Sat Nav Advice Please.

[1581960]

I’m thinking of buying a Sat Nav but have no knowledge of the pros and cons of any of the many products available. It will be used in the UK and Ireland only. If possible I would like to put the destination in as an Ordnance Survey grid reference. Being hard of hearing it would be nice to have a selection of voices to choose from, some I find easier to hear than others. Any advice would be appreciated, thanks in advance.

[retrocop]

Well Tom Tom do a range with default choice of voices in a load of different accents. You can pay extra for celebrity voices if you wish.
Last year I was nominated Marco Polo on a trip down to Verdun with old mates of mine. We covered many different sites on our journey including battle fields and Commonwealth War cemetries.
I discovered the use of Lat/Long dirctions which I prefered to addresses and Post Codes etc.
Not sure about O.S. Cartography though.

[Old_Geezer]

I find mine doesn't even know all postcodes, nor all public houses, nor major businesses/shops for that matter :-( Good luck.

[1581960]

Thanks retrocopy.

[1581960]

Which one do you have Old_Geezer?

[Old_Geezer]

Tom Tom.
I suspect they all have improvement opportunities. Good for avoiding jams on route though. Not so hot on getting the speed limits correct always.

[CrapAtCryptics]

The current Garmin products are quite reasonably priced, easy to use and generally offer lifetime maps ( about 3-4 updates per year ). I`ve used them for many years and had not a single problem in the Uk and touring Europe.

[bhg481]

I find TomTom more user-friendly than Garmin - it's all a matter of personal preference, so the only way is to go somewhere like Halford's and play with them.
I've never seen one that allows you to specify OS grid references but Lat/long is common and most have "Places of Interest" eg, tourist attractions, car parks etc.
The more expensive they get the bigger area of mapping gets, so start by looking at the cheapest since you only want UK maps. Lifetime map updates is worth considering, as buying them as you think you need them can be expensive.
Go to Halford's and try programming one to plan a route somewhere and then try to make it go via somewhere else to see how easy that is. eg, we live in the south of England and regularly travel to the north and most sat-navs want us to use the motorway to the east of Birmingham; we prefer to go west of Birmingham so set a waypoint on the road to make it go that way. Repeat with a different make and see which you prefer.

[1581960]

Thanks bgh, didn't know Halfords had them on display for you to tinker with, I'll give it a go.

[Gizmonster]

Plenty of good advice here, but make sure you get one with traffic updates as well - I'm not sure if they all have traffic updates or not??

Some models require you to connect your sat nav to your phone via bluetooth, which is a bit of a pain; whereas others have a SIM card, so the sat nav can connect directly to the relevant server - so much easier :)

.... and yea - lifetime map updates is a must.

[Khandro]

I have recently installed a replacement battery in my old Garmin nüvi 250 giving it a new lease of life, but she, (I call her Gladys) is very out of date with maps, yesterday she got very confused near the German/French border due to new road constructions.
I get messages telling me to update, which I want to do, but get told there are non available - does anyone know how I can do this please?

[SparklyKid]

I love my Garmin sat nav. Bought 10 years ago prior to touring France. I did buy for £5 on tinternet the voice of Ozzy Osbourne, imitation of course.

When you take a wrong turn , instead of a silly voice saying " recalculating" A voice says " sharron sharron we're effing lost, much more fun.

[1581960]

Thanks Gizmonster et al, very helpful and I'm certainly not interested in anything that has to connect to a smart phone, mine isn't very smart!

[gingejbee]

Just as an additional point....in recent Which? tests on sat navs, the vast majority of Best Buys were Tom Tom....from their cheapest to their costliest.

[bhg481]

Khandro - there comes a point when it's better to invest in a new sat-nav rather than update the old one. Newer ones have better satellite detection and faster chips, so starting-up is quicker as is recovering from a trip through a long tunnel.

[1581960]

Very welcome gingejbee, many thanks.

[Khandro]

Thanks bhg, I shall miss "Gladys" though. Do all nüvis have the same woman's voice in English, does anyone know?

I shall miss, "Enter roundabout take third [stressed] exit. She's been a perfect companion, never gets cross - unlike another woman passenger I could mention :0)

[1581960]

An update for those that followed the thread. I finished up buying a Garmin DriveSmart 61, mostly because it was the one with the largest screen that I could find in Halfords and Currys. I asked in both shops and was told that none of the units would accept destinations in the form of Ordnance Survey grid refs! Guess what, this one does.

[retrocop]

Great. A good result for you. What about free updates?

[1581960]

Yes retro, free updates for life, however long that it. Took nearly a lifetime to update the maps on my pedestrian internet connection.

[retrocop]

A double result. Win Win situation.