Ridiculous routing ...... advice sought!

srw-uk

Hi, been using a 510 for a few weeks now and love it. The POI functionality is great, especially for those crafty camera's we all love.

However, I'm becoming increasingly frustrated with the routing that the 510 is giving me for a simple journey home. After reading various previous posts, I can see others suffer similar symptoms. Last night, I had the worst example to date.

I was only 2.5 miles from home on what is a straight road, I live on an estate which is a left turn after 2 miles, with 0.5 miles to destination. The 510 wanted me to take a right for 0.5 miles, left on another road for approx 1.5 miles, right again for 0.5 miles and then 0.5 miles to destination - 3 different roads (not to mention traffic lights and junctions).

The ETA shown on this route was 6 minutes, so I decided to take my normal 'straight on' route and let it re-calculate it. Re-calculation took 2 seconds and the revised route was the one I wanted - the ETA shown dropped instantly from 6 mins to 2 mins.

510 routing settings as follows :

Route type : Quickest
Pref for Motorways/Freeways : One tab away from 'More often'
Pref for Urban roads : One tab away from 'More often'

If the route type was quickest, the suggested route was totally wrong bearing in mind the ETA times I experienced. I will try again tonight with Route type set to Shortest.

I'm looking for advice on what other 510 users have found to be the optimum settings for routing, with so many combinations it's a difficult one to establish quickly.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions put forward.

This forum is great!
_________________
Simon (srw-uk)

ICN510 since 30.12.04!

ebbsfleet_gooners · Occasional Visitor Joined: Dec 30, 2004 Posts: 7

The trouble is that no navigation system can allow for local knowledge, what I mean by this if I am at home and set a destination for somewhere it always routes me via a busy junction that you have to wait ages before you can get out of so I never go that way.

Last weekend I had a trip around London to view some cars and to finish up at my uncles in Watford, I would have had no chance of doing this trip without my Navman.

it might not have been exactly the quickest or the shortest but I got there with no fuss or stops to keep checking if I was going the right way.

Hope this helps

stanshawe · Posted: Thu Jan 13, 2005 9:48 pm Post subject:

Hi Simon, after many trips like yourself I have at last come to an 'arrangement' with my iCN 510, if I want the (in my opinion) the quickest route home or for a trip out, by that I mean by using all the known backroads and believe me the 510 knows a few, I select ROUTE Shortest/ M/WAYS Less Often and URBAN More Often., now if I am going on a trip using my caravan I select all the opposite settings to above.
I have found that if you use the 'Quickest Route' the 510 looks for all the fast roads which isn't necessarily the quickest.
Another thing I have learnt is if you go on a trip just ignore the 510 while you are on ground you know (it soon picks you up again) and only listen to it when in strange territory, all the people who complain (no disrespect) about these Satnav units should remember that there is no knowledge as good as local knowledge.
Somebody once told me when I used to moan about Satnav and that was to always remember when you set a route for SHORTEST TYPE imagine the unit doing an aerial view of A to B and it will pick the most direct route whether it be A,B or C roads, now if you pick QUICKEST route again the unit does an aerial view of A to B but this time it will pick all the MAJOR roads, be it M/Ways or whatever, I know this probably isn't true to form but I have always imagined it like that and it works, TRY IT, I have been guided round roads I never new existed when on SHORTEST and got to my destination sooner.
Sorry to go on a bit, hope this helps (and anyone else who may read it).

Rich

sfi1 · Posted: Fri Jan 14, 2005 1:40 am Post subject:

As a user of Navman smartst V1 & 2 i can only say that the routing is often "UNIQUE". I was hoping for the latest version to be much better in that respect. What i have always found particularly frustrating (especially on trips across europe) is that the directions en route never match the pre-planned route according to the software. Just to explain, i always enter the departure and destination point to have an idea of what type of route the software is going to give me. Usually it's pretty good, but when you come to drive it, it changes a lot and takes you away from it. Maybe they should have an option where it would try and stick to a planned route.

srw-uk · Posted: Fri Jan 14, 2005 12:02 pm Post subject:

Guys

Thankyou for your replies, espeically Rich - I'll try your suggestions. I agree with your observations re. local knowledge.

If anyone else has found 'optimum settings' for routing, please post them for all to share.

Many Thanks
Simon
_________________
Simon (srw-uk)

ICN510 since 30.12.04!

Tim Buxton · Posted: Fri Jan 14, 2005 12:20 pm Post subject:

Optimum settings is a personal thing, I think. You'll be far more critical of routing in your known area, but les so in unknown areas. I've added a wish to the 'Wishlist' for V4, which you can read here. Item 25 relates to having a few memory slots for storing different routing settings, in the same way that electric seats in cars now seem to have His 'n' Hers settings.

Please peruse the list and add anything you can think of. I've sent the URL for said list to Navman in New Zealand, so hopefully they'll be monitoring it and might even act on some of the suggestions.
_________________
Tim

eifion · Occasional Visitor Joined: Jul 28, 2004 Posts: 4

Just got mine and really liking it so far.

The routing does seem a little odd, e.g. was trying it out on the 1.5 mile journey from my house to my GFs, it gave me one route on the way there, and a different route on the way back, even though there's no one-ways and using the same routing options.

Perhaps it's just making sure I don't get bored?

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