TTN3 BT Voice Guidance & Loss of signal

[buckrogers]

Just got one for my HP4150.

Having had an icn630 for almost 1 year it looked like I could replace it with this.

Comparing the two I found:-

icn630 will say "Continue X miles" which is very useful the TTN3 says nothing.

TTN3 says "In 300 yards take the 2nd turning" - very confusing

TTN3 seems a little late on it's turn advice.

TTN3 occasionally looses GPS which the icn630 and Origin Blue never ever do.

Does any one know of a way to improve the TTN3 before I sell it?

[DavidW]

Navigator 3 counts down distance on screen - but there's no voice prompts to tell you to carry on.

"Take the second turning" and similar is only used if there are two turnings very close together (you're not in the Woburn / Millbrook area of Bedfordshire, are you?).

Late on advice - in what specific scenarios are you finding this? If it's overall, then it does give information early enough, but you may have grown used to your iCN 630's behaviour, and Navigator 3 will be different.

Loss of GPS position - can you provide some examples of when this is happening?


Overall, being used to your iCN 630 and noticing the differences with Navigator 3 could explain much of your unease with your new setup. It is hard to change from something you're very familiar with to something new, as you notice the differences.

You may find it better to put your safety speed at around 35mph - most of the time outside a built-up area you'll have a very uncluttered screen with no map and you'll find when you're nearly at a turning, you are shown a simple map of the junction rather than just an icon (this is a new feature in Navigator 3). Those simple safety screen maps can be clearer than a full on-screen map, which might help.



David

[buckrogers]

No, not in Woburn etc, but in Birmingham and there is rather a lot of them here.

Re the “late on advice” I would estimate that the TTN3 generally seems 1/3 closer too a junction before it advises, too late to begin lane manoeuvres in many cases, but this is just my opinion.

The loss of GPS position occurred frequently on very clear and well tested routes. Tomtom suggested a fix but to be honest the product should be stable by now and should not require the downloading fixes etc especially since there seems to be much comment about this type of thing in the forum.

The prospect of using the “safety speed feature” is alien to me, in contrast the Navman display is superb, very detailed and very useful, anything less being a backward step I feel. Again the lack of voice prompts marks a significant deficiency, so much so that sadly I shall not be using the TTN3 again. Maybe I will try the Navman 4410, but I will research this product more closely before hand this time.

Anyway I appreciated your help and advice, thank you.

[Darren]

Some love the dedicated systems whereas others prefer the adaptability of a PocketPC solution. You can't use custom POI's, no Safety Camera Database, no facility to run other software such as Topo Maps, no use away from a 12v supply etc oh and twice the cost!

As for the GPS issues, you don't mention what GPS device you have as this has a huge bearing on the possible causes as does problems with the SD Card, are you running the latest ROM for the 4150?

Suffice to say that the majority of users don't suffer frequent dropouts so we should be able to resolve that issue for you at least
_________________
Darren Griffin

[buckrogers]

"Some love the dedicated systems ....."

I agree with that, but the unit has to be 100% useable and reliable, akin to a cockpit instrument I would say. As a casing point, the display on the HP4150 is only 5mm smaller in its longest dimension and exactly the same width. Given the PDA is in portrait as opposed to landscape, I would estimate the detail to be 50% reduced on the TTN3. I guess I've got used to seeing short-cuts and skipping around congested roads and planning my driving based on the route ahead. This was especially useful during the snowfalls and fog of last winter. Some people took 6hrs to get home, I drove home with little extra delay.

"As for the GPS issues ...."

I'm using TomTom's own BT unit as supplied by them. My 4150 is brand new and I can find no later ROM than the one I have or any patches on HP's web site. My SD card is 256MB made by Viking Interworks and also new, it seems 100% reliable in all respects. I can store video images and play them back using media player with no glitches, so maps should be no problem I feel.

"Suffice to say...."

This is a little academic now and it would take a lot for me to retry the TTN3 even if I were given one for free, its not about cost. Sadly I have become dependant on GPS. Navman is not without its problems though, it makes silly mistakes, even advises incorrectly, but I have learnt how to deal with these. For almost 1 year I have not carried a map book and that speaks volumes.

I could add more about the TTN3 system, but I'm sure one day it will lead the field and then I will try it again... I wish it luck.

Thanks again.

[DavidW]

If you post any codes from the back of your SD card, I may be able to identify the manufacturer of the card.

TomTom Navigator works memory cards very hard, and will show up bad ones. The information I have is that some Viking cards are Sandisk (which will probably malfunction in your iPAQ) and some are not. Playing media files is placing different demands on the memory card to those TomTom Navigator does, and may not show up a problematic card.


My system (which is different hardware to yours, but uses a GPS based on the same chipset as the TomTom Bluetooth unit) doesn't give late advice. I don't use Sandisk SD cards.

The safety screen is there for a reason - a map scrolling away at high speed is just a distraction for the driver, in my opinion. So far as I remember, you can disable it by setting the safety speed to 0mph - though if that puts it on the safety screen all the time, just set it to the highest speed you can. You do have a choice.


It sounds like you're having some frustrating issues, but I also detect an element of you wanting TomTom Navigator to behave exactly like the iCN 630. Different developers will make different design decisions - it's not surprising that Navigator is different to the iCN 630 as the software is written by different companies.

If you like the iCN 630, I'd stick with it. If you're wanting the iCN 630's behaviour, then the best product for you is an iCN 630.



David

[Darren]

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