MN4 (with TMC) - some observations

[DaveMatthews]

Hi folks,

I've been using the MN4 Bluetooth TMC bundle for just over a week now and, while I'm generally very pleased with it, I have discovered some "quirks" which I was wondering whether anyone else had come across...

After gaining a GPS fix and TMC signal as usual, if I ask MN4 to calculate a route, the TMC and GPS indicators both turn red (and the blue LED on the receiver starts flashing) during the calculation. Usually the whole system recovers after a few seconds but if I have asked MN4 to calculate a relatively long journey (eg over 200 miles), quite often the PDA (an HP iPaq h2210) and receiver refuse to re-establish communications between each other and I end up having to reset them both...

I assume what is happening here is that the calculation process completely hijacks the PDA's CPU so that it stops polling for the receiver and they go out of sync with each other. If that's the case, this seems to be poor software design.

Has anyone discovered that when you see a TMC warning sign (eg the "queueing cars" or "narrowing roads" symbols) on the actual map view, tapping on it will occasionally pop up a little message giving you the detail of the problem? I say "occasionally" as it often takes a few taps to get the message. As far as the English-language version of the user manual is concerned, this is an undocumented but very useful feature! I just can't work out why sometimes I'll get the message if I tap on the symbol just once, while at other times I have to tap on it five or six times...?

While driving north up the M6 last week, as I passed a police car, MN4 went crazy, suddenly suggesting "Now turn left"!! When I looked at the screen, it thought I was driving about 50 yards to the west of but in parallel to the motorway. After about five miles, however, it corrected itself. I can only assume the police car was emitting some sort of radio signal that knocked my GPS receiver out of kilter...???

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Cheers,


Dave Matthews

[chris_w]

Dave,

Apart from your coments above - How impressed are you with it?

I have a Steetpilot 3 at the moment and my only reason to upgrade is the TMC. I'm just a bit concious I might be compromising on quality here.

Your views on MN4 would be appreciated.

Cheers,

Chris

[DaveMatthews]

> Apart from your coments above - How impressed are you with it?

Difficult to say as I have no other navigation system to compare it to. When it came to choosing a particular system, I went with Navigon partly because it received good reviews but mainly because of the TMC functionality. Had it not come with TMC, I would probably have opted for TomTom Nav 3 instead.

In practical day-to-day use I think MN4 is very good but not outstanding. Good points are:

Maps seem reasonably up-to-date (mid-2003 ?).
Map detail reasonably good
Navigation/routing excellent.
Voice instructions very clear and timely.
Tremendous level of customisation/configuration
The ability to recall saved destinations/itineraries with voice-activation.

Weak points are:

No ability to exclude particular roads from route planning.
User-defined POI implementation very poor.
User manual poorly translated in places.
TMC-related functionality very poorly documented
Access to pop-up TMC messages very hit-and-miss *
Street names not shown on 3D map view
Motorway junction numbers not shown in map view (Navteq?)
Some on-screen buttons too small to be finger-tapped.
Map view rendering when zooming or panning can choke occasionally.
Occasional brief loss of sats and TMC for no apparent reason - even when stationary! (Bluetooth problem?)

* The TMC pop-up message feature isn't documented and I wonder if it's actually an experimental feature that mistakenly got left in the production release of the software? I only discovered it by accident!

I would say that if you're not too bothered about TMC, give serious consideration to other packages. Should TomTom elect to switch over to the RDS version of TMC, I may well have another look at Nav3.

The one thing I don't understand about MN4 is the "journey simulation" feature. What's the point of that? It's the package's only gimmick, though.

Having said all that, I do enjoy using the software. Let's just say I look forward to Navigon's next upgrade!

--
Cheers,


Dave

[chris_w]

Thanks Dave,

The only reason I'm upgrading is for the TMC and to cut down the number of wires in the car - I'm not too impressed with the way Tom Tom have gone about providing this via GPRS.

I've used my Streetpilot whilst driving all over the UK and Europe, Chicago and New York and I know I can trust it. This is why I'm being very cautious in changing it.

I get the impression (not just from this post) that Navigon is not just there yet - apart from the way they provide TMC.

Even so I'm still seriously thinking about buying it because as you say - they are on the right track and a few of the things you mention look like the could be resolved with a software update.

It will be interesting to see how Tom Tom react to this and bring out an RDS TMC system of their own.


Thanks again,

Chris

[DavidW]

I don't think TomTom will offer RDS TMC now - at least not in the UK. The sort of licence fee that iTIS seem to be demanding for a RDS TMC licence in the UK means that the pricing of a TomTom Traffic subscription may well compare pretty well. The GPRS usage is fairly low, and in my setup, TomTom Traffic communicates with my phone via Bluetooth.

I've got a Brodit active mount hardwired behind my dashboard, the Bluetooth GPS goes on a magnetic mount sat on top of my ProClip with a charger that's cable tied to the ProClip and also is hardwired behind the dashboard, and the phone is in a Nokia wired car kit - again, the cables disappear behind the dashboard and it's all hardwired there (in my case to Vauxhall factory fitted wiring, so the phone audio goes through my stereo and the factory fitted microphone and combined radio / phone antenna are used). It looks pretty neat.


TomTom are reportedly combining iTIS and Highways Agency data (plus possibly the Scottish and Welsh equivalents) now, which may explain the reports of Traffic being rather more accurate than it used to be.

There's also the possibility of the GPRS link being used for other functions - such as tracking (authorised users being able to see the current position of a TomTom Traffic user), or, with the user's consent, reporting of current speed, location and direction of travel information to help improve the accuracy of TomTom Traffic data.



David

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