UK POSTCODE Support for TomTom Navigator 2

Dave

There seems to be a lot of people wanting to go online on ebay and get ripped for for £10 to £30 to purchase a postcode database for TomTom Navigator 2. Most people don't realise that we have a large postcode database courtesy of one of our readers George Spanellis.

If you want postcode support download these ZIP files and extract them like you would a normal POI, or download them from our POI-Sync Service.

Don't get ripped off, download them for free!

The links have been removed at the behest of Ordnance Survey as the files infringe Crown Copyright.

Once you have downloaded them into TomTom, all you need to do is on the Navigator screen, tap then NAVIGATE TO then select POI and pick the POI file you want that should have the postcode in for the region. It's as simple as that, as it will then bring back a complete alpha/numeric list of POI's with postcodes!

DinAlt · Posted: Sat Feb 07, 2004 4:58 pm Post subject:

Any advice on how to speed up the loading of TomTom with the post codes loaded ?

I've tried various combinations (I've got my maps on a compact flash card - Ipaq is a 2210 card is "rated" at 40x but pocket mechanic says it's nearer to 7x...

Without the post code pois load time for tom tom is pretty much instantaneous - with all of the london ones this goes up to almost 30 secs -add the South East pois and we're talkign minutes - whilst they're very useful I cant stand the delay this causes (call me impatient). is there any way of speeding up the start up process ?

DinAlt

Dave · Posted: Sat Feb 07, 2004 5:53 pm Post subject:

Now you can understand why a lot of companies do exclude UK Postcodes, because Pocket PC's and storage still aren't quite up to speed. The best way is to only load the Postcode POI files you need rather than the whole country.

DinAlt · Posted: Sat Feb 07, 2004 6:08 pm Post subject:

Hi Dave,

Yeah, that's what I figured - guess I'll stick to what I do currently - make Favourites for regularly visited clients and pois for the occasional ones (I only really wanted the post codes for the occasions when I get 'phone calls on the road asking me to visit a client which I hadn't planned to call on).

If I got my act together I'd enter all my cleints into Autoroute have it plot them out for me and then export the custom pois from there - but I can't be bothered doing it again (i have a large database of small boat manufacturers and repair outlets which I did this for last year) this sort ofthing is what pc /pda's were made for just have to get the energy up for the marathon typing sessions to make the database Smile

)

DinAlt

Dave · Posted: Sat Feb 07, 2004 7:24 pm Post subject:

You could have them in a seperate directory on yoru storage card and just do a copy in File Explorer prior to wanting to use them in TomTom, that way you can have them on the Pocket PC, and only use the postcodes you want, when you want.

DinAlt · Posted: Sat Feb 07, 2004 8:39 pm Post subject:

Hmm that's an idea - think I'll have a play with that ...

DinAlt

EliseMan · Posted: Sun Feb 08, 2004 1:51 pm Post subject:

Just installed the CM section only as this is the area I work in, seems pretty good although not complete. If the postcode isn't in the database I'll just revert back to address Smile

Dave

NickG · Posted: Mon Feb 09, 2004 1:13 pm Post subject:

dynamite · Posted: Mon Feb 09, 2004 3:02 pm Post subject:

I totally agree Nick. Which is why I've written my own application which looks up postcodes in a compacted and indexed version of the codesearch files from this site, and hooks into tomtom to navigate to the location.

The lookup for this application is virtually instant, with the entire UK postcode database (about 12MBytes) stored on the SD flash card where the tomtom maps are stored.

I am intending to make this application available to others but it's a bit rough round the edges at the moment... not enough hours in a day. I am also still working out how to recover my investment in the tomtom sdk.

Nontheless, I would like to offer support to your call for tomtom to incorporate it properly. Perhaps they could do that at the same time as releasing up-to-date maps, eh? Just don't hold your breath, guys!

- Niels

Barney · Posted: Wed Feb 11, 2004 2:32 pm Post subject:

People power!
I'm emailing Tom Tom support also.

tom9851 · Posted: Sat Feb 14, 2004 9:16 am Post subject:

I have just purchased H2210 with TTN2 and tried yesterday to load all those postcodes but have got myself in a right mess!
I downloaded each of the files as listed above one by one and then "unzipped" them - trouble is I don't know what to do with them now! I am a complete novice and would appreciate if someone could give me step-by-step instructions of what to do with these files in order to get them into TTN2 on my H2210 and how exactly to use them. Sorry for being so thick on this subject!
Thanks for any help.

Tom

tom9851 · Posted: Sat Feb 14, 2004 2:39 pm Post subject:

Further to my earlier post - I have tried to load these postcodes via the POI-Sync method. I have followed the instructions to the letter but when I get to the very last screen and click FINISH , I get the error message:-

ASSERTION FAILURE
E:\DNOTE\POIEdit\fautoupdatewizard.pas,line507

I deleted all the software that I downloaded and tried it again from scratch and exactly same thing happened!

Maybe I should give it up as a bad job and buy some maps!

Tom

Dave · Posted: Sat Feb 14, 2004 9:36 pm Post subject:

This is a serious error, and I'd suggest emailing the author of the program as he may know what's causing it. Seeing as we have lots of users running POIEdit without seeing this error, I can only presume it's something to do with the setup of your PC. It maybe a clash or conflict with DLL's or runtime files.

tom9851 · Posted: Sat Feb 14, 2004 10:51 pm Post subject:

Ok Dave I will e-mail the author shortly telling him about the problem I encountered.
In the meantime I have successfully managed to download one of the postcode files as listed above (thought I would practice with just oen for now!) and unzip it and pass it to my h2210 via autosync - I can now see the file(s) on the pda by tapping on "programs" and then "file explorer" - but what do I do with them now and how do I get them into TomTom?
Thanks for any guidance.

Tom

Dave · Posted: Sun Feb 15, 2004 9:06 am Post subject:

If they are sitting in your Great Britain country directory as a filename.ov2 then run up TTN2, goto the Map Screen, then FILE | PROPERTIES and then goto the POI/Advanced tab. You should find all the OV2's listed in there, tick the new ones and OK.

Now all you need to do is goto the Navigator Safety Screen, tap and NAVIGATE TO and select Point Of Interest. You'll need to browse to the POI group but you should then be able to pick a postcode. This works the same for any POI that you add.

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