CoPilot Live 7 Review Now Available

Shane-1970 · Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 5:09 pm Post subject:

So from what i have read so far, i take it the routing is still not very good or it is?

I'm looking to upgrade from TT6, and I quite liked the idea of live tracking as I'm off to Holland and Germany in May with our son and want the other half to track us on the way.

Plus in April we're off to the O2 Arena, this is all from Lowestoft.

So i'm a little worried that the routing compared to TT6 is not as expected and will send us into chaos!

The review is an excellent read and sounds brilliant, the reviewer said that the routing was as he expected.

Any views Guys & Gals?
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TomTom Camper & Caravan Edition (Go1005)
Samsung S7 Edge
Sygic as backup

Crazymeg · Occasional Visitor Joined: Dec 01, 2005 Posts: 4

Thanks for a great review. I am a user of CoPilot 7 and think its excellent and a great improvement over the previous generations.

I noticed in your review the comment about:

"The usual 2D and 3D display options are present as well as a nice feature which allows you to have 3D for the main display with the view switching to 2D as you approach a turn. Often it is much simpler to visualise a complex junction in 2D mode and this feature is a novel solution to that problem"

I cannot find how to enable this as it looks useful. Can you advise on this...Thanks
Andy

Darren · Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 6:04 pm Post subject:

That feature can be enabled in:

Menu -> Settings -> Driver Safety -> Map Type

Here you can chose to switch to an alternative view from the chosen one when approaching a turn. Even the distance at which this occurs is configurable. It's a very nice feature. I tend to use 3D most of the time but I like the option to switch to 2D on the approach to turns.

I should also add (and will update the review) that CP7 is fully Landscape switchable and I'll post a few screen-shots of it in landscape format.
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Darren Griffin

RoyC · Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 6:42 pm Post subject:

Darren - excellent review - thank you.

I am contemplating a change from TT5/6 to CPL7. My main problem with TT has always been the routing because I have a Motor Caravan and the tendency to take me into silly B roads is not helpful and the inability to avoid them whilst route planning is a shortcoming ( you used to be able to program road speeds in TT3 ish but that feature disappeared sadly). What I need is a 'avoid small roads' type option - or 'stick to major roads' or whatever. Is thee anything in CPL which might help me in this.

I am aware of the Navteq 'Transport' system which brings road widths etc into the routing algorithms and I am aware that ALK are bringing out a version of CoPilot which uses the 'Transport' data base. This will solve the problem completely. I am interested to hear if you have any 'inside knowledge' of whether that will be shipped as an upgrade to CPL or if it will be a new product completely? and when?

Roy

Darren · Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 7:02 pm Post subject:

Hi Roy,

In the Vehcile Type setting you can choose RV. Addittionally you can configure the custom profile and all the options open to you are in this image:

I cannot comment on ALK's future plans in respect of the Transport data but I would hope this will be available as an upgrade to existing users. You must appreciate that this would require new map data with the Transport layers and an updated application so it wouldn't be a cheap upgrade.

However if ALK can get this to market quickly they will steal a march on their competitors. ALK have a great deal of experience in the transport sector, it is where they started out in the US after all so I have high hopes.
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Darren Griffin

RoyC · Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 7:20 pm Post subject:

Darren - Thank you for that.

On some systems I have seen the RV mode simply avoids too many right turns , which is useful but not a complete solution. Are you aware of whether this does more?

On the 'Transport' product , I have since had it on pretty good authority that it is unlikely that it will be launched as a CPL upgrade but rather as a professional product. That is the reason I am stalling on buying really but maybe CPL7 with the features you identified will be a more cost effective solution for the next few years - while they sort out the Transport stuff.

Thanks again

Roy

Shane-1970 · Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 8:19 pm Post subject:

So is the routing good or bad compared to TT6?
_________________
TomTom Camper & Caravan Edition (Go1005)
Samsung S7 Edge
Sygic as backup

Darren · Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 8:28 pm Post subject:

Shane-1970 · Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 8:35 pm Post subject:

Thanks Darren,

It was an excellent review with some great pic's!
Then again all the reviews are normally spot on! Wink

Oh just a word on their support / sales line.

I phoned them up today after reading Darrens review and they answered within 4 rings, the chap i spoke to was polite, precise and answered all my Q's.

Which beats TT hands down! As their support is pretty non existant to be honest only supporting by email which takes ages to be answered!

So i'm now looking to change from TT6 to CP7 Live!

Si · Occasional Visitor Joined: Sep 30, 2003 Posts: 26

Hi Darren, Thanks for your reply, so to provide a constant and always checkable current position in effect you have to be permanently connected by mobile ? that could get pretty expensive !! Have I understood that correctly, not sure what a data access is , is that the same cost as browsing the internet on a mobile , or is it something else. (All I use my mobile for is making phone calls, though I know it will also browse the net at a considerable cost per minute) Please could you clarity what data access is.
Thanks Regards, Si.

Darren · Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 8:54 pm Post subject:

CoPilot's Live feature can be configured to restrict the polling interval. By default it sends a position report every 15 minutes but this can be changed from 1 min to 60 min intervals.

This will keep costs down but GPRS data can still an expensive business, depending on contract and carrier it can be anywhere from £2 - £6 per MB. I don't have precise figures for how much data is sent during every position report but would expect it will be in the order of a few tens of kilobytes at most. In which case 1Mb of data would take a long time to consume.

Assuming each report was 20k that would give you approximately 500 reports for 1 MB of data.
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Darren Griffin

Si · Occasional Visitor Joined: Sep 30, 2003 Posts: 26

Hi Darren, That's pretty good then , and makes it definitely a reasonable proposition for me. Thanks a lot for your very helpful and informative reply.

All the best, Si.

nonno · Occasional Visitor Joined: Feb 01, 2008 Posts: 15

I read your review with interest Darren. You guys must have a different version of CPL7 up there in the northern hemisphere to us down here in Australia, because all I can say is CPL7 is a huge disappointment for which we existing users have had to pay for and received very little in return. One correspondent on one of the local forum sites here described it as a 'Yabbie' (a small native freshwater lobster) all shell and no substance. What your review failed to mention is a lot of the functionality that CPL7 doesn't have were functions of previous versions, eg. text-to-speech, support for custom POIs, man we don't even have CPL7 supported safety camera warnings.

In addition to this I have to say CPL7 is less than stable. I'm running CPL7 on a Dell Axim X51v with WM5. It crashes not infrequently. CPL7 will not tolerate the PDA being turn off or put to sleep while it is still running (that's a sure method to cause a crash) requiring a soft restart. I am using an external BT receiver I purchased as part of CPL6. CPL7 frequently can't find the BT receiver (and always after a soft reset) requiring a search and re-establishment of a pair.

When set to automatic day/night mode switching, the day mode switch doesn't occur until after 11 am and night until after 9.00 pm. There are also a number of other bugs associated with the displays. In addition to this, the upgrade was supplied with Navteq maps that were 18 months old, hugely out-of-date and full of erroneous data eg. directing the driver to veer left or right on straight sections of road as well as at intersections which for the uninitiated is downright dangerous.

All of these issues have been sent to ALK and ALK's representative here in Australia where we have received either no or a 'sometime maybe never' response. It is my view that TTS and custom POIs (this was functionality that we paid for in previous releases) will not be fixed until CPL8 is released, another upgrade I'm sure we'll be asked to pay for. The really frustrating thing about all of this is that CPL could be an absolute killer of an application if due attention was given to the problems it has, some of them which were present in previous release and still haven't been fixed, rather than focusing on the tinsel.

RichDem · Posted: Wed Mar 19, 2008 7:24 am Post subject:

Hi Darren,

Great review, do you know if VGA devices are supported?

Thanks

Richard
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