I have never owned any gps, don't know much at all about them. I am considering buying this one. It is a good price,and seems to be a good one. I am looking for opinions. thanks!!

TomTom XL340S LIVE GPS

 

tomtom's are good the 2 things you have to look at is the price per year on the live service and the road updates. I tried to update mine and the cost was the same as a new one with lifetime updated. Just a word of warning

 

ok. thanks for the reply!!

 

I own an older TomTom and the updates are expensive like exidenick says. It has not given me any trouble though. Mine is about 7 years old.

 

In my opinion the GPS devices are redundant since the coming of smartphones.

My wife has a TomTom GPS. It works well if you have a street address for where you want to go. But it is not very good at searching businesses. It's good for the odd time she wants to visit friends out of town and needs directions to their house.

Me I do service calls. I use the GPS on my smartphone several times a day to direct me to customers homes. I also need it to locate parts stores when I need something on a job. The smart phone is much more powerful for locating businesses.

Suppose you were on the road and wanted to find a motel. With a smart phone you'd be able to find motels in the area. You'd also be able to visit their website, read google reviews, and call to find out if they had vacancy.

 

when buying a GPS, never buy reconditioned.
the price you pay for a reconditioned unit is only $5-$10 cheaper than new, and it does not come with the options of a new unit.

 

True to a degree, but problematic if you go into areas with limited/no cell/data service. GPS units store the maps on the device and the signal is worldwide. Personally, I don't mind or actually prefer to read a map, as on a smartphone over the 3-d directions on a GPS unit.

As a contractor, I have not felt the need for a GPS unit yet, either, but I also know my way around our county and cities pretty well (pop. ~170,000). Google maps on my iPhone fills in the holes in my knowledge of the streets.

Jason

 

A GPS on a smartphone may not be entirely accurate either - depends on the model. The GPS on my Optimus V sucks for accuracy - sometimes it puts the arrow within a few feet of my actual location, sometimes it's a couple of blocks away... It's like it has ADD and goes "Oooh, what's over there?..." You can actually watch the arrow wander around while you're sitting still... Strangely enough, the only way I can get it to be marginally accurate is to have the WiFi enabled...

I've often joked with people that if I had to rely on 911 to track me down using the GPS on my phone that I'd be screwed - I'd be watching the police a couple of blocks over looking for me while I'm waiving and yelling "I'm over here...!"

 

The older you get the harder it is to see the smart phone GPS and hear when on speaker.

Don't ask me how I know this.....

 

There was a time when I was driving all over five states doing business and wanted a GPS SO bad, but one worth having was close to a thousand bucks, and buying a new car with one in the dash was even bigger bucks.

After I no longer had a need for one, about two years ago, my wife bought me a Tom Tom for Christmas. I played with it some, but never really needed it. Then about two years ago I got an IPhone and there's nothing in the way of GPS that the Tom Tom can do, that the IPhone can't do. In addition to doing what the Tom Tom can do, the IPhone is always in my pocket if I want to know how far it is somewhere, or want to look at a map of some area.

I expect that the Tom Tom is now cheap enough that you couldn't set up with an IPhone for the same money, but the IPhone gives you so much other functionality, that there's really no comparison.

Good luck with your choice.

 

I saw that Woot yesterday and was curious, just not in the market for a GPS right now. I've had four different units, two of which I still have and I've looked at the TomTom before.

I won't even go into my first one, which was an offbrand POS. Then I got a Magellen, it was terrible and it very nearly got tossed out the window on more than one occasion. I sold it to a friend who wanted it primarily for the speedometer function as his oversize tires on his 4X4 threw off his stock speedo considerably.

Next I got a Sony, which has been a decent unit and is my backup. I switch it around between different cars, it always gets me where I'm going, though sometimes it chooses a creative route to get there. I also have a Garmin Nuvi which has been great, for the most part. They all seem to have limitations and quirks, I wish I could combine the best features of all of them into one unit.

As for updates, they're all expensive, the average seems to be 60-80 bucks from each manufacturer. The Garmin has been bugging me to update the maps for the last couple of months but I don't feel like dropping 1/3 the price I paid for the unit on a map update. I don't have the live traffic subscription, I don't live in a heavily populated area and it's not really worth it even for when I do go somewhere with traffic.

One thing I read about the TomTom that appeals to me is that it has a feature called "Map Share" where users can enter route changes into their unit when a road has been closed or rerouted or if the map on the unit is incorrect for some other reason, and then plug into the TomTom website and upload that data, and then all the other users who have done the same can get those updates and share their own.

As for smartphone GPS, I've been on several trips with friends who use them exclusively, and I'm not impressed. I just got back from a trip to Washington state with friends, traveling in their car and they said they'd do the navigating with their smartphones so I didn't take the Sony. Sure wish I had, would have saved a bit of time and hassle. Yes, the smartphone is nice in that you can more easily pick a business location to navigate to (you can do that with a GPS as well if the business in listed in the POI directory, and so far, most of the time I've looked for a particular business on my Garmin and Sony, I've been able to find it there) but the smartphone seems to be slow to respond and many times I came to an intersection and had to stop and wait for my friend in the backseat to tell me which way to turn, or, if in traffic or on the freeway where I couldn't stop I had to guess which way to go and then she'd tell me after minute or so if I was right or not, and if not, figure out a new route. And there are quite a few stretches of I% through Oregon with no cell signal on some services, so we were in the dark there when looking for a place to eat or get gas (she uses Gas Buddy and so didn't want me to stop anyplace that she hadn't checked out on her phone.) Also, the screen on a smartphone is small and would be hard for me to read if I'm trying to drive and navigate at the same time. Not to mention that laws that I would be violating in many states by doing so.

So, from my experiences with both, I'll take the mounted GPS unit over the smartphone for navigating, thankyouverymuch.

 

If you're shopping, I'll just say that I've got a Magellan RoadMate 3045-LM GPS, with lifetime map updates. The LM in the model name means "Lifetime Maps". A far as I know, Magellan uses that form on all of their GPS products.

Part of the package is that you install a client program on your home computer that lurks in the background. Every time you power up or sign on, the program checks with the Magellan computers to identify the latest software. If it's newer than what you have in the GPS, it pops up a little bubble and tells you that new maps are available.

I've got the Magellan for the car/truck, and Lowrance for the boat. Absolutely no complaints with either. (They do have different parent companies.)

Bass

 

I have a 5" Tom Tom with the lane assist and love it for trips. Yes the smart phone can do a lot, but on the other hand it is handy to have the smart phone available to search for info while following the Tom Tom and then put the address in. Also smart phones don't always get a signal and then you are lost until you get somewhere that it picks up. Trust me it happened to me. For everyday use yes the smart phone can be good, but on a trip or something I'd still want a dedicated GPS unit. My was reconditioned and have never had a problem with it and it was quite a bit cheaper at the time than a new one. Also in addition to the lane assist I would get one with lifetime maps.

 

I have a tomtom also. I had a truck with Nav for a few months, it went away, then I was stuck with no GPS. At the time I got my tomtom I used it in my truck and work truck. The main reason I have it now, though, is for work. I am on the road a considerable amount and I can't take the nav out of my current truck.

The two best features I use are the favorite places and coordinates. When I am somewhere I know I am going to be back to I save it so all I have to do next time is go to the favorites list and select it. Coordinates come in handy with site surveys.

As with all GPS units I think you have to be careful with addresses. They may not get you where you want to go - if it doesn't find an exact location it can put you on the wrong side of town, and even still if it finds an exact location if you put in a non-exact location you'll get messed up too. For example - 3456 Route 243 vs. 3456 US Route 243 South. Both may be an exact location, but which one are you going to?

Another one I love is when you get a street address on a road that isn't consistent. You may be real close to the road the address is on, but the address is 15 miles down the road - and, oh by the way, there are 8 breaks in the road, some of which are a mile apart. If your GPS takes you to the right spot you're in luck - if you don't know the area how are you to know where the road breaks are, which way they go, and how far down the next road you turn off back on to your road?