Help: Buying a GPS

alf101 said:
TomTom is not too bad either.
One of the things you may look for in a gps is route planning, not all the cheap ones have it.
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Yes, this is actually VERY important! I believe Garmin is ripping people off with not including this in their Nuvi Models, i mean it's not freaking hardware it's software. This is one of those things that you only realize once you bought it that its' a "wtf, this is what it's all about" factor that's missing. Garmin call it "advanced features" , but come on, this is why it's easier to plan a route on your cellphone GPS than on one of the Nuvis.

In case people don't know what this "feature" is. Imagine you want to drive from PE to Cape Town, but you want to include SPECIFIC places , i.e. NOT going along the N2. You simply can't do it! The stupid little Garmin will allow -one- "via point" but will in most cases redirect you back to the N2..stupid stuff like that. The best you can do is fool around with the settings like "do not use highways" or "shortest vs fastest" routes, but again, if you want to drive from PTA -> Johburg but skipping the N1 and taking the R21 and joining back into the N3 at Gilloolies..good luck telling your Garmin Nuvi about this route.

Now the 600-700 Garmin models have this called "Saved Routes" [why you need to pay R6000 to plan routes is beyond me].

TomTom calls them "Itineraries" . Catch is, i believe the cheaper TomTom models have this (but they probably fool around with this too, making all us suckers think it costs R4000 to "plan routes")....and believe me having this is awesome. There's websites that put these Itineraries for download [basically a full tour of an area] and you just load them on your GPS.

You also get from Garmin this PC MapSource software to plan routes, but guess what! If you got one of them cheapy Nuvis without the "Saved Routes" Feature you can't do diddly with the "Routes" you planned! It will upload but insert it as random "favorite" points and there's no way for you to make a route of it .
 
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diabolus said:
Yes, this is actually VERY important! I believe Garmin is ripping people off with not including this in their Nuvi Models, i mean it's not freaking hardware it's software. This is one of those things that you only realize once you bought it that its' a "wtf, this is what it's all about" factor that's missing. Garmin call it "advanced features" , but come on, this is why it's easier to plan a route on your cellphone GPS than on one of the Nuvis.

In case people don't know what this "feature" is. Imagine you want to drive from PE to Cape Town, but you want to include SPECIFIC places , i.e. NOT going along the N2. You simply can't do it! The stupid little Garmin will allow -one- "via point" but will in most cases redirect you back to the N2..stupid stuff like that. The best you can do is fool around with the settings like "do not use highways" or "shortest vs fastest" routes, but again, if you want to drive from PTA -> Johburg but skipping the N1 and taking the R21 and joining back into the N3 at Gilloolies..good luck telling your Garmin Nuvi about this route.

Now the 600-700 Garmin models have this called "Saved Routes" [why you need to pay R6000 to plan routes is beyond me].

TomTom calls them "Itineraries" . Catch is, i believe the cheaper TomTom models have this (but they probably fool around with this too, making all us suckers think it costs R4000 to "plan routes")....and believe me having this is awesome. There's websites that put these Itineraries for download [basically a full tour of an area] and you just load them on your GPS.

You also get from Garmin this PC MapSource software to plan routes, but guess what! If you got one of them cheapy Nuvis without the "Saved Routes" Feature you can't do diddly with the "Routes" you planned! It will upload but insert it as random "favorite" points and there's no way for you make a route of it .
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This guy is demo-ing a Nuvi 200 (don't know accurate this video is though) and says you can put in waypoints on this device...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8n8N0WY0e6k
(he says it around 1:30)
 
charlie_82 said:
This guy is demo-ing a Nuvi 200 (don't know accurate this video is though) and says you can put in waypoints on this device...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8n8N0WY0e6k
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I don't see the dude actually plan a route with multiple waypoints [because you can't on that particular Garmin]. All GPS'es allow you to add "points" or "bookmarks" or "favorites". Basically like saying Point X is where i work, Point Y is where i live, Point Z is where i like to shop, Point A is where i like to play Golf. However you can't string them together to make a route. You can ONLY go and say "go to ONE of these points right now" . So you end up going "Ok GPS, drive to Point X" then when you reach X, you have to go again "ok Garmin now drive to Z" and repeat.


You can "save" a bunch of waypoints (or rather it's more like "destinations"), but you can't save a "route" that involves going through 4 of those waypoints and then tell the GPS to calculate a route based on your multiple waypoints.

Just some tidbits to clarify a few things [i still don't believe the youtube guy is correct with the sidelong waypoint comment, i think he's talking about the single "via point" you can add, which rarely works as intended.
http://www.gpsreview.net/tomtom-itinerary-planning/
* Waypoint: A specific location you want to drive through, however you might not necessarily be stopping there. For example if you don’t like the route suggested to get from point A to point B, you could add point C to the route as a waypoint to force the route to go via that location, taking your desired route.
* Destination: A specific location where you will be making one of your stops in your daily journey.
* Itinerary: A list of waypoints and/or destinations combined in a specific order into a single route. You can have multiple Itineraries stored on your device, although only one can be “active” at any time. The Itinerary is your complete plan for the day.

There are two scenarios where you might use Itineraries. The first is for people in real estate or sales who need to visit many specific addresses in one trip. This might also apply to people on vacation who want to visit multiple local attractions in one day. The second reason you might use the Itinerary feature is if you are planning a long drive and you know ahead of time the route suggested isn’t the optimal one.
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diabolus said:
You must distinguish between "waypoints" and "routes" though. All GPS allow you to add "points" or "bookmarks" or "favorites". Basically like saying Point X is where i work, Point Y is where i live, Point Z is where i like to shop, Point A is where i like to play Golf. However you can't string them together to make a route. You can ONLY go and say "go to ONE of these points right now" . Simply put, you can have a whole database of "points of interest" but you can't line them up and say "i want to go to point X, then Y, then B" .
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Ok cool, I see what you saying.
Apparently this is rectified in an update for the 205:
http://forum.miata.net/vb/showpost.php?p=3630721&postcount=12

I'm trying to find a more reputable resource this though
 
charlie_82 said:
Ah then that would explain why, with all those features, the 310 is so cheap.
When a model is discontinued, does that mean getting newer maps is a pain in the butt?
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New maps are not a problem - however the 300 range does not support the "routing" option (i.e the stringing together of waypoints to plan a trip). It also does not support tracking (i.e the ability to see a breadcrumb trail of the actual route covered. I am not sure about this but AFAIK the newer 200 ranges provides limited support for both these features.

However for general road navigation neither of these features are really needed and sometimes, depending on the user, can make the GPS unnecessarily complicated. With the Garmin range you also normally get "Mapsource" which is a nice PC based mapping and routeplanning application allowing you to do route planning on your computers screen and transfer data to and from the GPS. This package also intefaces to Google Earth so you can preview your routes in Google Earth very easily
 
mikef said:
New maps are not a problem - however the 300 range does not support the "routing" option (i.e the stringing together of waypoints to plan a trip). It also does not support tracking (i.e the ability to see a breadcrumb trail of the actual route covered. I am not sure about this but AFAIK the newer 200 ranges provides limited support for both these features.

However for general road navigation neither of these features are really needed and sometimes, depending on the user, can make the GPS unnecessarily complicated. With the Garmin range you also normally get "Mapsource" which is a nice PC based mapping and routeplanning application allowing you to do route planning on your computers screen and transfer data to and from the GPS. This package also intefaces to Google Earth so you can preview your routes in Google Earth very easily
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When i bought my 300 the only real difference between the 200 and 300 ranges were non-GPS things like bluetooth and mp3 player abilities, which is in the end only "nice to have" stuff.

And yes, it's when you start using Mapsource on your PC when these missing "route planning" features on the Nuvi hit you like a brick of "wtf". You can plan your route absolutely perfectly on Mapsource, when you import it on your Garmin Nuvi it's no longer a route, it's just 50 "favorites" all lumped inbetween all your other favorites...it's impossible to tell your Nuvi to now go through all the points and what sequence, so it's a complete mess.

This is why i want to throw my Garmin out the car sometimes, it's extremely frustrating to plan a route where you know you want to travel on a certain road [i.e. NOT past Allandale Road on the N1 for traffic reasons] and then hearing your garmin going "recalculating,recalculating,recalculating" the entire trip because you went on the R21 and now the silly thing keeps trying to redirect you to the N1 from every onramp you drive past.

I now have TomTom Navigator on my cellphone, and this is when i realized what difference the route planning features makes. Obviously both Garmin and TomTom can do this, but the models and price for this particular feature might be very different.
 
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Man I knew this wasn't gonna be an easy option :confused:
I'm still leaning toward the 310 though, I think my mum would enjoy that bluetooth option.
She never figured out how to get rid of the Office paper-clip so I can't imagine she'll be mapping too many routes in Mapsource either :p

I am a little concerned about it being a discontinued model though. What is the downside of this?
 
I've got a TomTom 720Go and from what I understand you don't pay for map updates. Stuff like speedtraps you do pay for.

Personally I like this option more. I mean how many times do you update your speedtrap info compared to the map as a whole?
 
charlie_82 said:
Man I knew this wasn't gonna be an easy option :confused:
I'm still leaning toward the 310 though, I think my mum would enjoy that bluetooth option.
She never figured out how to get rid of the Office paper-clip so I can't imagine she'll be mapping too many routes in Mapsource either :p

I am a little concerned about it being a discontinued model though. What is the downside of this?
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The only disadvantage that I can think of is that Garmin is unlikely to do much updating to the 300 range firmware. If you purely need something to ensure you will not get lost and want the bluetooth option then the 310 is not a bad option.
 
AirWolf said:
Isn't that a paid service on TomTom?:confused:
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You get a free one year subscription to the speed cameras.
Go to tomtom home and download them.
After 1 year it's R399 per year.
Get gps quickfix as well - it finds satellites in less than 30 seconds.

Also a few cool voices to download for free, Darth Vader, Yoda, Hannibal Lecter and a few others I got there.
And plenty of points of interest u can download, wallpapers etc.

This is a pretty good forum with plenty tips if u want to know more.
http://www.pocketgpsworld.com/
 
charlie_82 said:
Man I knew this wasn't gonna be an easy option :confused:
I'm still leaning toward the 310 though, I think my mum would enjoy that bluetooth option.
She never figured out how to get rid of the Office paper-clip so I can't imagine she'll be mapping too many routes in Mapsource either :p

I am a little concerned about it being a discontinued model though. What is the downside of this?
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Makro ran a special on the 310 for R2000 for a quite awhile last year [that's where i got mine]. Might be useful to ask around the Makros, they never really advertised it and it was one of those instore things.
 
charlie_82 said:
Yeah it is discontinued. But it's for my mum who won't update it etc.
She'd like the bluetooth feature which is why I was after this one
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I saw the tomtom one 3rd edition advertised at Makro for R1299 a couple of weeks ago. It's also discontinued. May still have one or 2 left.
No bluetooth though.
 
If i had to choose between this:

TomTom ONE XL vs. Garmin Nuvi 200/300 . In fact most reviews compare the TomTom ONE XL with Garmin Streetpilot and 600/700 ranges...which pricewise seems a little unfair? Am i missing something?


I'd go for the TomTom XL : it's R2500 here, http://www.take2.co.za/electronics-tomtom-one-xl-gps-device-3962195.html .

Read a review here: http://gpsmagazine.com/2007/06/tomtom_one_xl_review.php?page=5

In fact people did make comments like this in the review
Not a fair review, you cannot compare a $400 GPS unit to $700+ units and expect similar performance.
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The guy was referring to comparing "route optmization" vs "route planning". The more expensive Garmins [and TomToms] can go further with your route planning and determine an optimal route through all the waypoints [as in determining the best sequence to use to visit all the waypoints] . The cheaper version only plot the shortest route between each waypoint and you need to decide the sequence yourself. But the fact of the matter is the Garmin Nuvis i've played with don't even have any of this [not route planning or optimization] .

Now i don't know what the newer Nuvis have in terms of functionality , but check the review above and then go check if the Nuvi's have all that ..especially the Route Planning/Multi waypoint stuff.
 
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diabolus said:
If i had to choose between this:

TomTom ONE XL vs. Garmin Nuvi 200/300

I'd go for the TomTom XL : it's R2500 here, http://www.take2.co.za/electronics-tomtom-one-xl-gps-device-3962195.html

Read a review here: http://gpsmagazine.com/2007/06/tomtom_one_xl_review.php?page=5

Now i don't know what the newer Nuvis have, but check the review above and then go check if the Nuvi's have all that ..especially the Route Planning/Multi waypoint stuff.
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R2500 is above my budget though.
I guess, in order preference, this is what I would want:
  1. Easy updates with speed trap info (the kind mercurial mentioned would be best)
    mercurial said:
    Don't worry about the maps - that you can download from certain places :p
    Click to expand...
  2. Anti-Glare
  3. Bluetooth
  4. Multi viapoints
 
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