reliable routes across different devices

[knnelg]

Hi,

I've been using an original TomTom One (and a plastic bag) on my bike for around three years now and this has served me well. The TomTom is an excellent piece of kit, but about 99% of my usage involves forcing the device to use routes I pre-plan, and in this respect, the TomTom interface (either on the device itself or using the TomTom 'Home' software) is very poor.

The power connector on my device is starting to get worn and is becomming unreliable, so I'm making this an excuse to look for an upgrade and therefore I'm considering a Zumo 550 (as well as possibly a TomTom 730).

I've read the manuals for the Zumo and Mapsource (CityNavigator?) and all the functionality I require seems to be present. However, I still have the following queries...

1) If I create a route in Mapsource/CityNavigator, with say 10 waypoints, then load this onto the Zumo. Then, when I'm riding the route, for some reason I want to miss out a waypoint, it looks like I'd need to delete the waypoint from the route on the Zumo. If I do this, will the Zumo recalulate the route, but include all the remaining waypoints in my route? I.e. the remainder of the route will remain exactly as it was before the waypoint was removed (on the TomTom, you can select any given waypoint and say 'Mark as visited' which will cause the device to route you to your next 'un-visited' waypoint and continue the original route from that point).

2) If I have my Mapsource & Zumo setup with preferences to avoid certain combinations of roads or use 'shortest' as opposed to 'quickest' routing, and I calculate a route. What happens if I export this route and send to a friend who has his/her device configured differently. Would they be routed along 'exactly' the same roads I painstakingly 'encouraged' my Zumo to use, or would they be directed along roads selected by their alternate preferences on their device?

Apologies for the long post, I'm afraid I'm not very good at going the 'quickest' route

Regards,

Glenn

[davidr]

Hi there and welcome to the forum.

Looking at your questions, I would have the following comments:

1) If I create a route in Mapsource/CityNavigator, with say 10 waypoints, then load this onto the Zumo. Then, when I'm riding the route, for some reason I want to miss out a waypoint, it looks like I'd need to delete the waypoint from the route on the Zumo. If I do this, will the Zumo recalulate the route, but include all the remaining waypoints in my route? I.e. the remainder of the route will remain exactly as it was before the waypoint was removed (on the TomTom, you can select any given waypoint and say 'Mark as visited' which will cause the device to route you to your next 'un-visited' waypoint and continue the original route from that point).

In my experience, deleting a waypoint in the middle of a route on a Garmin device doesn't work that well, particularly where you have pre-defined a custom route which follows particular roads, etc. If I were faced with this problem I would probably try to resolve it in the following way:

First of all, in order to prevent you route being recalculated if you make a wrong turn anywhere on the route, switch the recalculation mode on the unit to 'off' or 'prompted' (I prefer off personally) then when you get to the part of the route that you wish to avoid, simply stop navigating that route (if you have created in MapSource and downloaded it onto the unit, there should be no problem returning to it later), then simply navigate separately (using the unit) to the next desired point on the route. Once at this point start navigating the route again. I believe that the unit will realise that you are near to a mid point in the route here and simply let you navigate from this point to the end of the route.
I can't remember having tried this operration specifically but I have missed out bits of a route before and it has worked so I believe 90% that this behaviour is what happens.

For Question 2:

2) If I have my Mapsource & Zumo setup with preferences to avoid certain combinations of roads or use 'shortest' as opposed to 'quickest' routing, and I calculate a route. What happens if I export this route and send to a friend who has his/her device configured differently. Would they be routed along 'exactly' the same roads I painstakingly 'encouraged' my Zumo to use, or would they be directed along roads selected by their alternate preferences on their device?

The answer is that this shuold work exactly as it did on your system (i.e. the way that it was saved) PROVIDING that the receipient is using the same version of the City Navigator maps as you are. Otherwise, it would still work in theory, but as there are some differences between the Map versions (i.e. 6,7,8,9 and 2008) then it would be advisable to recalculate the route where the map is a different version (this can, however, completely change the route)

HTH,

David

[knnelg]

David, many thanks for taking the time to reply.

I've just borrowed a friends Zumo and have been playing with City navigator so I'm getting a better understanding of how things work.

After an initial enthusiasm for the Garmin software & hardware, I'm noticing more and more things I don't like. I fully accept that I've probably still got my mind in TomTom mode, but the Zumo device just seems to be not quite what I'd expected. Have to say the City Navigator is far better than TomTom 'Home' but I hear there is an application called 'TYRE' which may help in that regard.

Thanks again for your comments.

Regards,

Glenn

[davidr]

Hi there Glenn,

Personally I prefer the Garmin units for motorcycle use as they are more integrated (IMO) although to be honest, I don't have very much experience with the TomTom units so I'd be very interested to hear what it is that you like about them.

Of course, like any unit, the Zumo is not without its problems but on the whole for pre-defined routes as a complete package I think you'll find it's more complete than the TomTom, however that said it is possible to accomplish much of what's possible on the Zumo by using a combination of Google Earth, Tyre and other applications such as On-Route (a comprehensive tool which costs about 100 pounds)

If you're quite keen on trying out different types of software the TomTom and 3rd party applications work quite well, but honestly, for the price (TomTom Rider 2 and Zumo 500)are almost the same, so unless there's a saving to be had by going for the TomTom, I'd go for the Garmin every time.

Please feel free to post what you like about the TomTom, I'd be very interested to hear.

David

[knnelg]

Hi David,

Please feel free to post what you like about the TomTom, I'd be very interested to hear.

Before you read the following, please bear in mind I've been using TomTom products for over four years and my experience with Garmin and the Zumo is very limited, so I'm bound to have pre-conceved ideas of how things 'should' work. Several of the observations are very minor, but when bundled together they all form a general impression which for me, is not quite what I want.

Reasons I prefer Garmin/Zumo over my current TomTom

1) Zumo is waterproof. I currently use a TomTom 'One' (1st edition) with a plasic bag on standby in case it rains. This has worked flawlessly for many years but I can't deny it would be better if the device was inherently weatherproof.

Before anyone says 'why don't you buy a TomTom Rider', there are reasons I don't want one of those, but this post is going to be long enough, so I'll leave that for another day.

2) Mapsource is a far better way of pre planning routes than TomTom's 'Home' application.

I'm currently playing with 'TYRE' which goes a long way towards addressing this shortfall. The developer deserves a lot of credit for showing how TomTom should be helping it's customers. They need to hire this guy to sort out their PC application. Having said that, the major flaw with TYRE is that it uses Google Maps (which are fantastic), therefore if you try to 'fine tune' a route in TYRE, then export to the TomTom, the route has a very good chance of changeing as the TomTom will be using a different set of map data (and preferences).

If TYRE could be configured to use the maps on the TomTom device (or in the 'Home' application) then I feel this would be an excellent tool.

My current view is it's a good coarse planning tool, which could be used to generate a general route which would be 'refined' once it's on the TomTom device.

Reasons I prefer the TYRE/TomTom over the Garmin/Zumo combination

1) Planing a route on the Zumo is frustrating, in that if I want to plan a route involving several via points to force the route into the roads I want to use, I tend to use the 'browse map' option to add the viapoints. Problem is, that the Zumo always presents the current GPS (or 'set') location as the starting point of the map. I then have to laboriously scroll to the required location and select my point. Then when I add the next one, Im dumped back at the start again and have to scroll again to my required location. On the TomTom, it remembers the position I last used when selecting the previous point.

2) The spoken instructions are rather robotic compared to the high quality TomTom version. I should say this is the 'text to speech' voice and I've not yet tried a TomTom with text to speech so this may be an unfair comment.

3) Recalculation of route when you miss a turn or take a detour seems slow compared to my TomTom. First it seems to take quite a while (relatively) to detect the error, then the recalculation seems to take longer.

4) I'm having difficulty with the whole issue around how you can avoid a viapoint one you start riding a route.

I did a test recently where I deliberately took a wrong turning (simulating a diversion for whatever reason) and rejoined my route further along the planned route, but after one of my unvisited viapoints. The Zumo made no atempt to warn me I'd missed a viapoint it simply assumed I'd reached a point on the route and continued to direct me from there.

The TomTom would have doggedly tried to get me to go back to the missed viapoint UNLESS I tell it to regard that point as 'visited', in which case it would calculate directions to my next viapoint. The point being, that I am not in danger of missing a viapoint unless I explicitly decide to do so.

5) For some reason, no mater how hard I tried, I could not get the Zumo to consider ferry crossings as part of a route. This is strange, because if I try the same route in City Navigator, then the ferry is used without problem. Perhaps I failed to spot a setting in the config.

6) This is yet another minor point, but the Zumo on-screen keyboard is 'abcde' rather than 'qwerty'. The TomTom can be configured, and I prefer 'qwerty'.

7) TomTom has built-in speaker, no need for 'active' cradles for sound.

8) When calculating a route, it appears the Zumo can either include or exclude toll roads as a global setting, and you need to be aware what setting you have. Therefore if you forget you have 'include toll roads' selected, you may end up at a toll booth without the money.

TomTom will warn me that the route would include toll roads and ask me if I want to avoid these. I prefer this as I have to make a concious decision to accept or reject (this is configurable in TomTom).

9) I don't like the rather large Car or Motorcycle icon at the bottom of the screen, I find it clutters the map. I understand you can upload your own custom images so I could probably create some minimalist or empty image to remove this.

Obviously the above are my views, and I'm happy to be taken to task or corrected if I'm missing something.

Cheers,

Glenn

[davidr]

Very interesting review, thanks for adding. .

David