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[Field Marshal Dr. Opti]

If a crappy £100 Tom Tom has full post code facility why is it not available on many high-end inbuilt systems?

Lack of a post code facility may be acceptable if you have road names and numbers but out in the middle of nowhere it is far from good.

...and don't get me started on Industrial estates/Business parks.

I have just Googled this and it seems many other people are far from happy about this.

[05omegav6]

Your £100 TomTom is as much to blame as lazyarse manufacturers

Why pay a grand or two or bother to develop a decent built in system when the buying public can buy a box for £100 which does an up to date better job and can be used elsewhere, ie on bike/foot/a n other car...

Only reason your Vectrum has it is that it, a sunroof and leather seats are all that separates it from a Design model... and therefore make it seem like an extra level of functionality and all for a mere £1000 more... was an £800 option on the Design iirc.

Only two decent in built systems I have encountered were the full screen Comand unit in the E Class and the Tesla Model S, and of those two, the Google Maps based Tesla unit is far better, if only by virtue of being connected to tinterweb.

Even the top of the range TomTom is infinitely more use, and therefore better value, than a built in system

[Lazydocker]

But a built in system will always be far more reliable in built up areas etc...

Tricky one really... Must admit, I tend to use TomTom on my phone over the built in one in my car, unless in Londinium (where both are running)

[Broomies Mate]

There are a couple of people on this forum who claim the 'in-built' sat-nav systems are bettrererer than Mobile units.  They are wrong.

Example:  The iPhone is better than ANY in-built system..... and I say this because the best of the best use the same software as my iPhone, use the same maps, use the same satellites yet use a slower processor (probably).

I've got more computing power in my phone than a fleet of Omega's have in their telematics/multimedia system..... FACT!

[biggriffin]

There are a couple of people on this forum who claim the 'in-built' sat-nav systems are bettrererer than Mobile units.  They are wrong.

Example:  The iPhone is better than ANY in-built system..... and I say this because the best of the best use the same software as my iPhone, use the same maps, use the same satellites yet use a slower processor (probably).

I've got more computing power in my phone than a fleet of Omega's have in their telematics/multimedia system..... FACT!

That's you told!!

[zirk]

Had to pay a visit to the City of London yesterday, so no where to park blah, blah, went in by Tube, so having walked out of the Bank Tube Station then had to reply on my Portable SatNav in Walk Mode to get me to my destination, soon become apparent that I was starting to walk around in circles due to the high buildings and lake of GPS Signal. 

Point being, had I gone in the MIg with a 16 year old NCDC with a door number and Street Name, I know for a fact it would have got me straight outside the front door. 

[Entwood]

There are a couple of people on this forum who claim the 'in-built' sat-nav systems are bettrererer than Mobile units.  They are wrong.

Example:  The iPhone is better than ANY in-built system..... and I say this because the best of the best use the same software as my iPhone, use the same maps, use the same satellites yet use a slower processor (probably).

I've got more computing power in my phone than a fleet of Omega's have in their telematics/multimedia system..... FACT!

Computing power is great ... when you have a continuous signal, when the signal goes at least the Omega has accelerometers, a speed signal, and a clock, it can therefore continue to work by "dead reckoning" until the signal returns ... unlike your iphone which just stops and says "HUH ??"

 

[Kevin Wood]

If a crappy £100 Tom Tom has full post code facility

Stop right there. You can program in all your favourites, then take it from car to car, take it into the house to program the night before a trip, use it on foot when in an unfamiliar city, use it on your bike... Why pay more?

Actually, £100? someone gave me mine and I flashed a new SD card to replace the corrupted one and off it went.

I'm not helping, am I?

EDIT: forgot the LPG garage POIs, speed camera database and so on...

[TheBoy]

I fail to see the fascination with postcode. Whats wrong with town/road?

On the upside, TomTom in particular have dramatically improved their postcode accuracy in recent years, but than they had a poor base to start from (20% were incorrect when they first added the postcode function).


As to accuracy, portable units, including phones, are utter shite. Hence my last portable unit is somewhere towards the end of the Aston Expressway, when the piece of shit pissed me off for the last time.  A proper inbuilt one can remain accurate even with no GPS signal for ages (days in the case of the CARiN fitted to MFL).  The biggest reliability issue with Omega factory units is the ABS ECU...   ...no speed pulse, no go anywhere.

Anyone choosing to disagree strongly needs to re-read and understand the technology.


That said, the portable/phone units are often adequate, as long as not in wooded areas or modern areas or large cities.

[Nick W]

I fail to see the fascination with postcode. Whats wrong with town/road?

On the upside, TomTom in particular have dramatically improved their postcode accuracy in recent years, but than they had a poor base to start from (20% were incorrect when they first added the postcode function).


As to accuracy, portable units, including phones, are utter shite. Hence my last portable unit is somewhere towards the end of the Aston Expressway, when the piece of shit pissed me off for the last time.  A proper inbuilt one can remain accurate even with no GPS signal for ages (days in the case of the CARiN fitted to MFL).  The biggest reliability issue with Omega factory units is the ABS ECU...   ...no speed pulse, no go anywhere.

Anyone choosing to disagree strongly needs to re-read and understand the technology.


That said, the portable/phone units are often adequate, as long as not in wooded areas or modern areas or large cities.

Postcodes or town and road? Look up Station Rd Rainham. Which one do you want, as they're about 20 miles apart on opposite sides of the Thames. Using the postcode continually narrows the search as you enter it. This is how tools are supposed to(and IT based stuff rarely does) work; it just does what you want. I don't care how the magic pixies weave the secret smoke inside the box and paint the answer on the screen, just that they do.


Portable unit accuracy is shite? What utter 'dangle berries'. Set a destination and drive down the motorway at 110MPH. It counts down the distance to exit as you pass the appropriate markers: how the hell can it be inaccurate? It consistently displays the map for exactly where you are at junctions. I used mine for years to find the house number on long roads in the dark using just the number and the postcode. Or to find housenames on country roads. Drive through the Blackwall Tunnel, and it loses the signal about 1/4 of the way through. But, it carries on with your speed and picks up the signal the instant you exit the tunnel in enough time to direct to the correct exit. It works. It's that simple. Mine is the basic, small-screen, no bells and whistles European maps unit that I paid about £120 for about 6 years ago.

Every inbuilt one I've used has an interface that 'works' in the same way that a cold chisel compares to a scalpel: they both sort of make a cut, but you'd run a mile from the surgeon whose tools were made by Eclipse.

My only real complaint with portable units is a general one for anything that uses batteries: they should use a standard, easily replaced and readily available battery. Anyone who designs this sort of stuff should be abandoned in the middle of a dark forest with a 4D cell Maglite, 3 flat AA batteries and directions written on a soggy piece of paper.

[omega2018]

why would anyone not use postcodes? that's what they were invented for - to locate places easily.

to answer the op i think the reason they may not in oe sat navs is that there is a licence fee to pay to use the database, or certainly was back then and it was probably quite big at the time.

[dbug]

Buy a quality car and you get a quality satnav fitted - works off postcodes, roads, street nos, towns, motorway junctions etc etc, no connection issues in towns, woods etc.  Ties into current traffic info and immediately advises detours.  Also voice controlled if required.

[Marks DTM Calib]

CD70 does have postcode entry but, it does not accept the last digit (2010 discs and earlier which also have the TMC).

I use it quite a bit because the TMC works very well and because its there, that said I would not pay serious cash for it as the modern day smart phone apps do the same job well as long as the GPS signal is ok and they can get mobile connection for traffic data.

[Kevin Wood]

CD70 does have postcode entry but, it does not accept the last digit (2010 discs and earlier which also have the TMC).

I use it quite a bit because the TMC works very well and because its there, that said I would not pay serious cash for it as the modern day smart phone apps do the same job well as long as the GPS signal is ok and they can get mobile connection for traffic data.

I almost forgot that my phone can do it for free with traffic info, as long as you don't mind Google stalking you.

GPS implementations are so good these days that they rarely have a hiccup, even in cities. I think the only time mine has let me down was when I had to take a turning in a tunnel in Italy, but the unit dead-reckoned my position accurately enough to warn me even then.

Postcodes are essential because it's a complete ballache entering addresses one character at a time into a device with a non existent user interface.

As said, it beggars belief why anyone would pay money for one. If it's already there, then fine.

[Mr Gav]

There are a couple of people on this forum who claim the 'in-built' sat-nav systems are bettrererer than Mobile units.  They are wrong.

Example:  The iPhone is better than ANY in-built system..... and I say this because the best of the best use the same software as my iPhone, use the same maps, use the same satellites yet use a slower processor (probably).

I've got more computing power in my phone than a fleet of Omega's have in their telematics/multimedia system..... FACT!

I seem to remember a few years ago Crapple having to allow Google maps into their app store as their mapping was so bad.

I think nowadays most of the technology is on a par regarding portable devices so it probably comes down to cost.

The Nissan has a fairly decent in built sat nav so I use that rather than cluttering up the windscreen with something I don`t need.