|
I'm no fan of satnav, but my experience of having recently had a Parrott handsfree fitted by a local in-car gizmo specialist was that he was very knowledgable across a range of types of kit. It might be worth a call to that sort of operator for advice.
|
Checking the traffic conditions on a route prior to setting off is easily done with both TomTom and Garmin traffic units.
Turn them on, choose your destination, and they will both show you delays on your route. In some circumstances they can auto-reroute at that point to avoid (ie if it's a bad delay), or in others they simply show you how long the delay is, and you can choose to reroute yourself if you want to.
On the Garmin there is a separate screen that shows all the delays over the whole country, whether on your route or not. The TomTom (from memory, and I stand to be corrected) only shows traffic on your chosen route, but of course manually changing your chosen route makes it check again.
The caveat with these units is the nationwide traffic info signal strength is currently poor and so reception of traffic can be patchy via an aerial. TomTom offer the ability to get traffic info via a bluetooth phone as an alternative. A small call charge applies for each update but at least it works every time.
Edited by Dipstick on 15/04/2008 at 09:48
|
"TomTom (from memory, and I stand to be corrected) only shows traffic on your chosen route"
Since TomTom version 5 (and the latest x30 units will be version 8) TomTom traffic downloads a summary of traffic for the whole country. For the GPRS version of traffic it then downloads more details info if you request it but the default level of info is the sort of problem, length of delay in miles and time.
Dipstick is right in saying using an antenna to use traffic in the UK can be hit and miss, especially with TomTom units. This is meant to improve shortly with more stations. But the biggest problem with TomTom since version 7 of their software, is traffic via the TMC-RDS antenna does not work properly at all - it does not have a delay time nor does it display the holdups properly. It is the same with the new TomTom 530, 730 and 830 running v8 software too.
I personally use TomTom 720 with traffic via GPRS and it's great. You pay a yearly subscription to TomTom for th service and a small amount of credit is used to download updates. But my PAYG SIM with £10 credit lasts ages. If you plug it into your PC before you leave home it can download traffic info via your broadband connection.
|
Thankyou for this valuable information gentlemen, we wanted to know what to look for as the sales staff have a vested interest in telling you what you want to hear (politicians?), regardless of whether its suitable for the job.
Will try a more independent specialist Nick, hopefully more helpfull than the chain store.
It a pity that the information is difficult to receive via aerial, as the trafficmaster YQ unit has no trouble receiving and updating itself at all.
If the garmin models (i presume most) have this separate display for national viewing, that sounds like our best bet at the moment.
TBH we are a bit long in the tooth and don't need the navigation, its really the only way to replace trafficmaster units now.
Does anyone know the likely TMC subs?
Any other thoughts gratefully received.
Regards GB
Edited by gordonbennet on 15/04/2008 at 21:03
|
"It a pity that the information is difficult to receive via aerial"
TomTom's wired into the main car aerial have much better reception. Probably why the YQ unit got updates okay. But the latest TomTom units are poor in terms of software support for TMC-RDC traffic. Other units maybe better.
TMC subs are covered by the purchase of the "aerial" and free thereafter.
|
|
|
