Sat Nav.

[Pete B]

Have been debating getting one for ages but finding it hard to justify the expense considering how little use it would get. For UK and Europe, ball park figure of £140 plus.
However, having now just recieved my (free upgrade) i-phone 3GS I see that a Tom-tom app is available covering UK and western mainland Europe for £53. That would be a much more realistic figure, BUT, does it work as well as a dedicated sat nav unit, what are the pros and cons???? Will it just fill the (8G) memory? Should I just bite the bullet and buy a Tom-tom?
Anyone have any experience they could share please?
Thanks folks .

 

[easy]

Hello mate, I have a Tom tom one, which works realy well, both in the UK and the weird roads of Spain.

On my iphone 4 i have navfree its a free app and its sat nav! works like a charm, the only thing that is rubbish is the voice can lag a bit behind the actual navigation, but for free its great 8)

My mate has the Tom tom on his iphone 4 and he says it works fine.

Hope thats of some help. :mrgreen:

 

[Merlydog]

Hi there,
Having experienced most sat nav products out there, including the iPhone I would only ever recommend the Garmin. The most recent model is the Garmin Nuvi. The reason I don't like Tom Tom is mainly due to when in navigation mode it only displays immediately what's infront of you. You can't zoom out to see the route over all, whereas Garmin allows you to zoom in or out and remain at the point you have set it. Giving you a better perspective overall. You can store points of interest and I think the mapping is much better than Tom Tom.
iPhone is ok, just means if your 3G drops out so does your navigation for a time, txts & calls can also interfere at inopportune moments
Oh yes, and with Garmin Europe comes as standard whereas Tom Tom is more expensive :mrgreen:
However, I have been known to go against the grain on occasion, just for the bloody buggerence of it so Tom Tom may well be the preferred choice

 

[mattd1984]

I've got a Tom Tom one I think, it's only a year old really nice and small. When we went around Europe last summer it was fantastic. Only place it didn't work was cheque republic, I've always been put off by the iPhone ones as if your like me on o2 the signal will be dropping out all over the place and you'd never find your way. Tom Tom all the way

 

[froggy]

I have a cheap sat nav (think its a garmin that morrisons sold last year for £50) and to be honest it still gets me lost.
Last week i went to Bristol and despite using Satnav i still got lost, how was i to know that in order to stay right i 1st had to go left

 

[Clem]

I use the n drive app on iPhone It was a fiver and has always worked a treat

 

[skin69]

I run my Vodafone Sat Nav & it's been great for those odd times you need one.
It's always with me, never gets left in the car but it does use the battery & can be costly to run dependant on the network/package/deal you've got.
My 2 pence, for what it's worth...

 

[rustydiver]

Im on my 3rd TomTom now and i think they are Crap for their reliability and customer services.
I bought my 1St one about a yr ago Go 740 live its lasted 3 months before i had sim card problems they replaced it with a recon unit which lasted for 10 months same problem finally convinced them to replace with a newer model. Bearing in mind mine cost nearly 300 notes i think the new one is pants im only sticking with it cos they keep giving me more free live services on it i got it till late 2013 don't think the unit will last that long.
If i had to buy a new one think i would go for a Garmin.

 

[Marvel]

They reviewed this on the Gadget show a few weeks ago. Although the apps weren't as good as dedicated satnavs, they were a damn site cheaper and pretty effective. They probably still have the reviews on their site.

 

[dave]

tom tom any time, work uses them and never been a problem, i have a tom tom 1 and noproblems with it, had it 3 years so probebly should update maps but if something has changed it usually sorts it self out!!
Mate has a garmin and used it when i borrowed his car and to be honest did not rate it at all, may be just cause i am so used to tomtom!!

 

[Pete B]

Thanks for the replies folks. I have downloaded the 'navfree' app as recomended by Easy (cheers mate) and tried it out this morning going to work. Was impressed on the 'through routes' but it doesn't show many minor roads in this area, in fact at least half my home town is missing! (including where I live...) Maybe it's better elsewhere, will have to give it a go.
Next try will be the n drive Clem uses, though if he paid a fiver it's bound to cost me at least 20 quid!!! :lol: (in joke)
Christmas is coming and the folks are usually stuck as to what to get me, so maybe a tom-tom could go on the list? Will give the other options a good try first and report back. Thanks again all.

By the way, the battery life on my i-phone seems pretty poor, having to charge it every day despite minimal use. Is this normal?

 

[ozziedog]

Hey there , a bit late I know, (as usual). I go along with most of what people are saying on here. Had a Tom Tom was great but got squashed. Had the same on a htc phone and that was great but did lose signal sometimes, but was still far better than the built in Vauxhall one for out of the way or difficult places. The company gave us all a Garmin, used it two or three times and thought it was too slow and generally crap, went past too many turnings before it decided that was where to turn and it had a nasty habit of upgrading the map just as you were about to turn. If you stayed below 20 it could just about keep up. We got 60 to 70 surveyors out on the road everyday, I don`t know all of them personally but I do know 20 plus of them and only one uses the garmin on a day to day basis, because he is too tight to buy a proper one, mine just stays in the kitchen cupboard till the company wants it back or upgrades to a decent one. Mrs Ozziedog used the garmin one time to drive to Cheltenham from Bristol and she sings it praises to any one who will listen but most of the time she struggles to hit third gear :roll:

Ozziedog :lol:

 

[sparkywig]

Thanks for the replies folks. I have downloaded the 'navfree' app as recomended by Easy (cheers mate) and tried it out this morning going to work. Was impressed on the 'through routes' but it doesn't show many minor roads in this area, in fact at least half my home town is missing! (including where I live...) Maybe it's better elsewhere, will have to give it a go.
Next try will be the n drive Clem uses, though if he paid a fiver it's bound to cost me at least 20 quid!!! :lol: (in joke)
Christmas is coming and the folks are usually stuck as to what to get me, so maybe a tom-tom could go on the list? Will give the other options a good try first and report back. Thanks again all.

By the way, the battery life on my i-phone seems pretty poor, having to charge it every day despite minimal use. Is this normal?

Yes.

I've got the navfree app as well, it's OK and you can flag incorrect routes and locations.
I've also got a Garmin nuvi, and although you need to keep the map updated regularly, it's much better than the TomTom's I've owned.

 

[Jason]

I use Co-Pilot on my iPhone and have done every day up and down the country for over a year. Would recommend it.

http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/copilot-live-uk-ireland/id324592881?mt=8" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

 

[dubscum]

sunshine Pete, not chatted (if thats a word) in a while, all i'll say is don't by a garmin, i bought one, its fully rubbish, no info, like what time it is, how far away your are etc.

 

[Pete B]

Updating a bit sooner than expected!!! Decided that navfree was not for me, if it doesn't know where I live, how can I trust it to know where anywhere is? Also got it to check the route to the EB Xmas lunch and it went miles and miles off course from what I know to be the best/simplest/most obvious route for me.
Looked for N drive (isn't the i-tunes site crap to navigate?) , no joy but found 'navv' uk & ireland and upon reading the reviews it appears it is N drive with a different name! Good reports and just three and a half quid. Will try it out in the morning but so far so good, knows where I live and has planned a sensible route to a known (to me) destination. Fingers crossed

Best bit is, if this works well then there is a navv app for the Benelux countries for the same money. Well handy for next year 8) .

 

[Guest]

any recent android phone have google maps and the built in satnav is excellent, pros are its free and always up-to-date so you dont have to buy sodding maps every other year. cons? i cant think of any. i saw this on the new desire HD with a 4.3 inch HD screen and its incredible.

 

[Baldrick]

any recent android phone have google maps and the built in satnav is excellent, pros are its free and always up-to-date so you dont have to buy sodding maps every other year. cons? i cant think of any. i saw this on the new desire HD with a 4.3 inch HD screen and its incredible.

There was a comment on the non-HD Desire that using the GPS, 3G and permanently on SatNav would drain the battery faster than the charger could top it up so that over a long journey you could lose power.

This might depend on the charger ampage...but might be worth a question...

 

[Guest]

definitely a faulty model. i saw a review of the desire in comparison to the iphone 4 and it outlasted it by 1 hour, gps wireless and video all running.

 

[Jimbly]

I've been running Skobbler on my iPhone alongside an old TomTom for a while and prefer it - it's much more up to date, as I'm not prepared to fork out the cost of a new sat nav just to update TomTom maps. It's free and still downloads maps on the go, so a pain if you lose 3G or go abroad but they've just launched a 'Forever Map' to store on the phone, so no more downloads. It's UK and all of Europe and is a couple of quid. It's massive mind - more than 2Gb but if you've got the space...