considerred better for the USA and TeleAtlas is slightly better in Europe. Garmin uses Navteq and TomTom uses TeleAtlas. Both Gramin and TomTom offer map upgrades on most units for a fee, much of which goes to the mapping company from what I have heard.

The big differences are the user interface and routing. For this I prefer Garmin. On one particular road where the directions are divided by a median with U-Turn locations my Garmin says go 4.5 miles, and my Father-In_laws TomTom says go straight at every U-Turn location.

Finding a location to go to on both can be a bit of a bother since you have to walk through the state, city, road and number but from what I can tell neither (Garmin or TomTom) is significantly better than the other. The newer units have voice recognition which I haven't tried so I can't say how much this helps.

So for the most part I'd recommend either a Garmin or a TomTom unit depending on the features you want and the current deal. Other brands I haven't been too impressed by, except for the price.

I have a Garmin GPS V that currently lives in the Berlina for use as a speedometer, and a GPS 10X with windows mobile software running on my Phone or my wife's Dell AXIM 50V for the Elan Speedometer and navigation in the other cars.


Rob