New Sat Nav

JohnnyN

My Dad gave me some money for Christmas to go and get myself something so I thought it was about time that I upgraded my sat nav. I've got an old Road Angel Navigator with the big flappy antenna at the back. I've had it years now and its rather large and occassionally sends me down blocked roads. So whilst out buying some Go-Karts for Lauren & Jacks presents, I had a look at all the new stuff available in Halfords. They're doing the 'upto 50% off' deal too.

I had a look at the Tom-Tom and the Garmin and ended up with a Garmin 705. £119 less 2.5% VAT. After I got home I did some further investigating as the bloke wasn't very clear at explaining the choices. I changed my mind about which one that I bought and went back to the shop and changed it for a Garmin 760 with Bluetooth and MP3, European mapping and its got an FM transmitter along with a load of other stuff. It was a bit dearer at £200 but I paid around £300 for my Road Angel and its got nothing like the new Garmin. Its got a 4.3 inch widescreen and that's about all I know for now. I've got to give it to my Dad to wrap up now. I'll let you know more on Christmas Day! ;-)

Matt

Very nice indeed mate. The Garmin Nuvi I have is quite good (18 month old now), but they seem to have come on in leaps and bounds over the last year. Looking forward to seeing what you think after Christmas

vocky

very nice, I will have to get a sat nav next year when my cdti gets replaced, I have the veccy 'sri satnav' model at the moment which obviously has a built in sat nav :lol:

Sjdickso

Looks nice that Johnny, i bought a Garmin last year after Matt lent me his and i thought it was really good.

Matt

Sjdickso said:
Looks nice that Johnny, i bought a Garmin last year after Matt lent me his and i thought it was really good.

Except when faced with country road on the way to Courtenays!

That road was deff fun :lol: Zaffman deff did not like it either.

rik1083

I just found out that there's a version of tomtom for the n95. which means no more paying to use nokia's crappy "maps" application, if you have a n95 it's worth doing because it really is miles better and you can get it for free if you know where to look :twisted: :geek:

Drakey

Matt said:
Except when faced with country road on the way to Courtenays!

😃

That covers virtually all roads Matt.....hence my impossible to keep clean over the winter months!!!!!!!

Nice bit of kit by the way Johnny :thumbup:

JohnnyN

Yeah mon!!

JohnnyN

I'm a little undecided with the new Garmin 760 Satnav. I can't fault the mapping but its the safety camera warnings i'm finding issues with. I've been used to a Road Angel Navigator for years and a Road Angel is primarily a safety camera alert system with maps. The Garmin is primarily Satnav with camera alerts.

The Road Angel warns you loudly and visualy and counts down the distance until you reach the camera. With the Garmin, it alerts you that you are in a camera area but doesn't pin point the location of the camera with a count down. They are completely different, maybe i'll just have to learn to get used to it. The other thing is with the Garmin, when you are in navigation mode, you don't get an actual speed display on the screen. You only get time of arrival and distance left to go until the next turn. I might not have quite mastered the menu setting yet but I can't seem to find an option to have speed showing aswell. Only time will tell.

:think:

Matt

There should be an option for showing the display with the speed on John, it's like a digital dashboard display, and shows speed, average speed, max speed etc.

Me and the wife are thinking about getting another SatNav, and going back to TomTom, as after 18 months with the Garmin, I still can't get on with it. Last night we went to my Mom's house, and it AGAIN took us down the most random back lanes for an unknown reason. Yeah, we got there, but it took about 15 longer than usual.

JohnnyN

I know this is naughty of me but I do like to know where the speed cameras are with plenty of warning. I will probably go with this for 12 months and then have another look next year. I did rush in a bit with this but never mind. I'll be looking at Road Angel products again next time.

Matt

That was one of the things when I was bying. I asked about the speed camera options, and they did say that they are two distinct products. Garmin is satnav with optional speed camera, and Road Angel is speedcamera with optional satnav. I don't think there is anything yet which gives both equal running

JohnnyN

Here's another niggle. My Road Angel used to use mini-USB for charging whilst in the cradle and had a nice long lead to tuck in behind the dash so that I could have the satnav mounted in the middle of the windscreen. The Garmin uses its own style cable for the cradle and the lead isn't as long. So now it means that I have to have the satnav mounted over my boost gauge (bottom of the 'A' pillar) and then the lead will reach when all tucked in behind the dash.

Grrr!!

:evil:

Matt

That's shite mate, my Garmin Nuvi uses mini-USB as well. I wonder why they changed the connector type?

JohnnyN

There is a mini-USB on the bottom of the unit which you can charge the unit with if you connect it to the computer/wallsocket. You can also update the unit through this mini-USB connection too. But, when you plug the mini-USB cable into the unit from the lighter socket in the car, the unit goes into charge mode and you can't switch the unit on for normal operation?? Don't know why they made it that way but they have.

I'm going to call Garmin next week on their helpline to see if there is a longer cable available.

Sjdickso

On charge mode you should be able to use in normal mode. If you connect via mini usb i dont think it work on normal mode via a pc.

JohnnyN

I'll have another go tomorrow but when I tried it earlier the screen showed a PC to indicate it was connected to a perhiperal source and I couldn't switch the unit on?

Matt

JohnnyN said:
I'll have another go tomorrow but when I tried it earlier the screen showed a PC to indicate it was connected to a perhiperal source and I couldn't switch the unit on?

That's definately not correct mate. Best see what Garmin have to say about it.

JohnnyN

I used the Garmin to spread the z22se.co.uk sticker to the Isle of Wight today!! ;-)

Only a day trip to see something that I made in work that has been mounted in a village church. Anyway, I used the cradle cable today and that powers the unit whilst its in the cradle. I also took along the mini-USB cable and I removed the cradle cable and used the USB and the unit shut down automatically and went straight into charge mode without the option to switch the unit on. I'll be on the phone on Monday.

Sjdickso

It does not sound right to me at all Johnny, Hope Garmins support is good. Let us know how you get on.

The speed camera warning is a bit vague, but i have used alot worse. I also dont think it gives you enough warning when coming off at junc's on the motoway. But in saying that all the sat navs i have used had some niggle i thought the garmin was the best i tried but that was over 12 months ago.