Navman F20 what a load of rubbish....

cheapread · Occasional Visitor Joined: Jan 01, 2007 Posts: 13

I am so disappointed with it - It tells me go up one way streets, it tells me turn left or right when withing say 30 metres of a street and it can either be the first or second street, it tells me take the n'th exit at non existant roundabout ahead (several instances..)- sometimes I am waiting for it to tell me what to do and I've sailed past the junction before I am prompted to take an action, it definitely is wrong with its advice on distances ahead, it will say 200 metres ahead when it is much less, or more. I have absolutely no confidence whatever in this item - it also obliges me to acknowledge a safety warning everytime I switch it on - it has no choice of roads - A roads or B roads or motorways.
If I miss the advised turning because of its hesitation - admittedly in the centre of Bath.... it takes so long to reconsider the next action that I am driving around aimlessly whilst waiting for it to figure out its algorithm.

What a LOAD OF rubbish - if this is the state of the art, we will look back at it in a few years time and LAUGH at how arcane it is -
Am I crazy or wot, or is it a duff one-off? -admittedly I NEVER look at the display, I rely on the spoken instructions - how can u look at a 2" display and concentrate on the road as well...
what
a
load
of
JUNK....

I am about to borrow a TomTom1 soon and will run both concurrently and maybe report back.....

I wish someone had advised be thus three weeks ago I wouldnt have wasted my money. Buyers beware - borrow one first!

gtz101 · Occasional Visitor Joined: Feb 25, 2007 Posts: 4

tomtoms are good

retrogeezer · Occasional Visitor Joined: Jan 27, 2007 Posts: 3

I'm very impressed with my F20.....done a 400 plus mile round trip to look at 10 houses in a weekend and did not put a wheel wrong once.

Dustysworld · Posted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 5:36 pm Post subject:

I have purposely gone of route on routes i know with my F20 and its got me on track in seconds . Not sure the routes it got me on are the routes i would of taken, but none the less it got me to my destinations. The T1 TMC Module tho is another matter, be prepared to buy a new antenna or play ping pong with navman support .
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Johnny_D · Posted: Thu Mar 01, 2007 4:53 pm Post subject:

F20 has worked fine for me over the last 2,500 miles or so.

Granted, it does *not* have the bells and whistles of the tomtom go range. but it does exactly what is on the box.

I wonder exactly what the OP was looking for from his satnav system?

It's a tool. You can't follow them blindly!

JD
_________________
TTG 300 Died the death of a cracked screen
Navman F20 USB Fell off
TTG 520 Third time lucky?
Bloody Superb PGPSW Camera Database.
Not much else!

jaybond007 · Occasional Visitor Joined: Mar 02, 2007 Posts: 4

I just bought an F20 and what a lovely looking bit of kit this is compared to my old garman i3. Only bad points i can see is unlike the i3 it dosent have even ONE via route, no detour button, and no vehicle choice selection which for less money the i3 had. Apart from that i'm very happy with it and its other features :D I hope in future i can change the voices though Rolling Eyes

kshotton45 · Occasional Visitor Joined: Mar 23, 2005 Posts: 46

I have a Navman 510 and am happy with it.
But ! I can sympathise with Cheapread when it comes to the centre of Bath!
Don't take a Navman into the centre of Bath ! you'll end up going round in circles !!

Dustysworld · Posted: Sat Mar 03, 2007 2:12 pm Post subject:

I cant think of a nicer town to go around in circles in :D
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cheapread · Occasional Visitor Joined: Jan 01, 2007 Posts: 13

Well then guys.....
I borrowed the super-stud' Tomtom One for all of last week - a typical busy'ish week round the West Country - and so I had my desired opportunity to contrast and compare, both in the car same time....

TT1 battery much poorer than F20
TT1 speaker much worse than F20

TT1 superbly fast at kicking off from power-up and dictating a route -
F20 continues to rotate it's globe seeking fixes and stuff for ages - hopeless by comparison....

TT1 great on roundabouts - especially on big roundabouts, -as you are half way in thru a roundabout it further prompts you with 'take exit' which can be very handy - F20 stay sthum, says nowt.

F20 wins hands down after exiting a manoeuver, like crossing a roundabout, it tells u what its next instruction is even though several
kilometres away - TT1 is painfully quiet with nowt to say...

IMHO TT1 is marginally better with its choice of navigation instructions -
sometimes F20 gives u the info too late or confusing when there are say two left turns ahead and the instruction can be interpreted as either - you just gotta take pot luck which one it means....

F20 with easy volume control button is good -
there is none on the TT1 , mind you you wouldnt want to turn it down ever -crap speaker 'n all.

All you guys out there will know - but newbies might not - that both units use the same map software source.
So you'd laugh at me bumblin along with bitch 1 on RHS telling me what to do, and almost same time bitch 2 rabbitin on on LHS almost mimicking same instruction. To stop them both talking at same time I had one on metric and one on miles - so in most instances the same instructions were repeated immediately after each other.

Thus no great differences - both almost exactly the same.

Conclusions -

If I had the choice tomorrow to take one or t'other off the shelf- I would dither.....but if the £50 difference or even less was there, I'd take the cheaper F20.

Sat Nav, as presented by these two examples is FAR FAR away from being precise - just dont be disappointed by their crudeness.
Remember Bill Gates had to cheek to sell Win 95 to Corporations as a robust computer operating system and made billions our of it.
Likewise Sat Nav - we'll look back in 5 years time and laugh at these offerings.
By the same token I wouldnt be without them - they are brilliant in comparison to me and my AtoZ and a magnifying glass and several repeat visits back to the index page AND the petrol saved.

But long as I live, I cannot IMAGINE what the hell the colour 2" screen is for- don't even try to enlighten me !! - It can be just as dangerous as a mobile phone IMHO

Thanks for your feedbacks and comments on Bath - lovely town for
dollies with BIG shopping bags - diabolical for drivin round.

Oh and by the way I prefer the female voices- I prefer bitches instructing me on my next manoeuver- I'm more comfortable with it, just like the wife sitting next to me, you get used to it .
Wink

Drive safe guys !

cheapread

Dustysworld · Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2007 12:20 pm Post subject:

So is the F20 not so rubbish after all ? or is the tom tom even rubbisher 8O 8O Wink

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steviebilbo · Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2007 5:30 pm Post subject: F20 Problems

Cheapread... just a thought but do you have one of those 'Prohibitive' type windscreens with the heating element in it, as they tend to make the device 'act up' a little and from what I recall you need an aerial to allow your device to receive a good signal.

I have the N40i and it is (99% of the time) very quick, accurate (to within 5-10m) and clear in its instructions. Only once has it had me leave the motorway (and rejoin at the same roundabout) for no apparent reason. It DOES have other annoying attributes but not to the same degree as you are experiencing.

Just my 2p

Steve B
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"Better to remain silent and be considered a fool than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt"!

steviebilbo · Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2007 5:44 pm Post subject: F20 Problems

Cheapread... just a thought but do you have one of those 'Prohibitive' type windscreens with the heating element in it, as they tend to make the device 'act up' a little and from what I recall you need an aerial to allow your device to receive a good signal.

I have the N40i and it is (99% of the time) very quick, accurate (to within 5-10m) and clear in its instructions. Only once has it had me leave the motorway (and rejoin at the same roundabout) for no apparent reason. It DOES have other annoying attributes but not to the same degree as you are experiencing.

Just my 2p

Steve B
_________________
"Better to remain silent and be considered a fool than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt"!

cheapread · Occasional Visitor Joined: Jan 01, 2007 Posts: 13

Steve, err, you may have a point, indirectly....!
I tend to keep the sat nav on the passenger seat next to me ! -
that may be less than clever -
no, my car is a Focus basic model, no fancy windscreen like a more upmarket Mondeo I used to have and hated - maybe I'll use the windscreen clamp (still in the box!) and see if that's better- Embarassed

ejhardy · Occasional Visitor Joined: May 14, 2006 Posts: 2

Hi

I bought the F20, because it was such a good deal (i used to have tomtom on an Ipaq but the Ipaq died) , I drove round for an hour and its fine, it got me where I want to go, its small, its easy to use etc. But it seems to have one huge problem. It only allows one route.

E.g Im driving between two locaton on either side of London, it routes me the most direct route (changing quick or short route options makes a few changes, nothing huge) , there is no way to get it to take me the long way roung (A2 M25 ) which is twice as far but in London traffic actually works out quicker, on the TomTom I can ask it to calculate another route until it produces one I like, or just say go Via this point.

Its a real shame, The F20 is a really nice unit and the price is brilliant. But its a deal breaker for me, I've sent it back and orderd a TomTom , bit more expensive but at least it will give me options on routing.

Thanks.

keithjeffrey · Posted: Sat May 19, 2007 3:24 pm Post subject:

I have got an F20 Europe and I will admit that it is not perfect.
If I were to sit here and think about it for a while , I could probably come up with 5 or 6 things that I don't like about it.
BUT ( and it's a big but ) for £ 150 , I have got a sat. nav with 21 European countries on it , which I think is a bl@@dy good deal !!!!!
If you want an all singing and dancing sat. nav. then dig deeper in your pocket and pay the extra money.
Too many people have champagne tastes and like to pay beer money !
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Keith
TomTom GO 730T App 8.392 (1909/091109) , W and CE 2GB v835.2419

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