TomTom GO 930
The TomTom 930 will soon make its way to stores in North America. With flagship new features of Active Lane Guidance, Static Intersection Images, and IQ Routes we were excited to put a few hundred miles of testing the TomTom 930 over the last few days. Will the 930 be finding its way into a car near you?
We won’t cover every feature here, since many of the features duplicate themselves in other models. If you need to get full up to speed with all of the functions, check out our TomTom 720 review for the basics, then step up to the 920T review for information about the more advanced features. What we will present below is much about how the TomTom GO 930 (and 930T) expand on those features. If you don’t care to read those, just know that the 930 comes packed with maps of North America and Europe, Bluetooth hands free calling, optional live traffic services, an FM transmitter, 4GB of internal memory with an SD card for expansion, MP3 player/photo viewer, optional connectivity with iPods, multi destination routing, text to speech, a few million POIs, a remote control, the ability to record your own navigation voices, and a remote control. Okay, ready now? Good.
Physical Design
The overall size and shape of the 930 is the same as that of the older 720 and 920 models. One difference is the color. The 720 had a shiny silver color, and the 920 had a matte silver finish. The new 930 features a shiny black finish. In many ways, looking at the 930 from the front resembles an iPhone… shiny black finish around a wide touch screen. That may not be 100% unintentional. 
The remote control has also been changed to a deep black color to match.
The 930’s physical appearance is totally hot, but I worry a little bit that the more reflective shiny black finish might make seeing the screen a little more difficult in high glare situations. Probably not much, but it does happen with other shiny black GPS devices a little.
Active Lane Guidance
A popular new feature on GPS devices is lane guidance. Often, “turn right in one half mile” with an arrow pointing to the right doesn’t provide as much detail as you might need. On complex Interstate interchanges there could be four lanes continuing straight with three lanes splitting to the right. In thick traffic, how many lanes do you need to cross to get into the correct position? Do I need to be all of the way over? Which way does my current lane go?
This is what Active Lane Guidance (ALG) sets out to provide. Instead of a simple arrow pointing towards the right, you can see a small graphic in the lower left showing each lane, and which lane(s) you need to be in. Light blueish lines indicate lanes you don’t want to be in and white arrows indicate the lanes that will take you to your destination. Dividers are also displayed in the lane guidance section.
At the right is a photo showing the feature in action. The road being driven has four lanes. The first lane and second lanes are separated by a barrier, and both continue on the current highway. The third lane can either continue straight, or turn off at the exit. (We know we want that exit because the line in this lane is white.) The forth lane also takes us to our exit, and is an “exit only” lane.
Static Intersection Images
When using a similar feature on other GPS devices (the NAVIGON “Reality View”) I was on the fence if I liked it or not. Initially I didn’t like the feature as the image is static and it doesn’t follow your progress and update as you get closer to the intersection. It did start to grow on me though.
However the disappointment with the Intersection Images feature on the TomTom 930 was just how infrequently it appears. I drove through endless Interstate Interchanges going from one limited access highway to another waiting to see the Intersection Images and they never appeared. I double checked that the setting was turned on (it was) yet I couldn’t get the images to appear.
On the NAVIGON models the Intersection Images don’t appear on every multi-lane interchange either, however it does appear on most Interstate to Interstate changes. I resorted to using the ‘Prepare Route’ feature and simulating different routes before I was able to find some locations where the images appeared. (Los Angeles.) But I couldn’t get it to appear in any of the locations in Boston I tried, either driving myself or while simulating a route.
The intersection image starts to appear between 1/2 and 1/4 mile before the turn. You can basically think of it as similar to the Lane Guidance window in the lower left, but blown up much bigger, covering the entire screen. The image doesn’t change as you progress towards the intersection, however the ‘distance to turn’ field is still there in big print counting down.
IQ Routes
Saving the best for last, IQ routes is perhaps the biggest reason you might want to look at the new x30 series from TomTom. It is worthy of noting that this is an area where TomTom has previously…. how shall we say it… had the most room for improvement. Most TomTom devices tend to be extremely conservative when predicting the time it will take to cover a given route, and the estimates tended to be even further off in remote areas. As I’ve said in the past, I’m thankful that TomTom devices get me places 20 minutes early, rather than 5 minutes late, but I’d still prefer a more accurate prediction to begin with.
So here is how it works. Within TomTom HOME there is a preference you can enable that allows TomTom to “gather anonymous statistical trip information”. It used to more fully spell out the function, adding “such as how long it actually takes you to travel a route”. As you drive a road segment, your TomTom device is recording how long it took you to drive each road segment, versus how long the device predicted it would take you.
If you opted into the service, the device would send that information back to TomTom. TomTom in turn aggregates that data and builds up more accurate time estimates for each road segment, for various days of the week. The data is then combined into the underlying mapping data on the device.
Unlike MapShare, it is relatively easy to figure out just how well IQ Routes works. Let me tell you, it works. Overnight TomTom has gone from being one of the least accurate estimates of travel time to the most accurate. Combine IQ routes with a traffic receiver and you have a system that could rival the network information Dash uses.
Here is just one of a number of specific examples I found. Note that in this route the estimated travel time is 1:23. Having driven that route thousands of times, unless you are in a blizzard the trip will typically take about 0:50. Prior to IQ routes, TomTom figured it would have taken close to 70% longer than that.
Now see what happens when I enable IQ routes. The estimated trip time for this route is now down to 0:51. Bravo! I found numerous other improvements as well. I simulated a trip I took last summer to Watertown, NY (what was I doing there?) and the trip took me about 6:25. With IQ routes enabled, it estimated the trip at 6:39, without IQ routes it estimated 7:47.
But the fun doesn’t stop there. Let’s say you are planning a trip into the city over the weekend. You would like to know in advance how long it will take to get there. Since the IQ Routes feature allows you to plan routes in advance, it will now ask you when (today, tomorrow, weekday, or weekend) you want to take the trip. The time estimate will then be based on historical averages for that day type. Now only if we could insert the time of day…. or tell it when we need to be there and have it tell use what time we need to leave…. I guess we will have to wait for a future update for that.
TomTom NavCore 8
A few other extras pop up on this device. Speed limits, and speed limit warnings now appear on the bottom of the status bar. Typically just the road speed limit is displayed (when known) however if you are exceeding the speed limit by a certain margin the graphic will turn red. This feature is in addition to any audible speed alerts you might have setup. You can see in the screen shot on the right I was going just a wee bit fast in the 45 mph zone.
MapShare has also seen a few minor tweaks. You can now edit the speed limit of a road segment. In addition, the interface to edit turn restrictions has been improved and is more intuitive than it was in the past with arrows more fully illustrating the changes you are proposing.
Purchasing Advice
If you are super excited about the static Intersection Images only, you might want to think twice. The limited amount of places where the images appear make it one of those “I’ll take it when I can get it” features. The lane guidance information in the lower left corner is super helpful when you find yourself saying “how many lanes do I need to get over and do I have enough time?”
But the real winner here is IQ Routes. IQ Routes takes TomTom to the top of the pack when it comes to estimating route time, and those times will continue to get even better as TomTom collects more data. IQ Routes, combined with the RDS-TMC receiver the TomTom 930 will have you covered both for expected and unexpected delays.
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In the features list on the left sideof this page, you indicate this is ’slim’ but show ‘no’ on whether the unit is ‘pocketable’. I thought this was pocketable. Please confirm. Also is there a case?
I define “pocketable” as less than 4.5 inches in total width, and less than one inch thick. Since this GPS is 4.6 inches wide, it doesn’t meet my personal definition of “pocketable”. Accessory cases are available, but not included in the package.
I wish the Active Lane Guidance would also show the exit number. I think I liked the Navigon screen better. I’m looking forward to some review comparison, especially when Garmin comes out with their solution.
What is the 930T vs. the 930? Can’t find info on this one. Is it for European customers?
The 930T includes the traffic receiver in the box. The 930 doesn’t include it, but you can purchase it as an optional accessory.
pocketable at 4.6″? = yeah, that extra 0.1″ is a HUGE factor. It would never fit in my pocket compared to a 4.5″ model. (I’m kidding)
’slim’ and ‘pocketable’ are relative. it depends on how big your pockets are.
Yes, it raises issues sometimes. But at some point I had to sit down with a ruler and some boxes and just say “here is where I’m drawing the line”. For pocketable I said 4.5, and stuck with it.
Does “Operate My Go” in TT Home work with the 930 on a mac?
Tim,
How does the IQ Routes info that your device gathered get back to TomTom, when you connect to a PC? Do you know if there is an estimated cost for the service?
Sounds like the time of day would really be useful so you get a better picture of rush hour conditions, or peak times.
Yes, IQRoute information is exchanged when you connect the Tomtom to your PC. There is no cost for this service.
Tomtom uses a program called Tomtom Home on the PC/Mac. There are services on it that do cost money, like new maps, and other little things.
However IQRoute updates, map SHARE updates, and quickGPSfix updates are free to download on pretty much a daily basis…
Ryan, that is close, but I’ll make one correction. IQ Routes data is sent back to TomTom when you use TomTom HOME as you describe if you have opted-in to sharing that data. However you do not get new IQ Routes data downloaded to your device on a regular basis like MapShare and QuickGPSfix. The only time new IQ Routes data gets added to your device is through an official map update. The data is packaged up with the map so the most often you could get new IQ data is quarterly.
Correct, if you’ve opted in to share the data the information gets transmitted back to TomTom when you update your device through the Tomom HOME software.
What is the bluetooth capability. I have a Verizon Blackberry. Thanks!
@ michelle
hi there, i’m from holland and have seen the Tomtom 930 (usa, europe) / 930T, T stands for Traffic Messenger Control, TMC. is in europe free info (usa, europe) / 930 HD-T (only works in the netherlands in combination with SIM-cards, for live traffic information, costs: 10 euro a month. more info: http://www.tomtom.com/hdtraffic?Lid=4&selector=true )
TT 930 is very quick with calculating and the lane assist is super!! better map-share functions. and you can download one time a free card for your tomtom (in europe, don’t now of this offer is also for the usa) and i like the black collor of the device.
my conclusion: it’s perfect!
greets
o and one more thing, it’s one of the first gps devices that can navigate without a connect from sattelites!!! built in sensors registrate that your moving and slowing down or speeding up, if you make a turn or not. it could be handy for example like tunnels with exits in it.
The 930T has an FM traffic receiver, and also uses IQ Routes? I wonder how it combines the two to get a route?
This sounds like an interesting device. A bit more expensive than some though?
Are there any costs after the initial purchase?
George, IQ Routes just changes the time estimate for the route without looking at the traffic situation. With a traffic receiver the adjustments for any know traffic delay will be applied the same way (to a degree overriding the original estimate).
I see. Thanks.
I know it isn’t quite available, but do you know if there will be subscription costs, for the traffic in particular?
There is no subscription cost for the device nor IQ Routes. Traffic does have a subscription cost. The first year is included with the receiver and I think after that it is $60/year.
George, if you’re interested in seeing historical traffic speeds, similar to info used by IQ routes, Google is also now offering it. You can look at what traffic will most likely be like at certain times each day, all through the week. Pick any day, and use the slider control to see traffic at various times of that day. It’s color coded to can tell you how fast the traffic is moving. Best of all FREE.
Unfortunately, what the Google feature doesn’t do is change your estimated travel time… it just changes the color of the roads.
Tim,
Does IQ routes actually change the route itself based on the data or does it just change the time? Ie, if it knows a certain road is slow on Mondays, will it route you different vs. another day of the week?
Yes, it can pick a different route with IQ Routes on versus if you turn it off. TomTom says it will result in a different route as much as 50% of the time. I didn’t see different routes picked (on vs off) as often as that, but it does actually change the routes picked.
Thanks for the info on Google traffic.
On the 930, why would calculate a route without IQ Routes? Why the option to toggle it?
Unless I’m mistaken I thought I read somewhere a comparison between updating maps on a TomTom and another device, Garmin maybe? I thought it seemed expensive. The 930/930T sounds pretty good, but if it is costly to keep it updated then I’m not sure about it. I know they all cost something.
Is there an actual release date for the 930?
I’m not sure why there is an option to toggle IQ Routes, but here are a few guesses.
1) Whenever you are dealing with user generated data (even if it has passed a validation process) it is probably a good idea to allow the user to turn it off.
2) Perhaps they want people to be able to see (as in my examples above) just how well it actually works.
3) Whenever you release a new feature it is a good idea to offer a way to “roll back” in case there are times when it produces results that are not as good as before.
As to map updates– With the TomTom you have access to free updates submitted by other TomTom users for up to 1 year. Map updates are made available every quarter, and typically cost $99. They frequently go on sale, and most users will choose to update once every 1-2 years.
Where can I buy a GPS which can monitor vehicle speed and alert the driver (or someone else) when exceeding speed limit.
Is their any chance TomTom will offer a firmware upgrade to give the 920 the IQ feature ?
Rick,
The IQR is built into the new maps.
Even if you got NavCore8 of free, you would still have to buy the new map!
Rick,
The IQR is built into the new maps.
Even if you got NavCore8 for free, you would still have to buy the new map!
So that everyone is clear on IQRoutes feature, it is not something that is updated via TTHome or a Mapshare type update. The IQ info shipped with the map is all that you will have until you purchase a newer map with new IQ info. That’s why there is not “subscription fee” or additional Plus services charge. Tho you can opt in to report travel times (road segment travel speeds), the reported info will not be available to you until you buy a new map. It doesn’t mean it has no real benefit. It does. Over the next few map updates, I would expect more and more local roads will be included.
is the fm receiver for traffic good in Europe and the US on the 930T…have the 910 and use it in US and Europe…is it worth upgrading
The traffic receiver is physically different in Europe and North America. The same receiver cannot be used in both locations.
Are there any improvements to the Navcore 8 software. Constant irritations with 7 are:
- You can only edit the name of a POI that you have entered. If you want to edit any part of its address you need to delete it completely and enter a new one. (Pretty lame)
- You can not edit the name of a POI category that you added. I created a new Category and entered about 50 POIs. When I wanted to rename the category my only option was to delete it and all the POIs. (Really dumb)
Last question: I guess it would be wishful thinking to hope there is an Off Road mode?
Tim, Thanks for the elaborate test. Can you tell me how many voices you have on your device? I mean languages. Does your 930 “speak” only English or do you have the usual “choice of voice” ? Living in a foreign country, wanting to hear my mother tongue and having heard about “regional limitations” is my reason for asking. Thank you.
Does the 930T have a built-in traffic antenna in the power cord like the garmin or is it still separate?
Separate.
It seems the more I read about the x30’s, already in use in Europe, the less appealing they appear. Lane Assist is apparently very spotty, no particular erea they are even reasonably complete. IQRoutes is still a work in progress and really only assists in travel time estimates. Doesn’t yet take into account time of day or even day of the week. Options are Today, Tomorrow, Weekday, Weekend. I have the same attitude towards this as the upcoming nuvi 800’s. I don’t see enough reason to go for either if you’re already fairly happy with your current PND. Neither will bring very many changes to the table. IMHO, the x30’s are repackaged x20’s with two added features. (Three if you count being a speed limit reporter for TT for free). I think both manufacturers can, and probably will do better by year’s end. I’d sit on the sidelines for this one.
I run a small educational sales company and travel 4 states. Currently, I have a 2 year old Garmin StreetPilot C550 which doesn’t connect with my Palm Treo 700p. A good friend has considered buying a GPS for some time. He drove my car and used it on a trip recently. He set-up the phone to work with it and it was perfect. He wants to buy mine now and let me upgrade. I had an occasion to use a Tom Tom a few weeks ago. I liked it and am considering a purchase. In looking at features, I note that the Garmin has ability to save 500 waypoints and the TomTom 920 or 930 only 48. Many locations I go to are saved for further use. I must have 100+ now. Am I going to be disappointed with the 920 or 930? Any other disappointments I might be looking at?
Brian, you can save those locations as custom POIs rather than favorites and have virtually no limit to how many you can store. That also makes it easier to backup, and transfer to different devices down the road.
Just when I start focusing on a potential replacement device I hear something that makes me think again. After the Dash reviews were not great concerning its routing ability I started looking for a possible alternative GPS with traffic. The Dash traffic solution sounded good, but obviously other devices do traffic differently. The 930T sounds good, but what gatorguy is saying makes me pause again. While it isn’t bad exactly I wonder whether it is worth it. However, given that the pricing I’ve seen isn’t much more than the 920T I wonder if it would still be a good bet to go with the 930T with the thought it will only improve. My whole point is to replace my old Garmin 2610 with a more up-to-date device with traffic.
I think TomTom is playing conservative with IQ Routes right now since it is a brand new feature. Certainly as they amass more data, being able for the user to select a travel time is the next logical step, something that would be easy to implement, and something I’m sure they are planning on. It is such an obvious feature that they must feel they don’t have quite enough data yet to fully blow it out.
Having used IQ Routes, I can say that it makes a pretty dramatic change in how it predicts time estimates and perhaps even more importantly what routes it selects.
Of course they had more room for improvement in their time estimates than other manufacturers, but the fact that this brings them back to the top in time estimates and impacts route decisions makes it a winner.
Tim, I suspect that is you run the same route travel time estimate of both the TTx30 and Garmin 700’s, you’ll get nearly the same result many times. I honestly have found the Garmin estimate to be nearly dead on in most cases. I haven’t seen the “optimistic” Garmin estimates referred to in several posts. On a common 30 minute trip, my 760 is nearly always dead on or off by no more than 2 minutes at most. Maybe a 5% variance in actual vs. estimated in the vast majority of cases?
I find that with Garmin devices, if the route covers lots of major state highways or interstate highways, the route will always be about 5% optimistic… I’ll never get there quite as fast as the Garmin thinks I will.
On most medium state roads, smaller state roads, and local roads, especially in rural areas I’ve found the time estimates on Garmin devices to be a bit too conservative… but not as conservative as the TomTom devices were pre-IQ Routes.
With IQ Routes, the TomTom devices are now a bit more accurate on highway/interstate predictions, and much more accurate on state roads, local roads, and rural areas. And more accurate than the Garmin devices for those routes.
But what is more important to me than the time estimates (I just become accustomed to their estimates and adjust appropriately) is that the TomTom now offers better routes in many cases because of the more accurate data.
What we also can’t ignore here is people’s driving habits and how that relates to the time estimate from the GPS. Some people are more comfortable matching or exceeding the speed limit in rural areas where other people might be more comfortable doing so on highways.
I know some people who drive about 50mph wherever they go…. rural, city streets, highways. While I know other people who will drive 20 on city streets or rural roads and 80 on the interstate. So driving habits will always play a role in time estimates.
Note that the feature is called IQ routes and not IQ ETAs, this is as much (actually more) about picking smarter routes than it is time estimates. IQ Routes seems to do a better job at picking clever routes than TomTom devices were before.
I agree that this isn’t a feature that will cause a significant amount of x20 users to dump on ebay to grab the x30, but it is a good improvement in time estimates and route choices.
When will the 930 be aval in the states?
Should be any day now.
I’m not sure if one does things better than the other or not, but it seems to me that you pay more for a Garmin to get the same functionality you get with TomTom. And I’m assuming, just for discussion, that the IQ Routes really doesn’t offer anything over how Garmin determines their ETAs. In other words, it’s not a feature that adds anything. Of course, the long term costs need to be factored in as well, but I don’t see a significant difference there.
I have found the 930 at a store on the 24th. The sales associate said they got them in on Tuesday April 22nd. Excited about trying it out
Tim,
I was about to pick up a 920T when I saw your review of the new 930. It seems the big advantage is the IQ mapping, if TT use the data collected by users to update future maps - will all TomTom products benifit, once you update your maps? Or only the 930?
I am having a hard time justifying the price differance between the two and will probably opt for the 920 as the price is dropping..
BMan - TomTom hasn’t said what might be available down the road for other devices. Historically, many software features introduced in new devices trickle down to older models over time, however they don’t make any promises that it will happen.
I have a Garmin nuvi 760 and a TomTom 720 and I prefer the TomTom EXCEPT that the 720 display is not very bright and thus is very hard to see in bright sunlight (the Garmin is really bright). Have you noticed the difference that I see in display brightness of those two units? Any improvement on that end in the new 930? I will buy a 930 as soon as I can, but only if the display is brighter than on the 720.
Francisco - I’ve found the 720/920/930 screens to be plenty bright, even in direct sunlight. Running it side by side with the 750/760 I don’t see much difference. Sure, at the highest brightness setting the Nuvi is a little brighter, but I find it washes out the contrast so I don’t drive with it at the brightest setting.
If you “don’t see much difference” in screen brightness between the TomTom 720 and the Garmin 760, then either:
1 - I have a defective 720 (yours is “plenty bright, even in direct sunlight”, mine most certainly is not. Actually, my 720 is almost unreadable in direct sunlight). And / or
2 - you have a defective 760 (”at the highest brightness setting … it washes out the contrast”. Mine certainly does not)
After I posted my original question about the brightness of the 720 vs the 760, I read your review of the 760 which states that:
“Perhaps the best part of the newer Nuvi devices is the screen. The screen is incredibly bright, brighter than just about any other GPS on the market. These newer screens (as compared to the early 300 series for example) are so bright it is the only GPS I’ve ever considered turning down the brightness from the maximum setting. Text is crisp, and extremely readable.”
That is exactly my experience with the 760, but I see no loss of contrast at any brightness setting. Perhaps my 720 may be defective because it is almost impossible to read in bright sunlight.
Thanks for your excellent website and help.
Francisco - Then my suggestion is that you won’t be any happier with the 920/930 than the 720.
Tim,
With my 930 I tried the “Operate My Go” function on my Macbook Pro and it downloaded a file. Well it kinda works. It identifies the device as a 730, some functions work, others don’t. Some buttons are clickable others aren’t. I can not get it to go to the map or driving view screen - it just shows a screen with No Route Planned on it. Has this worked for you?
I also had copied over the Mapsettings.cfg file from my 920 hoping to retain my favorites, etc. The only thing that was picked up was my home location, recents and favorites were not. I had to manually enter my favorites again. This may be because of the different NA map versions and I hope I didn’t cause a problem by using the 920 file and moving the 930 one out.
One thing I noticed - when I first started it up and connected to Home it had the signal strength bars arranged horizontally but when I was playing with it last night they were vertical as they are in the 7.481 update on my 920.
I’m off tomorrow and will be checking it out on the road.
Question about traffic (as compared to Garmin 760)
On the TomTom, is there a difference between receiving traffic through TomTom PLUS (which I assume uses my AT&T phone/dataplan) or the Traffic Receiver? Is one more accurate than the other?
How does the traffic functions compare between the TomTom and Garmin? Do they only report there is a traffic problem on the current route? Do they both offer re-routing in case of accidents or long delays?
Thanks!
(Torn between these two units)
Yes, there is a difference between using the TomTom RDS-TMC traffic receiver and using the TomTom Traffic PLUS service. In theory, the RDS-TMC traffic should be better than the PLUS traffic. TomTom has explained to me that the RDS-TMC traffic uses just INRIX data, while the Clear Channel TTN (TDS-TMC) system uses data from their own network in addition to the INRIX data.
However, more than one person who has used both in the same area has told me they have been getting better data from the PLUS service than with the RDS-TMC receiver. I can only theorize that there was a lack of broadcasting towers in their area for the RDS-TMC information that might have inhibited the information getting to them while the PLUS service simply needs a cell signal.
I travel extensively in a motorhome and have used MS streets and trips with GPS for routing and POI especially campground locations by location and features.
Has anyone experience with campground locations on the Tom Tom?
The campground POIs probably won’t be as extensive, however the 930 supports custom POI databases so you can import them from other sites. There are quite a few people that have done that with pretty good results.
I just received the new 930 yesterday and put it to the test immediately since I’m leaving for Europe in 2 days. I tried it out in the mid afternoon and evening yesterday and again in the morning today. For comparisons I own a Magellan Roadmate 700 that I updated to a 760 and have used extensively throughout the US and Europe for many years. I had found the Magellan hard to beat for picking consistent good routes, next to other GPS’s my buddies have owned (Garmin, TT, etc) but the Magellan takes a long time to re-route, and it’s bulky to travel out of the country with, hence the TT 930 purchase.
Here’s my impressions so far:
My main dislike at this point is the screen washing out in the daylight. It’s near impossible at times to see the screen when the sunlight pours into the car window. And because the included window mount is short it forces me to have it positioned more towards the front of my windshield in both cars I own (Prius and G35) which leaves it more susceptible to washing out. My quick fix for this will be to construct a little hood for it that will keep most of the incoming light shaded from washing out the screen. If anyone else has suggestions let me know.
It doesn’t tell you what side of the street your destination is on. Certainly not a biggie, but I wish it had that capability.
The map is a little less clear as to upcoming streets, on quick glance, compared to the simplicity of the Magellan with the easy to see white background against dark streets design. I’m sure I can get used to this in the long run so I’m not considering this a deal breaker.
I checked to see that the lane guidance was on but I’ve never seen this come up in the last 2 days, whether on city streets, expressways, or the freeways. I live in the San Francisco Bay Area (Silicon Valley) so maybe they don’t have that feature in this area. Might see it more when I get to Europe?
The feature of speaking the address info is nice but incomplete since you have to at times physically tap in your choice from a list that comes up after speaking the street name. In other fields you can just say the number next to the correct choice, but not on street names. Again, not a deal breaker, but I wonder why they couldn’t have every choice in every category be accessed by voice only and not need physical interaction. Must be costly to do since so few other companies have this implemented correctly. I have a built-in GPS in my G35 that does this quite well.
Overall, I’m going to give it a go and keep it. I’m hopeful that it will do a great job while I’m traveling through Europe the rest of this month.
Dave, The 930 doesn’t verbally announce the side of the street, but it will display it with a final arrow as you approach the destination and by which side of the street the checkerboard flag is placed.
You can go through the entire voice entry procedure with just one tap by following the “Spoken Address (Dialog)” method and following the other settings/tips in the “Voice Prompt Tips” section of our 920T review.
Dave, I agree 100% with your comment that: “It’s near impossible at times to see the screen when the sunlight pours into the car window.” For me this is THE major problem with the TT930; and frankly I am getting very tired of that, very fast. Even without the bright sun the screen to me looks dull, although of course it is readable. I can not understand why TomTom will not improve screen brightness. The Garmin 760 (which I also have) is much brighter and easy to read even in the brightest sunlight. By the way, on my TT930 lane guidance is on but to date I have never seen it at all… I hope you will enjoy your upcoming trip, and good luck.
Dave, the Lane Guidance hasn’t come on for me at all in the Baltimore area in the 9 days I’ve been using it. I had to run a demo route in the 95/495 hwy. area near Washington,DC to actually see it activated. My guess is that this is an evolving feature that will be increased in future maps/updates. The screen brightness has been my only complaint with all the TomToms that I’ve used. Never used a Garmin but in the stores it’s obvious that their screens are brighter but I’ve gotten hooked on TTs. Sometimes I drape a baseball cap brim over the device to see it better.
John, that’s what I suspected about the lane guidance feature, that it was in its infancy and maybe more areas added in the future.
I’ll work through the brightness thing to some degree by masking off the top and sides a bit with some makeshift setup, but I suspect I’ll like the unit enough to hold on to if for a while until the next big wave of GPS units arrive on the scene that makes us all drool.
I like the look of the Garmin units but in all of my friends units they seem to be a bit iffy with the way other things work. I know there is no perfect unit but the Magellan 700 Roadmate was as close as you could get, even for years after it was passed on by by newer technologies. Everyone is out to make MP# players and everything else out of GPS units, I just want a GPS unit that does GPS really well and simply. I think this Tom Tom is going to do the trick based on the tests I’ve thrown at it so far (barring the washed out screen thing). Thanks for your replies.
Cheers,
-Dave
I haven’t had any problems with my Garmin 760. It has worked great. I am sure this TomTom will work well, too. It’s just your preference.
Tim, when viewing the map as your traveling to your destination is there a way to see the name of the poi’s as they are passed? Thank you
You can go into Browse Map mode and tap on the icon.
Tim, I’m curious concerning the Lane Guidance. How often does it appear compared to the Navigons? Not necessarily the Reality View screen but the lane arrows on the bottom left. I’m just wondering if there are more areas on the Navigons that show this.
Probably depends on the area, but in my area I see it more often on the NAVIGON devices.
Real newbie here. Bought my TT 930 just last week, and am curious about some things. I agree on the brightness issue. It’s pretty washed out on the windshield of my G35 as well. I’ve raised it to right under the mirror, angled it down, and seems to be better. I much prefer mounting it very low, right above the dash, on the left hand side, up close to the doorpost. But during the day, I haven’t figured out a way to shade it there. Still a work in progress.
But my question for you pros. I’m not likely to make it to Europe this year, but for the life of me, I can’t find the Euro maps on my machine. I’ve scrolled through the states, Canada & Puerto Rico, but nothing for Europe. Any idea how to find this? I thought it was included, and that was one of the reasons I bought it, since I do make it there on business from time to time.
Any suggestions?
Thanks!
For those who have recently purchased one of the 30 devices there is a new NA map version available - 805.
About the Europe maps, I believe if you go to page 2 of preferences on the device you’ll see Manage Maps. Tap on that and you’ll be able to switch from the NA to the Western Europe map.
Thank you John! You are absolutely right! Gives me something new to play with!
Now, if only I could figure out why the TT930 keeps reading from the sample books on most startups!
And since this is comment on a review, I’ve been very pleased with mine in the first week of useage. It helped me find two locations out of town I’d never been to, and on a late night food run in a strange small city it did a great job finding a pizza place the hotel desk couldn’t find, and getting me there and back.
I was just about committed to a Garmin 660 until I saw this review, and fell for the new features and user comments steered me to the TT930.
Just thought I’d post a quick update. I’ve now been in Europe for 3 days and have used my TT 930 quite a bit (already traveled through 3 countries and about 600 miles of freeways and small towns). I really do like this GPS quite a bit now. In regards to the lane guidance feature, I have now seen it work many times and it’s a very cool feature. It gives you a lot more confidence in your next move on the motorways, besides being very slick looking graphically. The speed camera feature works perfectly so far, as well as the correct speeds and speeding warnings. Already saved me a few possible camera tickets. I still wish it didn’t get so washed out in the daylight, but so far it has been OK to deal with.
Also, it is very fast at recalculating. I had to maneuver around a city in Belgium yesterday that had construction everywhere around the city. Had to constantly divert from the route and it would come up almost immediately with alternatives on the fly.
They really have the European thing together and when they eventually get all the lane guidances for the US to match it will be very hip here as well. Very glad I took the chance and bought this for my European trip.
Dave,
Thanks for your update. I wasn’t sure when you said “they really have the European thing together,” if you were referring to the Lane Guidance feature only. Did the 930 function pretty much the same in the US? Other than your issue with the display washing out it sounds like you’re pleased with it.
Yes, I was speaking about the Lane Guidance primarily, only because I didn’t see it come up while I was testing it in the SF Bay Area the 2 days before I took off for Europe. And of course, the speed cameras are not as widely used in our area either so i didn’t get an idea how that would work in the US either.
But yes, overall it’s an impressive piece.
Oh yesh I didn’t mention that it also interfaces with my Blackberry perfectly, importing my phone numbers perfectly and the hands free talking works very smoothly so far.
My buddies out here on the road are quite impressed with it, especially when i tell them the price. They always say “that’s the price including the European maps?”.
Hi Dave,
I was wondering which Blackberry are you using. The 930 does not seem to work with my Blackberry 8830 World Edition phone.
I would like to buy a 930T in the states for use in USA and Europe.If I buy in the US, I understand that the TMC function will not work in Europe due to a different antenna. I also understand that the ASR will not work in Europe for some reason. Can you get a different power cord with the right antenna in it? As most of my use will be in Europe, can I order a European spec unit from a US dealer?
Thanks Dave. I’ve been a Garmin owner for a long time, but I’m seriously looking at the 930T primarily because I’m missing two things with my current unit. One is traffic, which you can get from everybody now, but the other is lane guidance. The only two I know of providing additional lane help are Navigon and TT, so I’m also looking at the N 2100Max and 7100.
George, I might wait a few months before latching onto the 930. Lane guidance is pretty rare in the States right now. To get additional data, you buy a new map. Updates are costing $129, instead of the standard x20 prices of $100. Wait out another map update or so and you’ll be much happier
Roger - Correct, there are different traffic antennas for the USA and Europe. You are also correct that ASR only works (out of the box) for the continent where you purchased the 930, however you can find the files to make it work on the other continent.
I don’t know of any USA retailers that stock the “Europe” version of the 930.
Thanks Gatorguy. The lack of interchanges using that feature does concern me. Waiting is the one thing I didn’t want to do, at least not very long. I’ve got a trip the end of June to New England, and possibly some others during the summer and fall, so I was hoping to have something by then. I don’t understand releasing it before you can make use of the functionality. Maybe not every interchange, but at least some. As more devices make it out on the roads maybe we’ll find it works in more places.
Just so people don’t misinterpret… the Intersection Images are not 100% vaporware… they do exist for some intersections in the USA, but they are few and far between indeed.
Considering buying a 930T for my wife that drives into the city daily (100 mile round trip). I’m really interested in the traffic service. My understanding is that this service is free for the first year, what is the cost after that? Additionally, I have read that the RDS-TMC (which I take it as the built in reciever) is not always up-to-date when reporting traffic issue. Any feedback on this subject?
Location: Kansas City, MO
Thanks for your feedback in advance.
The traffic service is expected to cost $60/year after the promotional period. The quality of the service will vary by location, I don’t have any specific feedback for your area.
Tim, having not previously owned a GPS, how effective do you consider these devices for traffic avoidance? As I posted earlier, long daily commute so navigation options are a plus, providing the traffic service is realiable within a few minutes, i.e. 5-10 minutes.
Is it worth the investment? (I know open ended question) but we live in our cars or so it seems.
I’ll say that there is a reason most all of the traffic services come with a free trial subscription.
Sometimes they will report traffic that has already cleared, sometimes they will not report when traffic does exist, and sometimes they get it right.
The service is only getting better with time, and despite the cost it is one of those things where you say “well… I guess I’d rather have it than not have it”, but overall it is no match for sliced bread.
I’ll echo what Tim said about the RDS-TMC receiver. I’m in Baltimore and it has helped me several times. When the renewal comes up ( I still don’t know how they know you’re using it ) I will renew. It won’t change your life but I’d rather have it than not.
Will the 930 provide walking routes? If not, will it at least locate where you’re standing and where you’re walking? Is there another unit that will do this? How does the 930 compare to the Nuvi 770 and 670?
Vic - Yes, it does have a pedestrian routing option.
Tim & John, thx for the response, I greatly thank you. One confusing item for me. I notice on Tomtom website they do not list a 930T anywhere, but I found several websites that list a 930 & 930T (including this review). So is there a 930T, if so I haven’t found any place that has the “T” model packaged. Can you provide me insight into this item. I understand the 920T has the traffic included, so what about the 930?
Thanks,
i have a 920, is this worth upgrading to?
Tony - I’m not sure why the packaged “t” models are not shipping quite yet, but I anticipate they will be shipping soon.
Tim - Thanks for your response. Do you or anyone have any information comparing the 930 with the Nuvi 670 and 770?
You can compare them here.
How does the 930T compare to Garmin’s nuvi 880 soon to be released (May 2008)? Which unit has the fastest boot up time? Also, Garmin has a feature called “dead reckoning” on their Streetpilot 7500 unit but not on the 880. I read that the 930 has enhanced positioning technology. What’s the difference? Does the 880 have this feature?
Do any of these gps have real-time traffic for free? How does the 930T’s compare with the 880’s “MSN® Direct for U.S. compatible”.
Another question, the 880 has this feature: “It automatically marks your position when you remove it from the windshield mount, so you can navigate with nüvi on foot and find your way back to your vehicle”, does the tomtom has something similar or does one just entered the location of the car into the 930T. The 880 is twice the price of the 930T which considering all of the 930T’s features is leaning me towards the 930T unit.
An addendum to my previous question, does the 930T work well around buildings versus the 880? I had borrowed a family member’s Magellan unit in when visiting Montrael, Canada a few years ago and it stunk. It couldn’t find the GPS signals and it was enough to get my wife to declare no GPS units for our future. I’m hoping to convince her to move away from paper maps with this new unit. If the unit I buy does not work quickly and accurately, I fear my wife will never allow me to purchase another one of these units again. 8-(
Scott, since the 880 hasn’t been released yet, it is impossible to answer most of those questions. You can read about Enhanced Positioning Technolog on our 920t review. None of them have free traffic. The TomTom devices can mark your location in a parking lot as well– just manually.
Hi Tim,
Is the unit 930T fast navigating through the menu screens? I’m really looking for speed as I’m the type of driver to quickly get into a car and go. If I have to wait to get my info into the unit, it will slow me down too much.
Yes, it is fast. It boots faster than most Nuvi models as well.
Hi Tim,
I just read your review of enhanced positioning technology but it did not give me my answer. If one is starting out in an area full of large buildings but no GPS signal is avaible, will the enhanced positioning technology be able to adapt or will the unit give up until a GPS signal is found(this happened to me in Montreal believe it or not)?
No, it only provides assistance after the signal has been lost, if it was never there to begin with then it won’t help. But if you are basing your experience from a Magellan device “a few years ago” you will find that the GPS chipset performance has likely improved quite a bit since that time.
Hi Tom,
thanks for taking out from your precious time to answer our questions and concerns…i know the 920 and 920t has a feature where you can get to know cheap gas prices along your route or within a radius…does the 930 have this feature too?? I am sold on this unit but need to confirm this? Thanks
Imowo - Yes, you can get that for the 930 as well.
Thanks Tim.
The comparison was very helpful. But I still can’t decide between the 770 and the 930. I’ll just keep using my laptop with DeLorme USA 2009 and wait until the 880 comes out. I’ll keep monitoring these comments. Great forum. Thanks again.
Thanks for your recent answer Tim. Is is possible to obtain a different power lead with an antenna suitable for use in Europe?
Tim,Have you heard any news from tomtom that they’ve cancelled shipping the 930 here in north america? I live in alberta and ordered 930 from gpscentral.ca calgary and they’ve credited back my order. Their website has this note,”MAY 8, 2008. TOMTOM HAS CANCELLED? SUSPENDED? THIS PRODUCT. WE’RE ARE NOT SURE OF THE REASONS YET”. any idea what went wrong?
Rey, from what we have been able to tell, they just didn’t get stock as fast as they had hoped. You can find an extensive discussion about it in this thread of our forums.
Tim,
Thanks for the link. Just talked with Futureshop store manager here in Red Deer Alberta. He told me they won’t carry the 930 and other products from tomtom in the near future due to volumes of returned products like the 920’s. Garmin’s inventory are fast selling more. And especially people who works in the oil rigs bought them and returned TT and exchanged with garmin units. I’m not exaggerating this but that’s what the guy told me. I want to buy the 930. Darn! Where would I order it now?
Can this GPS save a specific route (previously driven- to be selected to drive later)? If yes, would this route be exactly like it was driven previously? I heard the Navigon will. If yes, How many “saved routes” can it store?
It can’t… but I don’t believe there are any devices (including NAVIGON) that can do that. While the NAVIGON can record logs, I don’t recall (someone correct me if I’m wrong) it being able to convert those logs back into routes.
Tim, Do you know if and when Australian maps will be available with the 930?
Sonia - I think they are available for purchase now.
I had mistakenly ordered a TT920t instead of a TT930 from tomtom.com but they say that I can arrange to return it once I’ve received it. Meanwhile, I noticed that the local Best Buy had the TT930 so I picked it up. On the first day of use, it’s tried to divert me onto the HOV lanes twice. The first time wasn’t a biggie as I just had to continue straight on in the main lanes but the second time (on the way home), it directed me off the freeway to the u-turn that would lead me back to the transit center, I thought it was taking me to a parallel road so I missed the u-turn and made a left turn under the freeway, it then directed back through some residential streets back to the freeway and basically put me back on where it told me to get off. On the plus side, there was a stretch of the freeway that always gets clogged, practically at the last minute, it directed me from the far left lane to exit onto a toll road for a short distance and dropped me onto a residential street that bypassed the traffic jam altogether. The first time that the Advanced Lane Guidance came up it showed two lanes on the right exiting I610 to I10 east but in fact there were four lanes exiting, the two rightmost lane were for I10 west and the second set of two were for I10 east. It would’ve been more helpful if it had came up a few seconds earlier to show that the three lanes exiting I290 east bound to I610 south bound was on the left while the lanes on the right went to I610 north. It’s one of the few places where you exit left to go right and exit right to go left. Likewise, the second time it popped up, it failed to show the two lanes exiting I10 east bound to I45 north bound but showed the lanes exiting for I45 south. The third time it popped up for me, it showed the two rightmost lanes exiting I10 west bound for I610 north and one lane exiting I10 west for I610 south when in fact it’s just two lanes, the right most goes both ways but bifurcates to two lanes with the extra lane on the right going to I610 North while the other lane went to I610 south.
Overall, it seems like a good box if there was just a way to tell it not to take the HOV lanes. I’ll probably wind up marking all the HOV ramps as blocked but then that may eventually get shared out to screw someone else up.
Hi Tim,
I’m torn between the TT930 & Navigon 7100. My travel is mostly Northern New england and Southern New Hampshire. I like the mileage feature on the Navigon but am concerned about ease of use. Any updates on the touchscreen since your review?
Also are the traffic predictions equally accurate between the two?
Thanks
Hi Tim,
I just got the Tomtom 930 and it’s great so far but I have a weird Text-to-speech problem. When I go on I-405 in LA, instead of saying “Highway Four Oh Five” it will say “Highway Four West Five”. It does the same thing on I-605 and I-105 as well. Can you see if your’s does the same thing? I want to see if it’s a software issue that can be updated or if I should just exchange it.
Thanks!
Hi Tim…
Do you have feedback as to how good TMC traffic is vs. TomTom Traffic (through TomTom Plus)? Is one better than the other?
thanks!
Hi Tim
Will the FM traffic receiver provide coverage in states like vermont.
Thanks
I emailed Tom Tom about the 930 regarding walking routes. This was my resply to their response:
Your response is odd. You say that you can have the unit set a walking route: “You can set a preference in the unit to have it navigate using a walking route.”
Then you seem to contradict that with another contradiction within a contradiction: ” If it is available. It will not create such a route.”
Then you seem to suggest this might be a future feature: “Perhaps such a feature will be available on a future model but as yet it is not”
As I understand this, the unit can be set to a walking route and if that route is available it will not create that route and maybe that will be available in the future.
I have a Bachelor’s and Master’s in Business and have taught business communications at the graduate level and I still can’t understand this. Can it give walking routes? Or do you mean that it has limitations on the walking routes that it can give? Depending on the location, it might be able to give some walking routes in some situations.
The response below is bizarre to say the least. It is a simple question which required only a simple answer. Why make it so confounding?
I’ve had the 930 for about three days now and so far it’s missing some rather key features that I would’ve expected it to have.
For one, it doesn’t have an “avoid HOV lanes” feature, such a feature have been common place for some time now so it’s unthinkable that the latest and greatest would not have it (I’ve mentioned this shortcoming before). I’ve asked customer support about this but so far, no answer other than to turn off highway notifications which would still cause it to base routing on HOV’s.
The unit does not automatically change from day mode to night mode. I’ve found some public domain scripts that does this for the 930 but again, such a feature has been in the market for quite some time now.
The speech address input is initially turned off, and it’s far from intuitive as to how to turn it on. Basically, you have to first select the state before you select the city in a address input dialog in order to enable speech input mode. Of course, the input dialog panels don’t have anything that would indicate choosing a state before inputting the city however there’s a little country flag on the right hand side that if you click on it comes up with a menu of countries which would be followed by a menu of states. Sorta of an easter egg rather than a bonafide feature. The batteries don’t last very long, basically just enough for two trips of about 30 miles each.
There’s no battery gauge or information selection to view how much battery life is left though a low battery icon does appear shortly before running out of power.
When it’s operating as a Bluetooth handsfree for your cell phone, it has a green call icon but no red end call icon so you’re at the mercy of whomever is on the other end to hang up or you have to fumble for your phone. The volume for the speaker phone is really low, even when running through the FM transmitter to your car stereo speakers.
It gets traffic reports through my cell phone so it’s connected constantly to the cell phone’s GPRS. Good thing my cell phone plan has the unlimited data option grandfathered in from years ago when they didn’t want a separate data plan for unlimited use. And people wonder why I refuse to change plans just for more minutes.
The FM transmitter to your stereo would be so much more useful if it also had a FM tuner so that you could still listen to your radio station instead of just to the MP3 files.
It doesn’t seem to play many of my MP3’s exported from the Mac and when I select one song to play, it always starts some other song instead. They should just have an iPod dock on the back for a Nano, I’ll think that I’ll try a USB hub and plug both the Nano and the TomTom to the hub and see if they actually see each other (the TomTom has an iPod control selection…).
I haven’t found an easy way to select a POI say the nearest gas station or rest stop while on route yet. Many of the POI’s show up in the middle of the road or on the wrong side of the road. I spent an hour yesterday moving POI’s near my house around. They need to pay some people to probe drive to the POI’s.
It’s directed me to turn left on a street with a center median that prevents such turns but at least there’s a correct turn restrictions selection however you would want to do that after the trip and before you erase your route.
Adding roundabouts doesn’t seem to do anything.
I’ve found third party public domain software where you can input your mileage and the amount of gas you bought to top off and it would estimate your gas mileage based on your speed.
The unit was able to get me around some nasty traffic during rush hour but the feature set needs work.
I’m still trying to get responses from customer service about these gripes because like I said, these are pretty obvious features that should be there. Don’t call near the end of the business day, they just drop calls when it’s time for them to go home, then they send you email saying that if you don’t respond in 48 hours, they will consider the issue resolved.
The HOV is my biggest gripe since the IQ routes is most useful to the solitary commuter who would need to avoid HOV’s. The weekend family vacation traveler can use the HOV’s and would not be likely to worry about time of day traffic profiles. It would be nice if there was a way to view the traffic profiles on the routes, at least without going to Google maps.
Mark/Dave, regarding your traffic question, you’ll get the same data either way as they both use TMC. Unlikely you’ll get any many warnings in Vermont. Traffic reports are pretty much limited to large metro areas. I’ve seen reports in my area of approx. 1 million people once in awhile, but 30 miles northeast or southwest I’ll get traffic reports constantly since those areas are Orlando and Tampa. Exceptions on occasion, but it’s certainly not regularly.
The 930 does have a battery gauge, you just ned to tap the lower part of the screen where the signal strength bars are and you’ll see a screen with the software version and battery charge status. Also there is a preference on on screen/page 3 of “change preferences” for brightness and a selection to change to night mode when dark. It’s a little erratic so I don’t use it but it works. My 930″s speech mode is active as soon as I select navigate to address. There are two selections, one for spoken address dialog and one for spoken address and both are active from the get go.
John, HOV lanes are troublesome for most GPS devices, the road data just isn’t as good as it could be. You can block those segments with MapShare as you indicated and it will ask if you want to share those changes with other users. You would just say no.
Heather I haven’t seen or heard about any changes to the 7100’s touch screen. Traffic between the two will be nearly identical.
Dennis I haven’t seen mine do that.
Dave There is a difference between TomTom Traffic through TomTom PLUS and the RDS-TMC traffic on TomTom devices. RDS-TMC comes from Clear Channel and incorporates traffic data from INRIX plus their own incident data. The PLUS traffic is just the INRIX data. However I know people who have tried both and they say that the data the PLUS service offers appears more complete and comes in faster (perhaps it just downloads a wider range of data).
Mark - Are you asking about the range of the traffic data itself or the broadcast signal availability. You can find the answer to both by consulting the coverage map links on our traffic page.
Vic - you can set a ‘pedestrian’ option on the TomTom devices for walking routes on roads. It will not, however, create “straight line” type routes, it instead follows existing (auto) roads but ignores rules that apply only to cars like one way streets.
John (#116) No offense, but it sounds like you haven’t played around with the device much as nearly all of the things you point out can be done. The 930 does have an auto night mode. You don’t need to “turn on” speech address input, you just select it from the menu. There is a battery life icon, just tap the satellite reception icon from the map. When you are on a call you just tap the phone icon to disconnect. You can find POIs along a route by going to ‘find alternative’ -> ‘travel via’ -> POI -> along route. I’m not sure how you added a roundabout as that is not possible with MapShare. You can only report one might need to be added.
gatorguy - As noted above, PLUS traffic is a little bit different than Clear Channel traffic.
Do TomTom GPS units have the ability to download lake maps that have contour info, etc for use on the water?
Gary, no. But you probably wouldn’t want to on a device like that anyway. It is not waterproof nor water-resistant.
Since I have a commercial van, I can’t take parkways. Can you get routes for commercial vehicles also?
Nick, there is no commercial routing feature on the 930.
Thx,
Do you know of any GPS devices that are as good as the 930T that do have this feature?
There are a few devices that have that feature (some of the older Garmin Nuvi models come to mind) but most of the people I’ve talked with that have used the feature say the data just isn’t good enough to be reliable yet.
Thanks tim.. one more ?
Do IQ routes merely recalculate accurate driving time?
For example, would they reroute me on local roads in rush hour to avoid busy streets possibly or would they just come closer to estimating how long a trip would take?
(In the example you included, the route looks the same, just the time is different.. I wonder if it reroutes you intelligently as well???
Yes, I should have provided a better example where the route is different as well. Yes, it will route based on those time estimates. Keep in mind though that you won’t really get the granularity of “rush hour” times since it doesn’t appear that time is currently considered, just day of week. (At least at this time.)
I read that the screen is not good in bright conditions, what is your take on this?
D
Dotun - I haven’t had any issues with the screen. I primarily keep it set on max brightness, don’t allow auto brightness adjustment for the light conditions, and use the ‘Americas’ color scheme.
Many of you have asked about screen brightness… Here is our comparisons of the Nuvi and TomTom screens, head to head.
Thanks for your recent answer Tim. Is is possible to obtain a different power lead with an antenna suitable for use in Europe?
Roger - May 12th, 2008
Chargers:
http://www.tomtom.com/products/accessories/accessory.php?ID=387
What GPS chipset (on GO 930)?
Do NOT see GO 930 on Tomtom web. Is it discontinued?
Sorry, I found 930 on Tomtom web. But not much details on Specification.
What is the acquisition time for this unit?
Is there a manual I can download?
It seems GO 930 does not support WAAS and EGNOS. How accurate is 930 compare to other GPS devices that support WAAS/EGNOS?
The GPS signal (even without WAAS) is more accurate than the road database is, so WAAS adds nothing to auto GPS devices. Many auto devices that have WAAS ship with it disabled by default because it provides no advantage and will only reduce battery life faster.
Thanks, Tim.
A few days ago, I tried the latest update option to update the maps. Good news and bad news, the good news is now it asks whether or not I want to avoid HOV lanes although it still directed me onto a HOV lane of another freeway after directing me all around the city to that freeway, two freeways over, this morning (to be fair, there was a heavy truck accident with three vehicles on the more direct freeway so going around the city might have been worthwhile but it is a really big city to go around and it would have to have been pretty snarled on at least two freeways before the round about route would make sense). The bad news was that upgrading the map was an adventure and a half.
The download of the new maps took about 45 minutes and then while the maps were being installed, the Macbook got progressively slower till it became useless, I left it for about six hours in hopes that the installation would complete but it never did, so I wound up having to reboot the MacBook hence interrupting the installation. This resulted in a TomTom that defaulted to the European map and would not connect to the MacBook nor would it allow for the selection of a North America map. Placed call in to customer service, they instructed me to flash the TomTom but the flash utility could not see the TomTom from the Mac, tried a WinXP notebook and the utility for Windows flashed the TomTom but it still did not accept the NA map. Found that by waiting for the “connect to computer” message and then moving the USB cable to the Mac, I could get it to connect to the Mac, flashed it there, same results. Restored from backup on the Mac, TomTom then hangs on splash page. Tried soft resets many times, no change. Customer Service arranges for RMA and ends the call. Since it would be weeks before I could get it back, I continued playing with the TomTom, managed to get it to connect to the Mac again by a combination of connecting to the WinXP machine, moving cables and flashing but no amount of restoring backups again helped. Finally I noticed that I still had the new map in the items on my computer selection so I selected add to begin another map installation, that brought the TomTom back to life. Seems a bit flaky still, at one point it would reboot whenever I tried to route from the neighborhood Kroger’s to home and at another point, it would reboot if I missed a turn, I re-installed the map yet again and it’s only rebooted once since then.
The switch to night mode on the light sensor seems to always think it should be night.
I’ve sent email suggesting that the RMA be canceled for now, and hopefully the TomTom will settle down a bit. I’ll probably use a rsync trick on the Mac to keep multiple backups without using up too much disk space.
The screen is a little washed out during the day but if you mount it high on the windshield close to the rear view mirror, the mirror shades it enough for you to see the screen. The FM transmitter is a good idea but it’s difficult to find a channel that works well without interference and the interface makes changing channels while under way dangerous. I finally found a channel that only has a few static spots around town but it’s not a free channel as there’s a weak country music station on it that you can hear when you turn the TomTom off.
So far it has taken me on a couple of good shortcuts during the afternoon rush hour and one really long shortcut during the morning rush hour so I guess it must be doing something to help cut the trip times and that’s what really counts.
i was wondering if any one knows does the 930 tom tom turn on when you start your car . what is better out of the two 930 tom tom or garmen 780.
I can’t get computer voices to work no 730. I have downloaded & installed them, tried every option in the TomTom but no luck. The pc software takes a long time to connect to the internet & uses a lot of cpu.
Try going to “Items on your computer” in TomTom home, selecting the voice s you want and clicking add to download them into the TomTom, then disconnect the TomTom, go to change preferences, change voice and select the voice that you want. I find that sometimes when you download through TomTom home, it just winds up on the computer, not on the TomTom, also for some reason, making the selection via “Operate my Go” from TomTom home just results in a “The voice you have selected can not be used” message on the TomTom when it boots.
Yes, sounds like the TomTom home interface isn’t well designed, especially when you consider that the “Items on your Computer” page won’t indicate if the item exists on your TomTom but the add voices page will yet it’s that “Items on your Computer” page where you need to download it to your TomTom.
Well, with the new maps, the TomTom does ask if I want to avoid the HOV lanes when it first plans a route but if it ever recalculates the route such as when it updates it’s traffic information or when I select a low price gas station as a waypoint from fuel prices, it recalaculates using the HOV lanes. At one point it had directed me to the I10 HOV entrance so I manually recalculated the route then as I was driving off, the directions suddenly changed to direct me back to the very same HOV entrance simply because there was a traffic update. Very annoying.
Is there a limit on the size of the SD card that the unit supports? How is the audio quality of the MP3 player? Is there a fairly simple way of hard-wiring the unit to the battery and the head unit to minimize the visible wires in the car? I’m trying to find a solution to prevent replacing my Bose head unit while gaining hands-free calling, MP3 capability, and GPS navigation with one device to limit clutter without sacrificing audio quality or features.
I personally think that this new Tomtom is way crap.
:O And when i press “E2″ for my answer it asks for street name now that is weird.. When you press postcode it should as for postcode and house number thats it lol but this asking for Street name then city? i didn’t press Address i pressed Postcode 
That’s the whole problem.
When you go to Navigate To -> PostCode -> Enter your post code like e2 6nw the result is “E2″ that’s it.. and there are other results like Ethran Road for Postcode :O even Epringam some city :S for a postcode result??
I was told that GO 930 needs reboot very often. Is it true?
I don’t believe mine has ever rebooted itself.
My 930 has rebooted several times. The first time it started doing this was when I asked it to route from the neighbourhood Krogers to home. It would reboot whenever I asked for that route though it had no problems with other routes. I downloaded the maps again and it stopped rebooting when I asked for that particular route though I would eventually encounter another situation that would trigger a reboot.
The most recent reboot was when I didn’t follow it’s instructions to enter an HOV (yes I answered yes to the do you wish to avoid HOV question) and it rebooted while rerouting.
I think that it doesn’t handle corrupted data on it’s hard drive / flash drive or whatever it has for secondary storage. As their OS is Linux, the OS will expect the disk to be reliable unless the RAID feature is used. They probably could RAID their storage to be more resilient with bad blocks so hopefully they will be able to have a fix for it in the future. I suspect that the longer you go between refreshing your maps and or refreshing your application, the more likely it will reboot. Near as I can tell, there are three major components to the software, the flash which you can download a utility to refresh, the application and the maps which you can reload from TomTom home.
As Tim said above mine has never rebooted. I’ve had it for a month now and have been very happy with it.
Just to be clear, there is more than one John on this board and my 930 does reboot but it appears to be tied into when it’s routing and or re-routing plus where and how frequently it reboots changes if the maps are refreshed. My 930 is about a week old, first reboot was when it was two days old. Admittedly, I was putting it through it’s paces and had already had to completely re-image it and restore from backup.
It is horrible terrible when you flying on freeway and your navigator got freeze. I have a Navman, occasionally it freeze or send me to a different address miles away from the address I set. I hate those unreliable devices.
Yesterday, on the trip home, aside from the now common problem of the TT930 trying to route me onto HOV lanes (yes I have been blocking the entrances as I come across them but there’s a lot of both HOV’s and HOV entrances around here and yes I am answering “yes: to the “avoid HOV lanes” question which appears if you have the new map but apparently that selection doesn’t apply to automatic route recalculations), and aside from the occasional reboot which I’ve seem to be able to bring to a minimum by reloading the maps when it starts happening (hopefully we’ll run out of bad blocks in the flash drive some day); I’ve now come across a new problem.
When using the TT930 for hands free calls, not only is the volume way too low (barely audible) but the audio system tends to hang at various points, sometimes resulting in a repeated sound, the only way out seems to be to press the power button and hope it can power off (I’m not about to look for a paper clip for a proper reset while driving). At one point, after powering off and back on, it would play music but not speak any instructions (hands free mode disables the instructions for the duration of the call so somehow that feature persisted across a power cycle). Again the only way out was to press the power button. The hands free needs to be much more reliable, especially since my cell phone can only bind to one bluetooth device at a time, there should be separate volume controls for the hands free, music and instructions and there should be the option of still having the spoken instructions during a hands free call.
As I’ve said before, I bought this for the IQ routes and aside from constantly routing me to HOV lanes, the IQ routes and live traffic appears to be effective enough for me to keep the TT930 but it’s clear that the developers did not understand structured programming and this has resulted in an inconsistent and unreliable interface.
I do like the fact that it’s running Linux, perhaps someday in the future, we can replace the TT application with an open source version and I may be able to map out the bad blocks with the Linux badblocks command from a Linux PC.
The TT930 also failed to download the phone book from my phone, it says it did, but the phonebook icon is still grayed out, it should at least allow you to manually make phonebook entries which it doesn’t. This means that using POI’s or favourites as a phonebook is about the only alternative to entering numbers while driving.
As poorly designed as the TT930’s user interface is, it is more usable than those of the GPS systems offered with car rentals but that’s not saying much.
“As poorly designed as the TT930’s user interface is, it is more usable than those of the GPS systems offered with car rentals but that’s not saying much.”
I don’t think its poorly designed, i certainly think its one of the best out there.
The more you read the reviews, the more you feel GO 930 is a buggy device.
Any time I said something bad about GO 930, the message got filtered out.
“I don’t think its poorly designed, i certainly think its one of the best out there.”
Not really.
I’ve owned 3 TTs now. Initially I was more interested in a Garmin 760 but I received a TT 720 as a gift and got hooked on them. The 720 is gone but my wife and I use a 920 and 930. We love them both. In playing around with a friend”s Garmin and with units in the stores the only thing they have that would have interested me is a brighter screen. All of these have issues and features that will be of varying significance to different people. As for me I see why they’re the leading unit in Europe and have done so well here as well.
Wong - the only time we “filter” messages is if they violate our published comment policy or contain copyrighted information.
Well I’m back from my 1 month European trip and I can report that overall the 930 worked great. There were only a few times it messed up, and all but one time did that have anything to do with guiding me to the right place. These few problems were as follows:
It rebooted 2 to 3 times during the whole month and on about 4 different occasions it took a long time to find a signal when first booting up in the morning. Other than that, it worked great in every way that you want a GPS unit to work, with one exception (I think). The next to last day of usage I was travelling in the Alsace region of France, going from one beautiful small town to another along the back roads and wine roads. This one time it actually took me through a winery dirt road to get to the next town, even though there was a paved road that was available. Actually I was impressed it even had those dirt roads mapped at all, and it provided us all with kind of a highlight if the day’s adventures as we negotiated the roads with essentially a 4 door Opel station wagon.
All in all though I highly recommend this unit. The lane guidance was impressive and the maps were mostly flawless, as was the recalculation times when needed. I got used to the occasionally washed out screen and feel that for the bucks, considering all the features and European maps included, it was a bargain.
I do have a question though about the new maps that are being promoted. Even though this 930 unit is only about 4 weeks old do I really have to pay an additional $150 to upgrade the maps or am I missing something about this?
Hope this helps anyone on the fence about this unit. There is no perfect gps, they all come with compromises. I think this one has the right stuff for now, at least it has as far as how it works in Europe.
BTW, for reference, I used this about 23 out of 26 days on this trip, covering lots of miles over The Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, Italy and France. I definitely put it through the paces.
Cheers,
-Dave
To get computer voices (TTS) to work, follow this tutorial:
Enable Text-to-Speech: TomTom or Garmin
Dave I think the map update is $130, they release map updates every couple of months, so you will always feel a bit behind when the next one comes out. Most people will generally update every 12-18 months or so.
Came across an interesting issue that’s probably not limited to the TomTom. There was an accident on the 290 this morning and traffic was backing up behind the accident. i could see this on Transtar before I left for work and was pleased when the TT930 routed around the backed up section and the accident. While driving on the route around the trouble-spot, it recalculated a route which took the nearest route directly back to the section of backed up traffic. Naturally, I was skeptical so I selected view traffic along route and sure enough, the heavy traffic section had gone white indicating no data. The Transtar traffic sensors work by reading toll tags and calculating the speeds from two readings hence if the traffic is slower than a certain thresh-point, no traffic is registered. The consequence is that although the TT routes around heavy traffic, it will happily route you directly into stopped traffic…
I’ve seen similar things happen before John, and you are right it isn’t unique to TomTom. Even “crowd-sourcing” type traffic data can run into issues where if traffic is light and someone stops to change a flat it can sometimes indicate traffic.
It would seem to me that the problem with traffic sensors reporting no data when the traffic is at a standstill and erroneously reporting heavy traffic during light traffic if someone stops to fix a flat can be addressed with some simple heuristics i.e.: correlation with proximity of traffic incidents, correlation with traffic levels of neighboring sections and comparison versus IQ routes statistical data.
It’s a pity that the TT930 doesn’t do that. Then again, looks like no one else does either…
Yeah, and keep in mind too (and for those others reading) that TomTom, Garmin, Magellan etc are not– as of now, actually doing any of the data collection or distribution. They are merely receiving the data collected and interpreted by other agencies. That is why you can see TomTom and Garmin make the exact same mistakes, and report the exact same traffic as one another– they are using the same source for traffic data.
I live in the uk on a recent visit to Seattle i purchased a tt930 seemed to be a good product and worked fine in US .The reason for buying in US was 1 price and 2 western euopean maps .on my return to uk i tried through tomtom home to upgade maps under the map garantee . tomtom would only allow upgrade of US maps after a phone call to tt and email showing proof of purchase they gave me the upgrade for europe .
ASR would only work on US maps not europe this has always been the case even before upgrade of maps . TT have been informed but after 10 days no responce from them .
On the 9th june application software 8.10 was downloaded from tt now i have no asr on any maps
I have tried the motorcycle Garman, Tom Tom 910,920 & 930 all of which the screen data washes out in sunlight. All of their new features are useless if you can’t see it. Fiddling with the unit in heavy traffic with the sun in your eyes & trying to get the screen in the shade to eliminate the screen data wash-out is just as much of a safety hazzard as dialing a cell phone or changing a baby’s diaper. When will Tom Tom & others make a screen that is truly sunlight visible instead of selling gimics such as the nonglair screen on the 930 Tom Tom? Do you know of a unit that the screen data is actually sun light visible? I appreciate all your your valuable info along with that of others.
For the 930T, is is possible to obtain a different power lead with an antenna for a USA sourced unit ( a relation in California wants to give me one for a present) so that I can use the unit in Europe and take advantage of traffic braodcasts?
TomTom does sell different power adapters on their website. The traffic receiver is physically different for the USA and Europe markets, and thus you would need to purchase a second traffic receiver for that market.
I used my 930 for the first time yesterday and notice that the volume through the FM transmitter is much lower than that of the other FM stations. I have to turn the volume on the radio twice as loud as regular stations. I have the TT volume set at 100%. Is there some other way of increasing the volume?
If you think the FM transmitter volume is low, wait until a call comes in over the bluetooth handsfree. Not only is it barely audible but no amount of volume increase on your radio or on the TomTom will be enough. The volume problem is also with the other end in that they can barely hear you as well.
Met another TomTom owner today, his is just as bad on the handsfree. To top that off, if you switch to speakerphone on your cell phone to detach from the handsfree (a trick that works with the bluetooth headsets), it only disconnects for a few seconds before the TomTom takes control again. It’s too dangerous to fumble with either your phone or TomTom control to disable the bluetooth during the call and most phones don’t pair with more than one active device at a time so your options are limited. I tried pairing the TomTom to my NX6000 headset as a HiFi device but it fails to recognize the NX6000 as a headset, the TomTom thinks it’s a phone… This is very annoying and may require two cell phones, one for the TomTom’s traffic service and one for a parrot or headset so you can actually answer calls. Also the TomTom can’t seem to download my phonebook from my phone, since the TomTom has no way for me to make phonebook entries manually, I have to use a POI category as a phonebook. The TomTom home “Operate my Go” also just stopped working, it was fine last week and now it says that the TomTom doesn’t support that feature.
Uuugghhh…
It’s still trying to guide me to the HOV lanes, it seems to find ways to enter the HOV as quickly as I can block them with mapshare… I’m switching to a new approach, rather than block the HOV entrances, I’m blocking the long stretches of the HOV lanes themselves. Then again, maybe it’s just ignoring the blocks like it ignores the avoid HOV selection.
Paul, that is somewhat common for FM transmitters. I typically have to do the same in my vehicle with FM transmitters.
Hello,
Question….how to notice a differences between US antenna and EU antenna? Is it possible to see it ?
Arthur - I’m not certain, sorry. I know they look very similar, and the product number (often taped to the device in the packaging) is different, but having never held the European receiver I don’t know how to tell the difference.
I have a TomTom ONE 3rd Edition. Its good, but I’m looking for more capabilities, and considering the 930. I’ve learned more about the 930 here than even at TomTom’s web site. I have some questions that I’m not sure that I’ve seen answered:
1) The TomTom ONE 3rd Edition allows me to create a route by specifying the start and end, and while not entirely straightforward, I can create one “via” point in between.
Did someone mention that the 930 has the ability to create a route, starting at an arbitrary location (someplace other than the current location), to some other arbitrary destination, and to create multiple stop points (waypoints?) in between?
Home many in between locations can be specified? I’m not interested in whether it can automatically reorder the in between locations for the most optimal route.
2) I have a TomTom ONE 3rd Edition, and the other day when I turned it on after having it connected to my computer to update voices, etc, it displayed a brief message “Track logging is disabled”, but I cannot find any menu item that allows me to enable or disable track logging.
Is there a track log feature in the 930 that will log the current location every second or so? Can this track be displayed on the map screen either as you go, or later on? Is there a limit to the amount of points that it will record?
The Garmin 760 has a limited track log that is displayed on the screen, but it has a limit of 10000 points, and it seems to “lock” onto the nearest road and record a modified location, rather than record the actual location.
I’d like to have it log my real location for several weeks, and then download the log later in order to tag my photos that I took at the time with their locations.
3) How much free space is available on the internal flash memory? The specs say it has 4 GB, but how much is free and how much is used by the GPS software?
4) Will the 930 accept the 4 GB SD cards? Is sounds as though earlier models will only accept up to the 2 GB size, and will not accept the SD HC cards (starting at 4 GB).
1) 48 (listed in the specs above) waypoints in one route. No auto re-ordering.
2) I’ve never heard of that message, are you certain that is exactly what it said? There is no tracklogger on the ONE 3rd Edition nor the 930.
3) 190 MB (listed in the specs above).
4) Yes.
1, 3, 4) Thanks. 190 MB is not a log of free space, but at least you can use the SD card for more space, and at least all the US and Europe maps are included in the base memory already.
2) Yes, quite certain. But I’ve been unable to find it since then, and it did not last long on the screen. If I remember correctly, it was a small black message box in the upper right part of the screen on startup. I’ve been playing around with the raw track log capability hidden in the undocumented diagnostics screens on the earlier versions of the Garmin firmware, and was searching to see if there was such as thing for the TomTom as well. When I saw this message on my TomTom, I immediately did a google search, but didn’t find any hits. Eventually I came across your site here, hoping you might have some track log info.
The Garmins also have the official track log capability, although it is somewhat limited (10000 points). Although not perfect, it is nice to have even this limited capability, and if the 930 doesn’t even have this limited capability, I’m hoping that someone has written a plugin for the TomTom that can provide it.
Dan, there are reportedly some third party programs that can be installed on some TomTom devices to provide tracklog capability, but I haven’t used any. But people in our TomTom forums might be able to help.
1) I see the specs now, where it shows 48 waypoints/route. But I also see 50 waypoints in the specs too. What is the difference between waypoints (50), and waypoints/route (48)?
2) Great. Thanks for your help. I’ll check the Forums. You have enormous patience with all the crazy questions and comments that we post.
I wish I could figure out what I did to cause the message about track logging.
Waypoints (50) Refers to the number of “favorites” that can be stored on the device.
OK. Great, thanks again. I’m off to the forums.
Can I route a phone call through the fm transmitter so I can hear it on my car speakers? I have not been able to do it so far it works only for music and navigation instructions. Please tell me how to proceed. Thanks.
No, phone calls go through the internal speaker on the 930 only.
One think that bothers me about routing in general (not just TomTom) is that they will try to route you through a gated comunnities. This new MapShare feature on the TOmToms seem to address that.
I live in the Phoenix area of Arizona. Strong sun & hi temps. Been 15 + days of 105+ temps. Temps inside vehicles often reach 150+ in the summer. I’ve had 2 TomTom 510’s batteries give up. One replaced under warr. Second was my dime so I tried a Magellan Maestro 4250 & now it’s battery is gone too. First I thought it was the 510’s problem but now I’m convinced that the problem is the heat here. I can’t, however find documentation or get answers from the support centers on the environmental limitations. Any insights there. Security sometimes dictates removing it but others times it’s a pain.
From the manual for the 930:
Does the TomTom 930 have trip statistics like
average speed, maximum speed, stop time and distance. Also does it display elevation?
No, however It think there are some third party programs that can be installed which provide that.
I have been thinking of buying the 930 and really looked forward to the hands free calling, but after reading all the trouble everyone is having im leary. My question is has anyone tried using the audio connect cable to hook directly to the radio or hooking the GPS to another FM transducer to solve the problem of not being able to hear calls? The cable is available through tomtom’s website.
No matter what the audio configuration is, hands-free calls will always be routed through the internal speaker on the GPS.
I just got a TT930. I will recharge it through the computer cradle conection. How long does it take for a full charge? How long does the car charger UBS cord take? Should I recharge at home after every use, or should I let the battery run down between charges? Should I keep it connected and charged all the time in the computer cradle or cigarette lighter?
It takes longer to charge over USB than through an AC or DC charger. I recharge after every use. I don’t keep it connected all of the time.
Thanks, Tim. How long does a full charge take with a slower computer UBS connection. The owner’s manual doesn’t specify if it’s 2 hours or 24 hours.
About twice as long as it will take to charge via AC or DC power. AC and DC chargers will typically charge the device in about the same time as the battery life itself is.
I installed a 930T today and took it for a ride. Lots of great features but too many bugs and poor designs. I hope TomTom fixes them all soon in software updates. Here are some issues I found today.
Similar to what others have said, the 930T needs a way to terminate a hands free call with one tap, or at most two taps in the same spot, so you can keep your eyes on the road when, for example, you reach an answering machine and do not want to leave a message. This is the one flaw that is egregious enough to have me considering returning the unit.
Speech input can be used only to say the names of cities and streets. The GO will list a few interpretations of what you said, each with a number before it. I was able to confirm my choice by tapping it, by speaking its number, or by saying “Yes” to confirm choice #1. I don’t know whether I discovered undocumented ways to confirm by voice or whether it was a coincidence that the TomTom did what it wanted it to do. I wonder if it understands “None of the above” or “Back”.
My Motorola headset simply passes my voice through Bluetooth to the Blackberry’s voice dialer. The 930T makes me look at the screen and tap it to place calls. It would be great if I could configure it to let me access the Blackberry’s voice dialer instead.
I love the idea of Map Share as a community way to share map corrections with other GPS users. But when I submitted a roadblock along an itinerary that I had already driven, an attempt to replan that itinerary yielded “no route”. Even after I submitted a removal of the roadblock, the same thing occurred. A bug.
I planned a trip and wanted to save it as an itinerary for later quick reuse, but could not find an obvious way to do that. Nor could I find an obvious way to save places along the route as favorites.
When I tried to create an itinerary called “Home to Work” (a name I didn’t realize was in use by the system), the 930T froze and restarted itself. A bug.
There are wires all over my dashboard due to the car charger and the FM antenna. To remove the unit from the dashboard, I have to unplug two cords. Well, that’s what comes with portability.
As others have said, there should be separate volume controls for GPS directions and hands-free phone calls.
Sometimes, the 930T connects to my telephone automatically when I turn it on, sometimes it does not. I can’t predict it. I wish there were a Preference of “Connect”, “Don’t connect”, and “Ask me whether to connect” when one registered phone was detected at startup, and a choice whenever multiple registered phones were detected.
The Mac version of TomTom HOME does not seem to support either “Operate my GO” or any way to create an initial 4-digit password to enter when the unit powers om.
TomTom HOME sometimes freezes. I think it is when I am trying to do something with HOME at the same time that the 930T is ponderously connecting to the computer.
The PhoneBook can only be downloaded from the phone, not uploaded, edited or deleted. (If I weren’t wary of unintended consequences, I might try to edit the contacts.txt file on the Mac using TextEdit.)
Larry, most of the issues you raised seem to be just a matter of not finding all of the functions yet. You can end a hands free call with a double tap in the top left corner. The first tap hits the green phone number and the second tap hits the red ‘end call’ button. Exactly as you said you would like.
Speech input can be used for the entire address input process, including selecting numbers from the list as well as saying things like ‘Done’ at the end. You can setup an entire address with one tap and then speaking the rest with our tips. See the section on that page titled ‘Voice Prompt Tips’.
If you got a ‘No Route’ error after making a MapShare correction, then you must have trapped yourself onto a street which now had no exit.
You can save an Itinerary by clicking ‘Options’ -> Save Itinerary.
I’m not sure how you tried to name an Itinerary “Home to Work” when you said you couldn’t figure out how to save an Itinerary, but I was able to save an Itinerary with that name without any trouble.
The Mac TomTom home’s Operate my Go worked for about four weeks, now it claims that the TT930 does not support Operate my Go. I’ve found references on the net to removing certain files from the Windows version of TomTom home in order to force another download to the TT930 but nothing on the Mac equivalent. Haven’t cleared enough time on my schedule to hang on the phone with support for a couple of hours just to sort this out yet. Does seem odd that if there was some code that needed downloading to the TT930, that they don’t have it managed by the “On My Computer” selection.
There’s no antenna cord with my TT930, it gets it’s traffic info via GPRS through the bluetooth connection to my phone. Lately, it’s been saying connection failed the first time I try it after powering up but works with the second try.
It seems strange that the handsfree phone feature doesn’t pipe the sound via the same pathways as everything else. The internal speaker is barely audible in this mode. It would be better if there was a feature where the TomTom could pair with existing headsets or handsfree solutions and just pass the handfree through to the third party equipment that we already have for this purpose. I’ve tried pairing the TT930 with my Gennum NX6000 and the TT doesn’t recognize it as a headset, the TT thinks it’s a phone. Haven’t tried with my Parrot yet but then again I’ve lost the manual for it and the TT930 is using the cigarette lighter port that I had the Parrot plugged into.
My phonebook still won’t download to the TT930, it says it’s doing it but the phone just reboots.
I think that the FM transmitter needs an easier way to change frequencies. Currently, you have to type in the new frequency which means diverting your attention away from the road. It should be able to just move to the next unused frequency or be nudged up or down like most car stereos. It asks if you want to save the frequency that you’ve selected but I haven’t found a way to select on e of the saved frequencies (kinda as useful as write only memory).
I’ve just taken the TT930 on a trip to Canada to use with the rental cars. The traffic feature is pretty much useless up there, as is the speed camera subscription and the fuel price subscription. Pity, it’s when you’re abroad that the latter two features are most needed.
The TT930 seems to be a good idea and it is usable to some extent but it’s clearly inconsistent in the quality and design of it’s code. If there’s some improvements with code updates then fine but otherwise… I wonder if people are having similar issues with TomTom’s competitors…
Tim,
Thanks for addressing my issues and for the link to Voice Prompt Tips. I won’t have to return the device.
By “green phone number” I think you mean “green phone icon”. I looked for such an icon yesterday and didn’t see it. Today I see it. My bad.
I isolated the “No Route” problem to a segment of a certain street that Map Corrections shows as unblocked but that the route planner won’t use in the eastbound direction. This may have been a problem in the map when I got it or I may have done something to cause it, but whatever the cause, I can’t undo it. The reason I saw “No Route” for a while is because I added turn restrictions to another intersection such that the same street could not be entered in the westbound direction either. I have since removed the turn restrictions so I don’t see “No Route” any more but it’s sending me on an unnavigable route.
I can use the Itinerary feature (as long as I don’t name it “Home to Work”; not sure why you could). What I meant was that if I have planned a trip using Prepare Route or Navigate To–and perhaps edited the route to avoid certain roads–I haven’t found a way to convert that route to an Itinerary without reentering it one waypoint at a time within the Itinerary function.
On the positive side, I do not have a problem with low volume when using the hands-free phone function. The ring is actually too loud. The voice is a little louder than the GPS voice. Maybe it is dependent on the phone. I use a Blackberry 8800.
I also have discovered that if you invoke “Get numbers from Phone”, it erases the current Phone Book (which might have come from a different phone) and loads all of the numbers from the currently connected phone. (For techies: It uses a protocol called SyncML but only that protocol’s “one-way” sync command.)
Yes, green phone icon, sorry.
I am just looking at voice activated units and trying to compare the new Garmin NUVI 880 to the Tom Tom 930. I am also very interested in Bluetooth hands free calling. In one of the comments above, it seems that the speaker volume for hands free calling is low. When I looked at the Tom Tom 930 in a store, the speaker volume seemed very acceptable on the unit, but I did not do it with my bluetooth compatible phone. Can anyone comment on the speaker volume for hands free calling and I would appreciate any comments comparing the NUVI 880 to the Tom Tom 930 before I purchase one of these units.
Thank you.
The Hands free volume and the system volume are pretty near identical in my experience. One drawback that exists is that hands free calling can’t be routed through the FM transmitter to the car stereo like other audio from the device can be. So that is an issue for some people. But if you find the volume of the device itself acceptable I think you will find the volume of hands free calling acceptable. It won’t however, be quite as clear as the “native” sounds.
Thanks, Tim: Do you have comments on comparing the NUVI 880 to the Tom Tom 930 (aside from the big price difference)?
In terms of the voice recognition functionality– The Garmin wins there. You can pretty much operate the entire device by voice where the TomTom’s system is limited to address entry.
Tim: Thanks for your answers. So may I ask you or are there some restrictions on your answerting this question–Garmin NUVI 880 or Tom Tom 930????? Which would you get? Thanks.
Your needs/desired functions in a GPS device are likely to be different than what my needs are, which is why I don’t answer generic “which is best?” type questions. I’m happy to listen to what someone is looking for, and let them know which device I think will be best for them, but my own navigation needs and feature desires shouldn’t impact your decision.
Based on what you’ve mentioned so far– voice recognition and Bluetooth, I’d go with the Nuvi 880 as Bluetooth calls can be routed over the FM transmitter and it has a more complete voice recognition system.
Tim: Thanks. Appreciate your understanding of what I am specificallly looking for.
I said above: “I also have discovered that if you invoke ‘Get numbers from Phone’, it erases the current Phone Book (which might have come from a different phone) and loads all of the numbers from the currently connected phone.” True. But here is a way to fill the Phone Book with numbers from more than one phone.
Note: Back up your TomTom first using TomTom HOME.
Note: This worked for me on a Mac. There are numerous ways that your situation may differ. This may not work for you, or could conceivably cause problems, especially if my instructions have errors or are unclear, or if you don’t follow them carefully.
(1) Connect GO to phone A. “Get numbers from phone.”
(2) Without launching TomTom HOME, connect GO to a computer. After a minute or two, it will be fully connected. If TomTom HOME launched automatically, quit it.
(3) On Mac, open a Finder window; on Windows, open My Computer.
(4) Open the TomTom folder. Open the Contacts folder.
(5) Copy contacts.txt to a folder on your hard disk. Rename the computer’s copy of contacts.txt “PhoneA.txt” or whatever.
(6) Repeat step (3). Select and eject the TomTom. Disconnect it from the USB cable or the dock. Reconnect it.
(7) Repeat steps (1-6) but in steps (1) and (5) change “A” to “B”.
(8) Using NotePad (Windows) or TextEdit (Mac), or some other “plain text” editor, use copy and paste to merge the PhoneA.txt and PhoneB.txt files into a new file on your hard disk called “contacts.txt”.
(9) Be sure TomTom HOME isn’t running. Copy the merged contacts.txt from your hard disk to the TomTom “Contacts” folder, replacing the one that was there.
(10) Repeat step (3). Select and eject the TomTom. Disconnect it from the USB cable or the dock.
(11) Check to be sure all the numbers from both phones are now in your GO phone book.
You may want to keep the three txt files on your hard disk as extra backups.
(1) I used the TomTom to get to a store today five minutes before it closed, and then to another store that I hadn’t been to before. The 930T was easy to use and got me to both places quickly and safely. It’s a keeper.
(2) I said above, “There are wires all over my dashboard due to the car charger and the FM antenna. To remove the unit from the dashboard, I have to unplug two cords.”
I found a better way to route the cables and it doesn’t look as dorky now.
I used a Rip Tie (Velcro tape) to make an inch-diameter loop near the USB end of the charger cable and placed the loop around the windshield mount arm so the cord can’t escape. I used another Rip Tie to secure the FM antenna cord to the charger cord near their respective connectors.
(3) I said, “Sometimes, the 930T connects to my telephone automatically when I turn it on, sometimes it does not. I can’t predict it.”
Here’s what is happening: If either my Bluetooth headset is on and serving as a hands-free for my phone, or my wife’s phone is nearby and not connected to any hands-free device, the GO can not connect to my phone. Doh.
(4) I said: “The Mac version of TomTom HOME does not seem to support either ‘Operate my GO’ or any way to create an initial 4-digit password to enter when the unit powers on.”
Borrow a Windows machine for fifteen minutes and set the password there. Any USB cable with the correct size connectors will do. I didn’t even need the software CD. The GO had a copy of TomTom HOME in its internal memory and Windows installed it from there.
(5) I said, “TomTom HOME sometimes freezes.”
I have experienced no freezes since the first few hours of use.
There’s a point of interest in my 930T that is listed as a place “near you” but is not listed as a place in the city in which it is located. It’s unlisted there whether I use Find or simply scroll the long list.
Consequently, I can’t navigate to that POI until I am already there, unless I know its address.
Has anyone else seen this happen?
Thinking it was not listed, I reported it as a map correction. I hope Map Share figures out that it’s a duplicate.
Larry, what was the name and address of the POI?
ok, I am debating between Garmin Nuvi 760 and TomTom Go 930. Does nuvi transmit phone calls through FM to speakers? What are the major advantages of one over the other? I read carefully both product reviews and am lost now. This is my 1st GPS and would like to make the right choice. Which one I can customize more? Any help would be great!
The Nuvi can broadcast Bluetooth via FM. The TomTom is much more customizable.
Active Lane Guidance (ALG) as I understood has 2 parts: the lower left graphics showing lanes and the big static intersection image. Does it still work properly and show the small lower left graphics even if the static image is not available for many intersectons? If it does, then that’s perfect. I don’t like static image in a moving car
Thx.
JohnM - The turn arrow in the lower left corner will often show simple lane information– like the highway splits and you want the right side. But as far as the images with many lanes depicting where they go, medians, which way you want, etc, that will only show (as near as I can tell) at intersections where the static images show.
Thanks Tim for verifying my ALG question. But then how did you get the 2nd screen shot in the ALG review section above, with multiple lanes, 2 white lanes and image of the road with the car???
The static intersection image only appears just before the turn for a few seconds. In other words if your next turn has ALG and that turn isn’t for another five miles, they don’t show the static image the entire time. You still get the moving map (with lane info in the lower corner) until you get close to the turn, then the static image appears.
Just got my 930 so maybe I will find them later, but at this time I cannot find the maps of Europe. How do I find them?
Menu -> Change Preferences -> (next) -> Manage Maps -> Switch Map -> Western and Central Europe 2GB
Hi there,
Great support stuff!! Congrats. I am on the verge of upgrading from the GO910 to the GO930 but I understand from some web sources that the GO 930 has been discontinued. Can you confirm and will it still be a wise investment if this were true?
Keep the light shining!!
The 930 has not been discontinued.
Thanks!!
I am intrested in future write-ups on GPS devices.
Tim (re posts #207-208),
The POI was Peninsula Building Materials in Redwood City, CA. When I am near it and ask for POI’s “near you” it appears. When I am elsewhere and ask for POI’s in Redwood City, CA, it does not appear.
I submitted it as a MapShare correction before I realized it was actually there.
Hmmm. When I specify Redwood City and then enter only “Peninsula”, 24 POI’s appear (some of which re duplicates), none of which is Peninsula Building Materials.
But when I enter “Peninsula Building”, Peninsula Building Materials does show up.
It would be helpful if:
(a) Duplicates were suppressed.
and
(b) When the number of matches shown reached the limit (24?), the user was told (e.g., via a 25th entry called “Please be more specific”, which returns you to the text entry screen).
Hi Tim,
Great review site you have. Thanks!
I desperately need a GPS device that can help me plan multiple routes (ala Mapquest or Google Maps style”) in advance of a trip. After extensive shopping, it seems that only the TomTom 920 or 930 series can do that. Garmin does not seem to have this feature, even at the high end. Is that correct? Please confirm.
Re: the TT930, I have read many reviews that complain about its display quality (i.e. not readable in bright light). That seems to be a fatal flaw of the product. Do you agree? If so, is there a fix?
Liz - You can plan routes in advance like that on the Garmin Nuvi 700, 800, and 5000 series devices.
Regarding the screen– there isn’t a screen on the market today that is visible in direct bright sunlight. They will all wash-out. Some of the Nuvi models to have a brighter screen than the TomTom, but it isn’t necessarily a better quality screen. You can read more about this on our Screen Brightness page. There is also a good forum thread called TomTom screens really that bad? you can check out.
Hi Tim,
Thanks for the speedy response. The links you provided are very helpful.
Just a couple more follow up questions:
1. Still on Routing (which I consider to be the most important feature), on any of the models you cited to have multiple routing advanced planning capabilities, can you a) save the routes for later use, and b) review the route in advance and make modifications (like use this street instead of that street, etc.)?
2. Re: the TT930, I have also seen a few reviews about map accuracy. Is that a common issue in your view on TT products in general?
Thanks again for your great help.
1) All of those citied can do those things.
2) A couple of years ago it was an issue, no longer today. With that said, you will find map errors from time to time, but I hear from just as many people with complaints about either of the major map suppliers.
Can I store pictures and music on the SD card in my 930? If so, how do I go about this?
Yes, you can. Put in the SD card, connect to TomTom HOME, and have HOME add them to your device.
Hi Tim,
Went to the store today and played with both the TomTom 930 and the Nuvi780. Frankly, I detected very little difference in the display. I used the TT930 to plan multiple routes. The UI was fine. I had no issues.
Now I’m down to deciding between the 930 vs the 930T. Tim, do you have any advice? My understanding is that the 930T comes with the accessories needed for receiving real time traffic information. But given that Googlemaps on my Blackberry can give me traffic information anyway, why would I need the -T model? Plus, the subscription to a traffic service is another $60 per year. Couldn’t I just use Googlemaps to check traffic before leaving for the trip? I plan on using this unit primarily for road trip vacations, not for daily commute. Do you think my reasoning is sound?
The traffic receiver includes the first year of service. The advantage is that it is integrated into the device, and is constantly updating the traffic conditions and ETA. It might not be worth the cost of convenience for you.
Will the 930 work with an SD card larger than 2 gigs? I understand that some different machines will only support 1 or 2 gig cards.
Joel, see my post (currently third from the last) in this thread.
Hi Tim - awesome site. Appreciate your professional approach and neutrality.
Re comments 167 & 170 above.
1) Can you please clarify: The 930 has separate power & traffic cords/adaptors and each of these have NA & EU variants. Correct?
2) The same TT subscription works in NA or EU as long as you have the correct hardware bits. Yes?
3) What about Asia (specifically JP)?
And longer term… do you see TomTom moving in the direction of Dash in terms of connectivity?
1) Correct.
2) No, I don’t believe so. In North America the RDS-TMC traffic subscription is technically through Clear Channel. In many places in Europe no subscription is necessary (it is free).
3) There are not any I’m aware of that are compatible with TomTom.
Hard to say regarding connectivity. I’m sure it will eventually go that way… just don’t know how soon.
I’m suspecting that something is going on with the 930T - Amazon doesn’t have it, and doesn’t know when it will be in and doesn’t have anyone else selling it. Buy.com is the same situation, and they don’t even have a picture of the 930. BestBuy doesn’t carry the 930t - just the 930,and I’m reading bad reviews about the poor screen, accuracy, etc which is very odd for TomTom. Crutchfield is the only site that looks ok. Thoughts?
I’ve been having difficulty getting a signal once turning on my TT 930. Sometimes it takes over 10 min. Has anyone had this problem? I’ve since exchanged it but the problem persists. I don’t think it is the location because the TT 920 I had was OK after the initial start up.
Rog, I haven’t seen any indications of “something going wrong”. The 930 and 930T are the same except the T model includes the traffic receiver in the box. Most everyone appears to have good stock of the 930, and you can purchase the traffic receiver as an accessory. As for the screen issue, see the two pages I link to in comment #224 on this page.
Alica - Check out our Acquiring Satellites Tips.
Hello Tim,
I am also debating between Nuvi 780 and GO 930 as my GPS selection. It seems to me that from Navigation point of view GO 930 has an edge over Nuvi. I particularly like the feature that I do not have to depend upon satellite signal for navigation. I just want to confirm this. Say On a particular day, satellite reception was perfect and I was able to navigate with GO 930. At the end of the day, I park my Car in garage. However, the next day the satellite signal is not good because of weather. Can I navigate with GO 930?
I’m not sure I’d agree t hat the Nuvi has a navigation edge… The 930 still has (in my view) more customization and personalization options as far as routes go. But I’d say they are very similar in that regard.
Weather does not impact the GPS signal. At least not “weather” in terms of things like cloud cover, rain storms, snow, etc. It is impacted by “space weather” from things like sun flares, etc.
But in your scenario if for some reason at the time you turned it on the device could not find a signal, such as in a parking garage, EPT will not help. You must have a signal just prior to dropping the signal for EPT to work effectively.
Hello Tim,
Thanks for a quick response.My question is that if I leave car in my garage then GPS unit will have the information regarding my previous position and hence it should be able to use that information to navigate me to new destination using EPT without needing satellite signal. Am I missing something here?
You are not missing anything– It just doesn’t work that way. It isn’t a replacement for GPS, and doesn’t work as well as GPS. It is merely designed to assist you if you are driving under a double decker road or temporarily go through a tunnel.
Tim,
Thanks for prompt response. I have a quick question for you: Which in your opinion is a better GPS device nuvi780 or Go 930?
My criterion is very simple: which device has better (satellite) reception capability?
Thanks in advance,
Sanjeev
It is really a draw on that criteria since they are both reportedly using the SiRFstarIII chipset and they both use a “quickfix/hotfix” type assistance software.
Thanks Tim,
Sanjeev
Why does my TT930 seem to want to make me turn the opposite direction that I know I need to make on a route that I am familiar with — like into my driveway?
Does anyone know if you can ADD Bluetooth funcationality to the NUVI 850?
Occasionally when I turn off my 930, after a pause (maybe half a minute) it turns itself back on again. Usually by this time it has been put in it’s case, so it is hard to tell that it is on. Then of course the next time you got to use it, it is flat. Which is not a problem unless you don’t have a power lead with you. Anyone else have this problem?
I’m shopping for a mid-range gps. I don’t want a system that locks the touch screen while the vehicle is moving. Do you know which brands I should stay away from?
Mark, I haven’t seen that myself, but if you can I’d try reinstalling the application if it continues.
Debbie - Most portable devices (TomTom, Garmin) will work that way so any of them would work for you in that regard.
Mark, When my 930T is connected to power and FM on my dashboard and I turn it off while the engine is running, it sometimes turns itself back on a half minute later. Whenever it has “turned itself on” at other times, I concluded that something might have pushed against the power button while, or after, I inserted it into the case. It’s a little too easy to do.
The Mac version of TomTom HOME does not yet support either ‘Operate my GO’ or any way to create an initial 4-digit password to enter when the unit powers on. I used a Windows machine to do it (earlier post). But within a day or two (probably after I installed something through my Mac), the password was gone.
Tim, I’m not so sure about TomTom and the 930T - even their own website glosses over the 930T model - http://www.tomtom.com/products/category.php?ID=0&Lid=4
I really want to love this thing, but I’m also bugged by the fact that it can’t utilize a common device like a BlackBerry for it’s data connection - I already have a Bluetooth device for my car. They seem to omit data support for some of the most popular phones out their today (at least the ones with which you’d normally have an unlimited data connection with). No support for BlackBerry or Apple.
The 930T is just a 930 with a traffic receiver in the box… no other difference. TomTom does acknowledge it on their website here, and places like Crutchfield currently have it in stock.
I don’t know much about the Blackberry platform, but the reason data isn’t supported on the iPhone isn’t TomTom’s fault… Apple doesn’t allow those types of data connections to their phone. The same is perhaps true for the Blackberry.
Also, was on TomTom’s site - the RDS unit is “temporarily unavailable”…
http://www.tomtom.com/products/accessories/?Lid=4&Product=475&AccessoryCategory=7
Thanks for the reply Tim and Larry.
Tim, would you mind clarifying what you mean by reinstalling the application? Is there a specific application for power on/off or do you mean reinstall everything?
Cheers!
Use TomTom HOME to remove the application for your device. Then do an update and it should find the correct application and reinstall it.
Super quick reply Tim, many thanks!
Hi there Tim,i need to buy a sat nav and the go 930 sounds pretty good to me,im not into all the extras,i just want really detailed maps.Im going to be spending 3 months driving all over Australia,does the 930 have Australian maps on it?Can they be got?are they good?
Thanks
If you purchase the 930 in Australia it says it will come with maps of Australia, New Zealand, Europe, US and Canada. If you buy elsewhere it could come with different maps. I haven’t used the australia maps so I don’t know how good they are.
Tim,
Great site. Very informative.
I’ve been looking at the 930T since before it was released in the U.S. and I’m on the verge of getting one. I’d have one by now if they were available in stores like [snip]. I do see it online at [snip] and that’s where I plan to buy it. However, I’ve seen a lot of negative reviews lately and they have me a little uncertain. I do take them with a grain of salt, but the one’s that sound like bugs or software issues are a real concern. My questions: Do you know how responsive TomTom is to correcting software error if they exist? Also, pertaining to the complaint that you can’t direct phone call audio over the FM transmitter, could that be changed with a software upgrade or is that a hardware function?
I’ve been very happy with my four year old Magellan and its served me well, but it’s a dinosaur by today’s standards and I’m looking to upgrade. On paper the 930T is just what I’m looking for. I just hope that it can perform as expected.
TomTom generally releases more application updates than other companies– however to some degree it is out of necessity to fix existing bugs as they create more.
But generally speaking there are a few “solid” applications for each device and many people won’t update unless there is a new feature or fix they are looking for. That way they retain stability.
The Bluetooth calls going over FM isn’t something they will likely address.. I think there are some hardware considerations that prevent it.
I bought a 930 on my way home from Chicago to Milwaukee as I was weighing buying one and got frustrated with missing ramps in traffic. The active lane guidance was the main selling point to me, but I never found anything more than the arrow indicating the direction of the next turn. An improvement over my Garmin 10X and Motorola Q Smartphone. However, the Garmin and Q give me free traffic information and will redirect me on occasion. As you say, the IQ routing is great.
Another feture that made me switch from Garmin. (I have four Garmins and own stock) The next feature that sold me was the editable software. Mapsource Peeved me once too many times so I’m gambling that TomTom’s is better.
Negatives: FM signal is weak and often noisy in either of my vehicles, I can’t get my Motorola Q to work with it. It isn’t on the list nor is Sprint. I wish that I knew that before buying. The map correction feature is clunky to use on the GPS and via the Tomtom Home software isn’t much better. Finally, My Garmin 10X tells me that my destination is either on the right or left. TomTom just says I’ve arrived.
One comment on the FM feature. I like to listen to AM talk radio. I wish it could work there and just overpower the AM station to announce directions. As it is, if I want to avoid the wimpy internal speaker, I end up listening to moldy oldies that I put on the SD card.
Have found the maps and lane guidance much more accurate and frequent over here in Europe. When I bought mine, I assumed the lane guidance would not be that regular in North America and was proven right. Here, I regularly get the arrows and the screens popping up to show me exactly which lane I should be in for an exit or to get past one.
So far, very happy with my purchase. I have noticed that when the internal memory it too full, the unit hangs alot and sometimes does not restart. I discovered this when adding voice recognition to the european maps (per posting in forums) Have reverted back to the original software.
One thing I did notice was the backup/restore did not function properly. I backed up (with a memory card in the device). this worked fine. I renamed the backup so I could use it later. (frustrating, each time you backup, you need to rename as the backup is done with the same name each time :-< ) When I went to do a restore, it would not let me, telling me the device has a different memory card than it had previously. It was the same one with the same data on it. So, don’t know the issue but the next backup I’ll do, I’ll take the memory card out first. I got around it this time by manually copying the files from the back folders to the device.
I’m interested in getting a TomTom - either the 730 or the discontinued 720. The sites I’ve looked at which are selling the 730 in the UK are asking around £260, whereas you can get a 720 for £160 on one site I found.
Do you think the £100 price difference is worth it for the extra features of the 730? I’m not overly bothered about journey-time calculation or lane guidance, but the idea that more intelligent routes are selected on the 730 is intriguing. I just don’t know if it’s woth £100 extra!
Many thanks!
hi Tim,
I’m a European customer who lives presently in US. if I buy the TT930T in US, when I go back to Europe will it work normally without any additional purchase? if yes, are the stored maps for europe already good or do I need to buy some updates to have the most detailed? in other words is this really a world wide product or the version that they sell in europe is somehow different, to say better for that region?
let me know if you can
many thanks
Doug, if you are not interested in the the time of travel, then it would not be worth the money. What I like about it is if I have it plot an alternative, it tells me the difference in time and distance the new route is from the original. When I travel to a big city and am rushed for time, it is important to me. Otherwise, I bought an XL330 for my wife who has all the time in the world to travel around town.
filippo - Yes, with a couple of exceptions. 1) The traffic receiver will only work in the continent it was purchased in and 2) the voice recognition files only come for the continent it was purchased in.
Thanks Steve, I think I will go for the 720 - I live within walking distance of work at the moment and so the car is mainly used for social engagements and holidays, neither of which are really time critical!
The things that made me choose TomTom over Garmin’s 760 (speech recognition , iPod compatibility and more scope for customisation) are all present in the 720.
In addition to my post #262, I have further observations after using my 930 for a couple weeks. Originally I could not get the traffic data connection to my cell phone and suddenly it began working. It worked well until two days ago and just stopped. In the course of trying to get it working again, I was able to make my hands free phone section work, just once! I dialed home and left myself a message. Very good audio, too bad it doesn’t work more than one time.
Without the traffic data, the thing is a waste of money. About now I’d be happy with my wife’s XL330 which cost $300 less.
Voice recognition was another tempting feature. Forget it. Stop the car, close the windows and it works pretty well but too often you end up using the keypad. More gimmic than a useful feature.
Another sales gimmic that sold me was the ability to edit maps. Sounds nice but close to impossible to make modifications on the GPS itself and doing it on TomTom Home is still clunky. I like accuracy in my maps as like to change speed limits. Unless the WHOLE length of the road is one speed limit, it is too frustrating to use.
One time it wanted to make me enter the expressway at a no left turn sign. I edited that correctly, I thought. Today while using that same road it told me to make an illegal turn there again. So much for accepting corrections.
Editing POI’s works well however. Traveling a lot, I like to be taken to the entrance to the store I’m looking for. Relocating a POI on the GPS does go good so long as you park near by and can devote attention to the steps correcting it.
Speaking of TomTom Home, everytime I do some uploads and downloads, my quick menu loses one or two menu items and I have to reselect a voice. Sometime it switches to FM transmitting when I know I left it to internal speaker.
I added a memory card with some of my music but the FM signal flat stinks. I have two vehicles that I use it in. A Subaru with antenna in back and Toyota with antenna in front. Both give noisy signals most of the time and often the DC adapter radiates noise, probably from it’s voltage regulator. Pull the plug from the outlet and some frying goes away.
So to those interested in buying a 930 in the USA, check that your phone is supported by looking at tomtom.com/phones, forget the advance lane guidance, it’s not in the USA.
I’m not too happy with mine because the features that made me spend the $500 for it are not as advertised.
Steve, I wanted to add some clarifications. As you said, users should check compatibility charts to make sure their phone is compatible with traffic services if they want to utilize it for that. People more commonly use the RDS TMC traffic receiver instead for that reason. I suspect you know that already however as someone with the same name has posted on that page.
I’ve fond voice recognition to work 80-90% of the time, but not much (if any) of a time saver. But I certainly wouldn’t call it a gimmick. I know people rely on since the GPS is located too far away from them in their vehicle and they swear by it.
I’m not sure why you would think changing speed limit data is a gimmick. There are few roads where the speed limit doesn’t make changes, and if they couldn’t let the user show where that segment starts and stops you wouldn’t have an accurate speed limit.
If turn restrictions are entered properly, they work just fine.
The bug about preferences not holding across usage with TomTom HOME’s ‘operate my GO’ feature has been around for awhile, is indeed annoying for those who use that feature, and I really wish TomTom would get around to fixing it.
I think the 930 does work as advertised. Perhaps not to your expectations for your usage, but I don’t see anywhere that TomTom is being misleading about the product.
Mark said on July 14 that his 930 turns itself on sometimes. The next day, I said that only happens to me when I could have accidentally pressed the power switch. But now I am sure that is not so. My 930 really does turn itself on, even if I do this, which I thought would be foolproof:
Park the car and remove the ignition key. Turn the 930 off. Leave it on the dashboard mount.
When the ignition switch is off, my cigarette lighter provides no power. If the unit turns itself on, the battery drains.
My unit has this problem at least as often if I turn the 930 off before switching the ignition off, or if I remove the unit from the dashboard mount and store it in the case.
Because I virtually never use the unit without a power source, this behavior is merely annoying. If I wanted to run it off battery more often, it would be a bigger problem that that. But I hear battery life is not so good anyway.
Hi,
I would like to add something about the post #267
I called the TomTom and they told me that the RDS-TMC receiver from my TomTom 930T that I bought in Canada (I think it is the same as USA) will also work in Europe…but I have to admit I don’t try it yet in Europe
@Tim, could you comment why you mentionned that it won’t work in Europe vs what the TomTom guy told me over the phone?
You are right when mentionning that the Europe Map for the TomTom930 T bought in Americas doesn’t have the ASR but if you upgrade the Europe map to version 805 with the latest Map Guaranty (so, it is free) then you will have the ASR for Europe…Of course, with both Europe and North America with ASR …you need an additional SD card because both with ASR don’t hold on the internal 4GB memory.
Thanks
Well, I’ve always been told that it won’t work so I’m surprised to hear a TomTom CS rep to say otherwise. They carry two different part numbers, use different frequency hops, and requires a subscription in North America.
You can also download the Europe ASR files if needed, we’ve linked to them in this thread.
hi Tim,
thanks for the answer….Do you know what is the part number for the Europe and the one for the USA?
Thanks
I don’t know for sure, sorry. I think some start with 4v and some start with 9v but I don’t recall which is which.
Hi Tim,
Thanks…
I asked the question because my RDS-TMC receiver has the number 4V00.013 encrusted in the plastic of the oval part of the receiver…..but there is also a sticker around the cord which is written 4V00.083 weird…two different numbers!!!
thanks
Tim, my reference to gimmics are about features that are not what they are marketed to be. I haven’t spoken about the BS that the guy at the major electronics store told me about the 930. I’ll stick to what is on the box.
Traffic Ready Compatible info Traffic - Not at all. Nothing mentioning that anything other than what’s in the box is needed. Having a Garmin also, I know it is not that simple but this is very, very misleading for someone trusting the box to be accurate in describing the features.
Map Share Technology. - I call it a gimmic because it is poorly designed. As I said in my last review post, it is so difficult to narrow down a segment of a road to edit the speedlimit on the GPS that it is near a worthless feature. It is a bit easier on the computer with TomTom Home but it still requires numerous clicks to clear segments that you don’t want included in the new speed limit. Instead, they should have made it that NO segments are highlighted and you then click on those that you want included in the new speed limit. On one road I thought I have the mix of speed limits entered and sumitted correctly but I find that they are incorrect on the GPS afterward.
Handsfree Calling - again, nothing mentioning that not all phones with bluetooth are compatible. My Motorola Q has bluetooth and unlimited data plan with Sprint. There is nothing saying it will not work, until you buy the box and open things up. This is not something that can be excused. It should be clear that not all phones with bluetooth and Sprint are able to be used to make advertised features work.
Advanced Lane Guidance - Chicago isn’t a small town. Where is the ALG? I think I heard of it somewhere in San Francisco. Lots of it in Europe. the box should say limited availability in the USA.
Voice activation - a gimmic. Limited value and its quicker to punch things in usually. From what I hear the Garmin 800’s have voice recognition that is far ahead of TomTom’s. Admittedly, for hundreds of dollars more.
Add all of that to the bugs, occasional lock-ups requiring a reset and I’m sorry that I spent the money for it. For me, it is just an XL330 that cost 2.5 times as much.
I thought that I spent my money well on the XL 330 and the GO 930 but I now believe that the 930 does not live up to it’s advertising on the box. If I’m the only one sour on the 930 because of all of this, so be it. About the only thing that would make me satisfied with it is if TomTom gave me a free traffic receiver to make up for the cell phone misrepresentation. As it is now, I use my Garmin 10X and cell phone to check for traffic and then have the 930 do a few alternates. Other than these few things (G), I actually like the navigation end of the 930.
Steve when something is described as “compatible” as in “PC compatible” or “mac compatible” or “traffic compatible” it usually means that the “other” piece like the PC, Mac, or traffic cable isn’t included.
The method you describe of MapShare input wouldn’t allow sufficient granularity of editing speed limits. People wouldn’t be happy with that limitation.
I don’t think any company would be able to provide an exhaustive list of all the devices they are not compatible with. New phones are released too fast and too many new models come out to keep a complete list of everything that isn’t compatible. There is a clear list on TomTom’s website showing which devices ARE compatible.
So I disagree there is any misrepresentation. Misrepresentation would be saying that your phone IS compatible if it wasn’t… but they didn’t say that. You just assumed it would be compatible and unfortunately that wasn’t a safe assumption.
Tim, currently debating between the 930 and the 730. There’s a possible trip to Europe in the future, but it’s only a possibility, and might not happen for a couple of years.
So, a question: excluding the remote and Enhanced Positioning, are there any differences between the 930 and the 730 with European maps purchased separately? Put another way, do you get IQ routes and ALG for europe with the 930? Do you still get those same things if you add European maps to the 730?
Thanks much.
You’ve correctly identified most of the differences. Another difference is that the 700 models come with 2 GB of internal memory whereas the 900 models come with 4 GB of internal memory. So there wouldn’t be enough space on the 700 models to install both sets of maps in the internal memory at once. You could make a backup and swap the maps, then swap back when you are done, or load the extra maps on an SD card.
Something else to consider is that if it will be a couple of years before you go– if you purchased a 900 series now it the maps will be a couple of years out of date when you get there.
Tim, great articles and your commitment to answering follow up questions is impressive.
I am one of those debating between TomTom and Garmin. Understandably, a recommendation is very subjective, so I’d like to ask for a brief comparison of features important to me.
1) First and foremost, the feature that is by far the most important is accurate and “smart” routing. I live in Southern California (Orange County), and frequently run into traffic. I would love to have a GPS that could re-route me to always get the fastest route (within reason).
2) I’m fairly tech-savvy and not afraid of a little complexity (so the “simple” interface of the Garmin is not a bonus), but I do want something that is efficient when it comes to entering to destinations on the fly and coming up with good POI’s (such as the nearest Gas Station).
1) You know your friend who doesn’t like to take many risks, doesn’t like to deviate from the norm, and likes to go the route that is the most “sure thing”? That is Garmin. You know your other friend who likes to be a bit more aggressive, likes seeks out shortcuts to maximize efficiency, and most of the time he is right and saves you time… but occasionally things can go quite wrong— that is TomTom.
I think TomTom’s routes are “smarter” overall. However when TomTom “misses” it is usually a bit bigger of a mistake.
2) I’d say that is probably a draw between the two. The Garmin might include a few more POIs out of the box but TomTom’s search interface is a little more friendly with spelling errors and similar names.
Thanks Tim. You’ve hit the nail on the head with the comment about the maps being a couple of years out of date — that’s one of the main reasons I’m leaning toward the 730 over the 930. I just wanted to ensure that if I did purchase the European maps at a later date, that I wouldn’t be losing any functionality vs. the 930 (other than the remote and the advanced positioning). Sounds like that’s the case, which is very helpful information. Much appreciated.
I’m just back from Chicago with my 930, and DID see the lane guidance on several occasions, all that I remember were around Interstate junctions, like along 294 & 55 & 80. Yes, major intersections, but they’re out there. And honestly, I don’t need much of it for typical highway or interstate driving. Up there, with lots of lanes, it did boost my turn confidence.
Mike, I might be going down 294 tomorrow and will look for that. Did you take an exit from 294 to 80 or 55 or just see something while driving by those intersections?
I was in Algonquin today and the 930 worked nicely. On the way home it did some unusual routing and took me on some minor road which nicely bypass some towns during the mid-afternoon. Also had occasion to hit the detour selection in construction. That worked well. I have to see if that can be put in the quick menu.
I wrote TomTom about the phone compatability complaint of mine. I asked for a free antenna. Here’s their response; “Thank you for taking the time to contact TomTom Support regarding your phones not being compatible with the GO 930 for Traffic. We cannot send you a free RDS-TMC receiver because of this issue. The phone compatibility list for the GO 930 is readily available on our website through the GO 930 and TomTom Traffic pages.”
My point is that a consumer walking up to a display and then looking over the box is not told that they need to check TomTom’s website to see if their phone and provider is compatible. The features say Traffic ready, Handsfree calling and on another side has a Bluetooth logo.
People that are close and familiar with automobile GPS’s, TomTom included, need to step back and look at this from a consumer’s perspective. Should it not say right on the box that you need a compatible phone, provider and data service and provide the website to do so?
Oops! I just saw some fine print on the bottom of the box. “For availability of features, map coverage, services, accessories and more information check http://www.tomtom.com . Well then, shame on me and the store sales person.
On a similar note, while driving and listening to my favorite radio station, TomTom had a advertisement about gasoline prices. It implied it came with the GPS. While on TomTom Home last night they asked me to pay the $13 for the subscription. Too bad my phone isn’t compatible. But then, MSN Live is free via my phone so I get free traffic and gas prices anyway. I also find that the updated prices are fresher than what I get from my Garmin. I’d think that it comes from the same service. Perhaps not.
Does anyone have any idea why the NUVI 880 is not yet available at Circuit City when it seems to be available everywhere else?
Ok, I was wrong about the Advance Guidance in Chicago. I found it a few times. First was southbound I94 at the I294 split. The second and most useful time was at an interchange where I’ll sometimes miss my ramp. That’s 290 west by the 294 interchange. There it gave me plenty of advance warning and flashed a nice green arrow in the lane that I should be in. Very nice.
On a couple other occasions I didn’t get the picture rendering but did get the multiple lane arrows with the correct lane being highlighted.
After driving for a few house towards home, it routes me around Milwaukee, avoiding rush hour traffic. (I have the traffic cable receiver now) While getting close to home, it tells me to take a side street which would add two stop signs and some distance to what is otherwise a normal traveling traffic main road. I avoided the detour and the ETA drops by three minutes when recalculated. Just when I was falling in love with it again!
First, I’d like to say that my TomTom 930 has been useful despite all the issues that I’ve mentioned in my earliers posts and despite the issues that I’m about to mention. Second, I agree with Steve Bukosky in that the map share makes it far too difficult to mark the desired segments for editing the posted speed limits but I disagree with his idea of having no segments selected and then selecting them manually as that is almost as difficult as deselecting the segments. I think it should be a matter of selecting segments between two points particularly if those points can be the points marked when you select mark map error while you drive (it would be nice if it could allow you to record a short description of the error being marked when you hit the mark error button while driving).
My new beefs are that although the IQ routes is clearly a step ahead of everyone else, the entire routing concept is flawed with respect to taking traffic and statistical traffic profiles into account. The routes are planned with current traffic information only. Here a commute can easily take an hour so it may be a half hour before I reach a particular point on the map so the current reported traffic condition at that point shouldn’t be one that’s used but rather an estimated traffic condition based upon the current traffic condition of the segment and all segments that may affect that segment multiplied by a coefficient to project the traffic estimate a half hour into the future as well as a weighting of the projected condition from the historical IQ routes traffic profile. The effect of traffic incidents could also be projected in this fashion into the future and perhaps live RIS information from other TomTom users. The coefficients would be calculated offline based on information from which IQ routes is collected and from historical traffic information from the road sensors. If each segment was to be estimated from the past state of all segments (ideal case), time was in 5 minute steps and projections up to an hour in the future was desired, the number of coefficients would be the number of segments squared times 12 (number of 5 minute periods in an hour) which could be quite large. However this can be reduced greatly as the segments considered for each segment need not be all segments but only the segments that are within the traveling time from where the estimate is desired and after a certain amount of time, it would be better to just use the statistical IQ routes profile data instead of factoring in all historical data.
As it is now, the 930 often tells me that I will have 226 minutes delay on the normal route whereas I know that if I just wait 30 minutes, it will just be a 35 minute trip. There has been times when it starts detouring me off the freeway and then 15 minutes into the trip it’s trying to get me back onto the freeway, sometimes to the same point that I left it from.
If TomTom wishes to use my method, I’ll be happy to negotiate a royalty arrangemnt for such a “Future Routes” approach
Seriously, since the 930 is a Linux box. I may be able to work something like this out if I can get the SDK for the TT930.
Yes, it’s me again, Mr. Negative. My TT930 does seem to reboot quite often still but I’ve noticed that it tends to be when there’s a high load on the system ie.: while calculating EPT positions when I’m circling around in the spiral ramp of a parking garage, when trying to calculate routes while the GPS position is jumping around due to the buildings downtown, or when an incoming hands free call comes in while I’m otherwise entering something into the system.
All of this makes me wonder if they are using the default memory management algorithm from Linux. The default behaviour is to optimistically allow the OS to allocate more memory than it has based on an assumption that most won’t ever get used which if the computer’s main purpose is just people editing files and navigating the folders, this would be true but it would not be true with a dedicated purpose computer like the TomTom. The TomTom should have the setting “vm.overcommit_memory = 2″ set in it’s /etc/sysctl.conf file and perhaps some memory reservation (vm.min_free_kbytes and vm.lower_zone_protection) set there as well. I haven’t installed the bluetooth tty package to log into the TomTom manually but if someone has, could they just check to see if /etc/sysctl.conf has those settings there. If not, then I would expect it to crash often which is exactly what it’s doing…
Not many people know about these tuning parameters so it’s quite possible that the TomTom developers never properly tuned their Open TomTom release of Linux. If so, this would be an easy fix for them.
I just purchased a nuvi 880. I previoulsy owned a nuvi 660. The screen brightness does not seem to be as bright on the 880 as the 660. The 880 does not seem to be as loud as the 660. Is this the way these are manufactured or could the unit I purchased have a problem. Also it seems problematic on my car radio to find a free fm channel All the channels that are not getting an actual radio station are getting static. Any advice?
Have been going back and forth about purchasing a GPS to use in Europe. DH and I oten have issuesd when it comes to routes, so this would take care of that problem. Those of you have used the TT930, is it really helpful for you? I need to get this soon as we leave in a couple weeks and will just be in Italy this trip.
Thanks for your help!!
Perhaps my needs are different than most when it comes to using the 930 in Europe.
I too will be traveling to Europe in about a month, and I want the maps of Europe so that I can find my way to places - but I won’t be driving. I’ll either be walking, or taking buses, and I want to know where to walk, or when to get off the bus.
1) I’ll mostly already know where I want to go, but probably will not have the address. Instead, I will generally need to be able to find what I want in the POI list (such as the Colosseum, the Eiffel Tower, etc), and then have it navigate a course to that POI that I can walk, or to follow while riding the bus (it will be interesting to see if the bus route follows the route that GPS will recommend, and to see it recalculate when the bus route differs).
2) Other times I will want to find places that are nearby without knowing what those are before hand. For example, I’ll want to find a restaurant that is close by, or find some attraction that is nearby that I could go see.
3) And finally, as I am walking to some place along the route that the GPS has plotted for me, I’ll want to be able to see if there are other interesting places along the way that I could stop at while en-route to the final destination.
I currently have a Garmin 760, and am debating getting the Europe maps for it, or getting the TomTom 930. I know getting the Garmin maps will be the cheaper alternative, but that is not my primary concern right now - the suitability to my needs is the most important issue for me at this point.
I suspect that how well a GPS does at these 3 items will depend on how good the POI database is. I’ll generally be interested in the well known and popular places this trip, rather than the lesser known places, so I suspect that these places should be in the POI database of pretty much any GPS.
So I don’t think that #1 or #2 will be much of an issue with whatever GPS I get, but I’d like your thoughts on this.
But #3 concerns me. I think what I need or what I want, is that as I am traveling along the route the GPS has planned for me (mostly by foot), that these other nearby POIs will show on the map, so that I can stop, see what it is (on the GPS), and then possibly take a short detour to that POI.
I may or may not want the GPS to route me to this nearby POI - If I do, I suppose that I will have to cancel the current route, and then plot a route to this new nearby POI. But that is not the important issue. The important ability here is for the GPS to be able to show me that there are some nearby POIs, without me having to go to the menus every block or so, and manually searching for nearby POIs.
Can I do this with the 930?
I also have a TomTom One 3rd edition, and I’ve used both GPSes (Garmin 760 and TomTom One) on occasion on trips, and I don’t know that either one really shows me nearby POIs as I am traveling.
The normal answer would be “Garmin’s don’t show on-screen poi’s, use a TomTom”. But in your case, your 760 would work just fine. Since you’ll be walking most of the time, I doubt you will want your map scale at more than 500′ and probably less. At that zoom level your 760 will diplay POPI icons. No need, IMO, to spend another $400+ for the 930 when a map for your 760 should do just fine. You might also check for a “TourGuide” SD card for your nuvi. Sounds like you plan to do your own exploring (not part of a group) and it may be just the thing to complete your visit. Historical and background info with built in POI alerts that trigger the spoken description. Just visit Garmin to see what might be available.
Yes, I’ll be doing my own tours, and plan to use my GPS as a tool to help me.
So the visibility of POIs is not particularly a feature of the the TomTom vs the Garmin, but more related to the detail / zoom level?
But when the zoom level is higher (lower?) such as when traveling at hiway speeds, you seemed to hint that the TomTom may display POIs, while the Garmin may not at that zoom level/speed?
Since TomTom is/has been more of a European product, and Garmin a US product, does that imply that TomTom may have more detail in their European maps than Garmin might?
I’ll check out the TourGuide idea at Garmin too - thanks for the tip.
Above 500′ scale (which is around a 3/4 mile radius) your nuvi won’t display on-screen poi icons. There may be a custom POI file available of tourist-oriented spots, which addresses the issue by announcing and/or alerting you that you are within a user-set proximity to one if using Garmin’s POILoader. As for Navteq maps (Garmin and others) vs. Teleatlas maps (TomTom and others) it’s pretty much the same in Europe as here in the States from the posts I read. Garmin will cover some areas that TomTom does not, and some places will be better mapped by TomTom/TeleAtlas. Both should be very good, but neither is perfect. IMO, I don’t think one is that much different from the other.
Leaving this question again. Does anyone find that the brightness of the Garmin 880 is diminished from the Garmon 660 or other models. Does anyone find that the volume of the 880 is not as loud as the 660 or other models.
Also discovered that I can make hands free calls if initiated from my phone, but cannot initiate the call from the Garmin either with the voice activation or the touch screen. If you use the voice activation or touch screen, you hear the sound of the nuvi dialing, but then nothing happens. I have a TREO 700w. If I initiate the call from my phone, the call is made and complete. The nuvi 880 bleutooth function does not capture the information from my speed dial list whereas my nuvi 660 did.
Any comments on these functions would be very helpful. I might want to return this unit and go for the Tom Tom 930TT
Have now had the 930 for several weeks, mostly in the Toronto area but also including a trip to Frankfurt Germany. So far I like it a lot, and was well prepared for it based on this excellent site. Some observations/questions, in no particular order:
1) I did see ALG in Frankfurt (intersection of highways 3 & 5) and it was very helpful.
2) TomTom Home is a great idea but has lots of room for usability improvements. For example, it’s wonderful that you can create or share POI’s and see them with appropriate icons (e.g. logos). But why can you not select a group of POI’s to load at once rather than going into menu again and again? (Or did I miss it?)
3) The manual says you can have the volume linked to ambient sound levels. This does not seem to appear in my “Volume Preferences” screen???
4)The voice input has not trained me very well yet - lot’s of errors and frustration.
5) I would like to have more flexibility as to the tolerance before the speed warnings sound, i.e. 15% above limit, etc. Still useful for those of us wanting to minimize speeding tickets!
Charles - (3) You should find it at Menu -> Change Preferences -> Volume Preferences -> “Link volume to noise level”.
Tim - thanks. I was at right menu but was operating via TT Home (doing settings while not driving!). The option did not appear. When I disconnected and tried outside it was there. Ta-da! Thanks again for providing such a great site…
I purchased a Garmin 880, but I returned it. I thought that I had checked the Garmin website for phone compatability and thought I read it correctly the the Palm Treo 700W was compatable. If you go to the 880 location on Garmin’s web site and slect bluetooth, a list comes up and you can select Palm Treo 700W. But you have to drill down further to actually find out the Treo is not compatable. [snip] wanted to charge me a restocking fee of $155.00 for something I had only four days, but they agreed to not charge me that fee. A good retailer and I will continue to shop at [snip]. I called Tom Tom to see if the 930T was compatable with my Treo phone and it is not. So, for the moment, there is no voice activated GPS that works with my $500.00 phone–not something I am easily ready to trade in order for a GPS unit that is bluetooth compatable with my phone. Just a caution for anyone that bluetooth is important to be sure to read down as far as the lists will take you to determine if a particular unit is compatable. From GPS-less and disappointed.
Does anyone know if the IQRoute and lane guidance work with the Australian maps? When I look in the TomTom online map store, it says nothing about the IQroutes in the map info for the current Australian map (the USA, UK, Alps etc maps do).
Scott, I know MapShare is available, but I don’t think IQ Routes and Lane Guidance are yet, though I could be wrong.
how good is the european map guidance? what countries do they service ? do they cover all the minor roads like the C category roads in the UK?
Is the Tom Tom superior to the Garmin line or is there not much difference. the fact that tomtom includes european maps is HUGE since we go to europe frequently. PLUS hertz now charges $15/day for their Neverlost ( which i could not live without but if tom tom is a s good as you all say then its byebye hertz and i will save $$ on renting a car next time)
I recently used the traffic camera function in Europe - It was great - a few false calls but mostly very accurate.
Do note that with the release of V8.x maps for the x20’s this week, that the x30’s are less than relevant. If you can find a 720 or 920 instead, for a much lower price, you can update the maps for free under TomTom’s “Latest Map Guarantee” and then have every feature of the 730/930. I suspect that the x20’s are going to be harder to come by, so if you’ve been considering the x30’s, I would act soon. IMO, it’s unfortunate that TT in essence has now made my 930 simply an overpriced 920. I’ll be more cautious in the future buying the latest from TomTom.
I haven’t compared the features of the 920 vs 930, but aren’t some of the differences Active Lane Guidance, Static Intersection Images and IQ Routes?
Are these features of the maps that would become available on the 920 if you upgraded the maps, or are these features of the firmware that is unique to the 930?
These are map features, not restricted to the 930 device. With the map update, ALL functions of the 930 are available to the 920. There are no hardware differences in the two models. Other than the maps, they are identical.
You also need the updated application version in addition to the new map. I don’t think I’ve heard from anyone who has confirmed this is working yet either– although I expect it should work.
I just purchased a GO 930 about 4 weeks ago, due to extensive travel in the US and Canada for work (I live in Canada), and an upcoming vacation in Europe. There were no 920s available in my area, so I sucked it up and laid out the cash for the more expensive model. Here are my thoughts on this GPS — I hope they help someone:
1. Having the W Europe maps was a real plus. I would still be lost somewhere in Italy without the GPS. I go to Europe every couple of years or so, therefore I found these maps useful, and worth the money. To get a similar GPS unit with all these maps from Garmin would have cost me twice what I paid for the TomTom. (Don’t get me wrong: Garmins have their good points, too.)
2. A computer voice may work in NA, but was of little help in Italy — it kept pronouncing things with an American accent, incomprehensibly, and I eventually had to turn it off. When “Susan” told me to drive through “Baloney Central” I just about went off the road.
3. The EPT (Enhanced Positioning Technology) was most useful. I drove through over 100 tunnels while traveling through the Apennine Mtns. Some were a few hundred metres long; some a few kilometres. More often than not, there is a sharp curve at the end of the tunnel, or an exit you have to take. Because the GPS showed me where I was even with no signal, I always knew what was ahead. My only suggestion here would be to turn off the automatic “night mode” if you’re going to be doing this type of driving: coming out of a tunnel into blazing sunlight, wearing sunglasses, with the screen almost dark is not helpful!
4. The ALG (Active Lane Guidance) and Static Intersection Images were pretty much useless. It sounds as though there aren’t a lot of images for the US, but practically every exit in Italy had one, and they all looked alike onscreen. In my experience, they were never an accurate representation of the actual exit, and in a country like Italy, one exit turns very quickly into four or five exits. I turned off this option, and had no trouble thereafter.
5. Problems: Very minor. I was led into dead-ends only twice. In both cases, I was on some pretty complex roads with S-bends and switch-backs (hairpins) following one after the other in rapid succession.
6. I have yet to find a GPS unit which has an option for “shortest route without taking me through the middle of nowhere”. So, my suggestion is to ALWAYS preview your route. I took out little “detours” using the “avoid part of route” option to stay on roads that were a little bigger than some the GPS suggested. However, at one point I ended up on top of a mountain, trying to squeeze my Ford Fiesta through a town gate past a bus of grinning nuns. You don’t get such adventures without allowing for a few back roads!
7. It would sometimes take a couple of minutes for the 930 to find a signal after being turned on, particularly if the previous route had not been cleared (my fault). Once “online”, however, its reaction time was very fast, and it would recalculate routes incredibly quickly when necessary.
8. I was able to download positions of “safety cameras” for free through TomTom Home. Those are the little boxes — sometimes hidden — that photograph you if you are speeding or run a red light. Very helpful. I couldn’t figure out how to set an audible warning however. Perhaps a siren sound would be most appropriate.
I certainly didn’t take advantage of all the 930s options while on vacation, but overall, I really like it. I am looking forward to using it in the US the next time I go down. The only really annoying bit was my traveling companions feeling they needed to repeat every GPS instruction to me just in case I didn’t hear it the first 3 times! Set a rule: no one parrots the GPS!!!
Has the TomTom traffic server been down lately? How can I find out if it has?
On July 28, I purchased a one-year subscription to TomTom Traffic. Until yesterday, it worked fairly well. Occasionally, the 930 had trouble contacting the traffic server until I cycled power. Also, it could never contact the server to update traffic while my Blackberry was busy on a voice call. But overall, it was a satisfactory service.
Beginning yesterday, the 930 has been unable to receive traffic info at all. In its TomTom Services menu, the “My Services” entry for Traffic now says that I have zero days left on my subscription. Once today, I got it to report correctly that the subscription would not expire until July 2009. But a few seconds later, it failed to connect and said my subscription had expired.
The TomTom web site has the correct expiration date.
To me, the most likely explanation for the failure is that the TomTom Traffic Server or its data base is suffering a multi-day malfunction. Is there a better explanation? Could my 930 have a hardware problem?
Well, another TT930 feature that doesn’t work. The coastal counties are under mandatory evacuation orders right now so it’s a good idea to avoid the freeways, hence I selected avoid freeways. Makes sense doesn’t it, well the TT930 happily routes you on the freeways despite having selected avoid freeways… It’s not as if it isn’t possible to avoid the freeways because if you keep selecting avoid part of the route, you eventually wind up with a freeway free route after about five or six routes. Also the GPS signals have been surprisingly inaccurate, it’s usually pretty good at guessing which road you’re on but now it’s almost always putting you one or two roads over. I guess the military have the GPS mode set to encrypt which they do during maneuvers, maybe they consider mobilizing for evacuations as a maneuver but this is somewhat counter-productive to be screwing with civilian GPS during evacuations.
That is why it is called “avoid” highways and not “exclude” highways.
I was looking into this GPS. Does anybody have any input? Does anybody that ownes this now, previously owned a GArmin Nuvi? if so what would you say about the comparrison of the two?
thanks so much. I am between this and a garmin nuvi 760
Ash, see these two articles:
Confessions of a Nuvi Owner: TomTom 930 Impressions
Confessions of another Nuvi Owner: TomTom 720 Impressions
In question 310, I asked about traffic server reliability. Some server problem that lasted about a week affected my account. Customer Support answered my questions within a few hours. When reliability was restored, they added some time to my subscription to compensate for the inconvenience.
I’m most interested in 4 things in choosing a GPS unit: ease of use, accuracy, reliability and the ability to enter multiple destinations at once. I’ve looked at Nuvi 760 and TomTom 930. Do you recommend one over the other?
Both would be great picks. The Nuvi can auto-sort the list of destinations for efficiency.
Where can I find a list of cities where the traffic data is available for the traffic option? I don’t want to spend the extra money on the “T” model if traffic data is not in my area. Can you obtain an optional antenna for the 920 or 930 that can be mounted on the outside of the vehicle? I’m going to be installing some other antennas on my van soon and would run the GPS antenna cable at the same time.
You can find that info on our Traffic page.
Finally the tom tom home did a download for map shares for the 930. 9737 corrections in use
Here are some more Voice Prompt tips for TomTom application software version 8.010 on the TomTom 930. (See http://www.gpsreview.net/tomtom-go-920t/ for Tim’s original tips.) If your experience differs, please comment.
If you choose “Spoken Address (Dialog)” from the Quick Menu while the speaker is muted, you won’t hear voice prompts and the TomTom won’t listen for commands. It will listen for city names, street names, and the digits of house number (and while it is listening for the house number, you can say “Cross Street”). But it won’t listen or respond to you when you say the correct match number (1, 2, etc.), “Done”, or “Back”.
Solution: Turn the speaker on.
If you choose “Spoken Address (Dialog)” from the Navigate menu instead of the Quick Menu, the TomTom turns the speaker on automatically and everything works fine.
When speaking a house number, don’t pause between digits. If the TomTom doesn’t get the number right, either use the touch screen to correct it or say “Back”, repeat the street name, and try again.
These are clarifications to the Voice Prompt tips in post 321.
According to the manual, the commands that the TomTom recognizes are Yes, No, Back, Done, OK, and Crossing.
“Cross Street” seems to work as well as “Crossing” (perhaps because they sound similar).
“Yes”, “Done” and “OK” are often interchangeable.
When you are presented with numbered matches to your utterances, choice number 1 is highlighted. “Yes”, “Done” and “OK” are all synonymous with “one”.
“Back” and “No” are not interchangeable. For example, if a house number is incorrect, say “No” to get an opportunity to correct it. If you say “Back”, you’ll return to the Street entry screen (despite what the manual says).
The manual states in one place that “357″ should be spoken as “three five seven”. In another place the manual recommends “three hundred and fifty seven”. Either one works.
Re: TT930. I have heard the battery life is short. Any experience to share? Will be doing a lot of walking and can’t afford a 1000′ power cord.
Dan - the battery life is rated at 5 hours. That is the “best case” or “up to 5 hrs” scenario based on a new device, reasonable backlight settings, not using the internal radios, etc.
My “real world” experience typically gives me 3.5 - 4.0 hours of battery life.
Does anybody know how to configure the gps to have the tapping sound? Right now, there is no sound when I tap on the screen.
Alvin, I haven’t heard of any hacks to add something like that.
I mean if there is a option for this setting?
No, there is no option for that in the TomTom software.
I am planning to buy a SD card for the gps. Does it support 16GB SDHC cards?
Some 16 GB SDHC cards have been found to work. But keep in mind that the TomTom device itself can only write to the first 4 GB of the card. It can read from the entire card though if you fill it with another card reader.
Thanks for your answer Tim. Do you suggest me to buy a 4GB or 8GB SD card for the GPS since it can’t fully support the 16GB? How about MicroSD with adapter?
What are you trying to put on the SD card?
Photoes and MP3 songs which I can play them through my car stereo.
If you need the extra space, I’d get the bigger card and load the music and photos from a card reader.
This query regarding accessory:
iPod Connect Cable & Audio Cable.
1. Does TomTom GO730 North America model supports this accessory?
or TomTom GO930 North America model supports?
Yes, the iPod connect cable is compatible with the 730 and 930.
For the SDHC cards, there are class 4 and class 6. Does the GPS support all the classes?
Hi,
I bought my Go930 here in Australia and for some reason voice recognition is not working (the icon is gray). Is it because it is for Australian market, or am I doing something wrong?
Thanks in advance for your help
V
No, It’s not because you’re in Australia. I had the same problem here in Texas when I first got my TT930.
If I remember correctly, I placed a support call and basically you had to select navigate to, then address, then street and address or by zipcode and then select on the upper right side of the screen, the pull down for State or country, you may have to select it again on the next page to pull up a menu of countries and states, select your country or state and then enter in an address to navigate to. Then for some strange reason, all those grayed out speech icons will come alive.
Don’t ask why this works, the TT930 is full of illogical odds and ends indicative of poorly designed modular code. It’s most likely a product that has evolved over time.
Hi,
I have both of your review’s on the TomTom 720 & 930. I like the new features of the 930 but would like to know is there a Tomtom model that offers the 930 features without the maps pre-loaded of Europe?
If you have the time could you also summarize the main feature differences between the 720 and 930?
Thank you very much for your time,
Vitaly, I know when voice recognition was released in North America an Europe it was not available in Australia as the necessary speech files had not yet been built. I’m not certain if that has changed.
Tim, there isn’t a device that is the same as the 930 without European maps. The 730 is close, but it doesn’t have the EPT feature nor the remote that comes with the 930.
I guess what I am trying to decide is:
A - I DO NOT need the maps of Europe so is the 930’s other features worth the extra $$ over the 720?
B - I am trying to figure out by your reviews what the feature differences are between the two?
Thank you again
Tim - If you go back to the top of this review we outline the feature progression. The TomTom 720 review gives you an overview of functions in all of the GO models. The TomTom 920 review covers features added in that model, and the 930 review on this page covers the features added in this model.
Purchased a TT930 a week ago. Although I am in Minnesota, I set it to the euro maps and tried to brouse/route plan using postal codes. After inputing the first three characters of the postal code the unit would give me a list of postal codes, with the next list being street names. I was under the impression that in the UK I could navigate directly to a specific postal code… I reviewed the manual on-line but didn’t find any info on how to correctly navigate via postal codes… any ideas? Do I have to have my feet on the ground in the UK to navigate this way?
Haw good does the 930 cover Bulgaria? Is it as detailed as US for example? I live in US but i travel like twice a year to Bulgaria
No, it is not as good as the North America nor Western Europe coverage. It is described like this:
why is no one blogging here on the tom tom 940 ? im under the 30 days i have a 930 should I return and wait 4 the new one
Hermes, TomTom has not made any announcements to bring to the 940 to North America.
Does anybody experience that the speaker of the TomTom go 930 breaks up? My ttgo930’s voice from the speaker is not clear when it speaks loud sometimes. It’s like an explodent. Is it the speaker’s problem?
Above 80% mine doesn’t sound as good, but I can still understand what it is saying
I think the quality of the speaker is not so good. I compared it with Garmin’s GPS. Garmin’s speaker is louder and clearer on both music and instruction voices.
Probably depends which Garmin you are comparing it too. The 700 series is pretty good. The 2×5 series is getting lots of complaints.
I have found that my TomTom does not recalculate a new ETA by comparing remaining distance with actual speed! Only past experience was with handheld units that did this task. Do any car gps units recalcuate the time enroute?
Ed, I’m not sure what you are seeing but the TomTom does constantly update your ETA as you drive through the route.
I have noticed a discrepancy between my speedometer and the TT930’s reporting of my speed of about 5%, i.e. TT=Car-5%. At first I assumed my speedo was off, but recent trips with rentals show similar results. Searching the web gives mixed results, i.e. speedo’s cannot be slow but may be fast, GPS’ do not take into account elevation (?) and “not real time”, etc. Which is going to be closer to a radar gun’s reading?
The GPS will generally be more accurate, but there are times when it can be off as well.
I think it’s important to note that the GPS receives position information. It infers speed and direction of travel from at least two such readings hence there is some inaccuracy with both speed and direction information particularly when the vehicle is traveling slowly. I find that my TT930 consistently estimates the speed on the high side. My guess is that they have a running average on the speed so that it’s based on several position readings to avoid sudden jumps but since a running average would be slow to respond, they bias it up with a fudge factor hence the speed tends to be on the high side.
Still have a question regarding postal codes in the UK(see posting #344). It was my understanding that I could enter the complete postal code for my destination, however the unit only allows input of the first few characters before offering a dropdown option list (which doesn’t help if you don’t have the complete address with you. Any thoughts? Do I have to be on the ground in the UK to have that option?
I’ve seen a few reports with users mentioning that their 930 would allow only the first three digits to be entered before popping up a list of available postcodes. Also have sen that it appears many are missing. One moderator noted that TT seems to be very behind on database currency on postcodes. In June (I think), TT did post an update for the zip file, tho it was for v7 maps. Not positive it woould help, but the link is here:
http://tomtom.com/updates/zipcodes/map7/wezipcodes715.zip
Well, the new application update went onto my TT930 a couple of days ago and for the most part, it appears to be an improvement. It now allows you to specify a “never use HOV lanes” preference so the TT930 isn’t as likely to lead you around in circles anymore. The icons for POI’s are smaller with little triangles to make them more like cartoon dialog balloons, unfortunately the graphics inside the icon tile is even smaller and I find it takes more attention away from the road to sort out what they are. Even the large icons for the proximity alert are difficult to recognize because the graphics inside have been reduced disproportionately. Although the setting for prompt for toll road occurs during the navigate to and recalculate original route, it does not occur during the recalculation due to changing traffic conditions, it will observe the prior preference if it the original route had prompt you on the toll road preference during the navigate or recalculate, otherwise it just assumes that you wish to take the toll road.
Unfortunately, the recalculate original no longer takes into consideration the current traffic conditions and requires you to either select minimize delays or await the periodic poll for a quicker route. This means that using recalculate won’t, depending on traffic conditions, necessarily get you a toll road prompt in order to compare a non-toll road route versus a toll road route which is why I have it set to prompt. That is to say that unless the recalculate original from your current location would normally traverse a toll road without considering current traffic, you will not be prompted for the toll road preference period, not even on the minimize delay or the traffic condition triggered minimize delay hence you will effectively not be able to plan a non-toll road route without going back through the menus to change toll road preference to always avoid toll roads.
There also seems to be a substantial hysteresis in that it takes a significant amount of delays due to changing traffic conditions before it considers a path other than your current routed path but this also means that the recalculate original will likely produce a completely different route as it would not retain the tendency to stay on the current route. Again this makes evaluating possible scenarios such as whether or not to take the toll road somewhat difficult without abandoning a tendency to stay close to the current route.
Before the update, the instructions played over the FM transmitter when it’s set to use the FM transmitter but now after the update, the instructions can be put over the internal speakers, a bluetooth audio HiFi connection, or the external phone jack but not via the FM transmitter. Although I like having the instructions over something more reliable than the FM transmitter, i would like to have the option of having it over both the internal speakers and the FM transmitter simultaneously. It sounds better over the car stereo but it’s good to be able to hear it while you fumble with the controls to find another clear frequency to use when you get too close to a distant radio station.
The minimize delays still only considers the current traffic conditions thereby not taking into account that it may take15 or 20 minutes to get to a particular segment of road and that it should really estimate what the traffic on that segment will be in 15 or 20 minutes rather than what the traffic on that segment is now. This should be easier that it sounds, now that the new maps have 7×24 IQ routes for all the subsidiary roads, it actually has the average speed profile for that distant segment for times other than the present and it’s a simple matrix to correlate a given segments future traffic conditions to current reported conditions on nearby monitored segments.
The “Always avoid HOV” option alone makes the new software worthwhile but there are still a lot of little things that I don’t like about the interface.
Prior to the update, the TT930 would not recognize my NX6000 Bluetooth handsfree as a bluetooth HiFi and I haven’t tried pairing them with the new software yet though I suspect the handsfree ear piece would be classified as an audio device whereas the TT930 would want to pair with an HiFi device hence I don’t think the twain shall meet.
The TT930 still rebooted twice while enroute to work yesterday but didn’t reboot today on the commute in. It’s not enough to say that the new software is more stable but I’m hoping that it is.
I’ve noticed that they’ve broken up the maps such that instead of all of North America, you can purchase various regions of North America. I wonder if I purchase the South Central US regional map, will it default to my older North America map when outside the regional map areas? I’d also like to know what changes were made to the maps before I purchase it. That is, it may worth purchasing the new map if the recently opened 24 lane freeway is on the new map (I’d like to see the Advanced Lane Guidance try and display 12 lanes).
I’d also like to be able to view and perhaps adjust the IQ routes information on the maps. So far, the only way I can think of inferring what the IQ route information might be is to watch a demo of a route. Maybe there’s some kind of utility to do that from the PC? (anyone know of a map viewing/editing utility?).
I would prefer if it would average in my actual travel times into the IQ route information so that my frequently traveled routes tend to reflect more recent travel times. It would be better to be able to continuously average in actual travel times from other drivers but just averaging my own in would be sufficient for between map updates. The algorithm could be real simple ie.: NEW-IQ-ESTIMATE = 0.9 * OLD-ID-ESTIMATE + 0.1 * MY-ACTUAL-TRAVELTIME. That way an erroneous travel time can’t bias it more than 10%. Another way would be to keep a record of your travel times so that outriggers greater than a standard deviation off the mean could be thrown out. It would also be good to somehow reset the statistics for a given road segment for when perhaps major construction has finished hence the old data is biased. For example, now that the 24 lane freeway is open, statistics from during the construction and from back when it was a 11 lane freeway are now meaningless.
As to the zipcodes issue that other posters have mentioned, the menu is simply previously entered in values and you don’t have to stop at entering three numbers. As you enter the numbers, it filters the list of commonly entered values, just keep entering numbers if you don’t see your zipcode on the screen.
Oh and my previous post about the speed being inferred, I meant to say that the TT930 speed measurements are consistently lower than actual speeds (not faster) which I like because I feel less guilty about speeding (I guess I was thinking of myself going faster). I know that my speedometer matches the results of radar guns because they have radar guns mounted on display signs every now and then, to tell you how fast you’re going. Hence it’s my opinion that unless you’ve changed your tire sizes, your speedometer will be more accurate for instantaneous speeds but the TT might be more accurate for longer time averaged speeds as it is just average speeds calculated from multiple position readings (note that the position readings themselves will have errors in them which we normally don’t see because the software snaps your position to a road).
A couple observations. 1) TomTom still can’t find millions of addresses in the form of NNXNNN such as 77N125 Williams Street, Anytown, MyState
2) TT is behind the curve on map subscriptions. When I bought my 920 the difference maker was the One Year Map Guarantee, which is very important in a GPS. If they offer that again this holiday season I could buy one; otherwise, no thanks.
I was wondering if a review and/or comparison can be made with TomTom and the new Nagivon 8110 GPS.
If you would, please provide your views on the Navigon 8110. Thank you.
Can the static intersection images be turned off?
Antonio - Yes.
Hello Tim, I’m new to Sat Nav. I need a unit that can be used world wide, mostly in a tourist situation. Looking at the 940 but wondering if the 720 would suffice?
NickB - the 720 doesn’t come with multi-continent maps like the 900 series does, so it would likely cost more money to add the necessary maps to the 700 series than it would be to just purchase the 900 series that comes with additional maps.
I kept my Tomtom 930 about a month and have now sold it on ebay. The unit cannot tell you which side of the road your destination is on (Tomtom support confirmed this). It also will not direct you to make a U-Turn even if it is legal (Again, tomtom support says this is because uturns are illegal in some areas, so they just avoid them entirely!). It also will not direct you to turn left across a divided road that has legal cross overs in it, at least not in Austin, TX. Instead, it will take you around the world such that you come at the destination from the other side of the road. This is really braindead and makes it almost useless for me here. Its got some great features but being able to do legal street maneuvers seems like basic features that need to be added.
Phillip, while the TomTom does not verbally tell you which side of the road the destination is on, it will show you on the map when known. Also you can report mapping errors though the TomTom MapShare program, and download corrections from other users– something you can’t do with other devices. Most users prefer the GPS not to give them any u-turns. I’m not saying the 930 is perfect, but you will find mapping errors with every GPS.
Can’t find if this GPS has a feature like Garmin 750/760 where it saves in the memory the names of the cities visited (or pulled up). It is a very important feature for my wife regarless of the voice control.
Thanks!
I see nothing in this report to make Garmin lose any sleep. Route timing and address accuracy are superb on Garmin units. Exit warnings are iffy on any GPS if you are entering the nightmare twists of St. Louis Mo. during rush hour. Here, I find that Garmin does a fine job of recalculating and going another way after I miss my exit.
I purchased the TomTom 930 over the holidays and its a great unit. I’m impressed with how quickly it picks up the satilites after it has been powered up. I am having one problem with my mobile phone. My Blackberry 8830 World Edition phone seems to see the TomTom unit when I ask it to search for Bluetooth devices but when I try to connect the TomTom unit to the phone it seaches but cannot find the phone.
TomTom hasn’t listed the 8830 on their compatibility charts, so either they have not tested it or it is known to not work. However we also have a user submitted compatibility chart where two people have reported success with a 920 which is basically the same software as the 930.
hi. im living in ireland and purchased a tomtom 930 yesterday. after driving around my neighborhood for 2 hours i have come to the conclusion that the mapping is crap. my 3 year old nuvi 660 is years ahead of the 930. too many missing streets or streets on the 930 that dont exist. driving through the country side the 930 showed me 1 mile of the map road all the time. garmin is much better for use in ireland. i think ill bring the 930 back to the shop.
tom
Which map version number are you running?
hi there tim
i think the 930 is using map version 9 and the nuvi 660 is using city nav europe nt v9
tom
There isn’t a version “9″ map for the TomTom.
ok so it must be ver 8. bought in 2005 or so.
tom
I know that my early comments were fairly damning but they did address some of my concerns with the latest update and introduced new ones which I do believe are quite serious but overall, the TT930 HAD been useful.
I say “HAD” because halfway during my Christmas trip as I had been proudly showing off the TT930 to my family, it suddenly just stopped picking up any GPS signal at all. Doesn’t matter where I am, how long I wait or how often I update the Quick GPS fix, it just sits there waiting for a “valid GPS signal”. It won’t even route without a signal so it’s basically just a really bad MP3 player now.
Mine has an annoying problem with not recognizing the traffic hook-up and it always seems to be when I need it the most. I have to reset it and often I don’t have anything small enough to poke the reset button.
I have found that if I don’t shut the unit down when I’m finished using it, the traffic feature works when I turn it on the next time and it doesn’t lock up as frequently.
I have found what I believe is a good deal on the 930. The ad says “new”. Is there a way to tell when I get it if it is indeed new or if it is refurbished. Also, does the 930 have the “30 day latest map” guarantee? I am going to Europe this summer so I want the latest maps available when I purchase the unit. Europe is the reason for the 930 and the “30 day latest map” guarantee is the reason for going “new”.
Thanks,
Mike T
Well, my TT930 is going back for an RMA replacement for the second time in six months. About the only good thing is that with each replacement, there’s so much trouble reloading the subscriptions that I have already paid for that they reset the subscriptions, at this rate, I won’t have to renew a subscription till a year after the warranty runs out but of course i doubt it will be working for more than a few days after the warranty runs out.
can you record mileage or feet when walking like a pedometer would do with the tomtom 930t.
Rick, no — there isn’t any tracklog recorder.
how long does it take to fully charge the 930 on the USB port charger?
Generally with these types of batteries and the power going to USB ports you can plan on a full charge from USB taking about twice as long as the estimated full battery life.
Hi, I have just upgraded from a Go700 to a Go 730 from ebay, Is there any way I can interegate the Tomtom to find out its actual age? It was sold as a New Unit and I just want to be sure that it is so. Was advertised as a 730T but when it arrived it was just the 730 so am now looking to buy the TMC/RDS Unit. Cheers Yan
Hi,I just purchased the tomtom go 930t and I have a few issues..
1st:my 930 looses sound alot and I have 2 reset it or sometimes it comes back on its own
2nd:the distance for the next turn is always off by a few feet or yards and that causes problems especially in big cities where there are alot of streets next to each other with no signs on them..and
3rd:why doesn’t this unit has like a little meter,or something that beeps when u r at ur turn or street there is no sound so sometimes I pass the street because the yards or feet are way off,any suggestions
1) I’m not sure. 2) Being off by only a few feet or a few yards is exceptionally good for auto GPS devices. 3) Instead of beeping, it uses voice prompts. It will prompt you ahead of the turn, and then again just before the turn.
Will the TT reorder POI’s into logic order (shortest route) once entered? The Nuvi 760 review rates this as one of its key features while nothing seems to be said about this for the TT
David C
I think you mean the “fastest” not “shortest” route.
But regardless, no, the TomTom devices do not currently have route optimization.
Hello Tim,thanks for the answers to my previous concerns,I have another question:With the 930 how do u play the music thats downloaded on the as card through the gps,everytime I go to jukebox on the device it only shows the 4 preloaded tracks on the unit not the card and I have a 4gig card with lots of music..thnx
Did you load the music on the card through the TomTom HOME program?
no I didn’t I loaded it thru wndows media,didn’t know how to do it that way
They need to be in a folder called ‘mp3′ at the root directory of the SD card, and the music files need to be in MP3 format.
I recently read a review on Amazon that said FM transmitting for VOICE INSTRUCTIONS has been REMOVED in the UK. Is this true? How would you use the TomTom 930 without the voice instructions?
The TomTom has an internal speaker that plays the voice instructions. The majority of people don’t use the FM transmitter as it prevents you from listening to the radio and rarely works well as there are often not many unused stations.
Hi Tim,
I need a new remote for my 930. The TomTom site does not indicate model#’s. After some Google time it appears that the TomTom remote family is as follows:
4D00.701 = 500/510/700/710/910
9D00.015 = 500/510/700/710/910
4M02.000 = BlueTooth 520/720/920/530/630/730/930
Do you know if this is correct? Are there other valid models for the 930?
Many thanks!
I just bought a 930, and I enjoyed having it on a recent road trip from Oklahoma to Florida. One frustration I had was trying to cancel guidance if I chose a detour. So…
HOW CAN YOU CANCEL GUIDANCE?
The way mine is configured, it is not readily apparent.
Thanks,
Dave
Hi Tim, I have 2 questions about the GO 930; first, I see that this unit does not have a compass? I presume that this means one that constantly tells you the direction you are heading and not something else? Next, I do aerial photography and many times I’m with clients discussing the photograpny, is there a way to lock in their address I’m at and convert it to Lat / Lon which is what I use for flight navigation?
Thanks for a great review!
Jan
well it sorta has a compass. On the display preferences you can select for a compass icon which is a little arrow that’s supposed to point more or less towards north and there’s also a setting to display heading. If you press the lower right side of the screen and then press the middle of the right side of the screen, it’ll display satellite signal strengths, a skyview of the satellites and lattitude longitude readings.
Note that it seems to calculate the headings based on recent movement i.e.: it uses at least two GPS data points to calculate the direction it is moving and uses that as the heading. If you’ve been standing still, the compass heading can easily be wrong and it’s difficult to get accurate headings when you’re a pedestrian.
My Go 930 has stopped recognizing my computer and I can no longer even turn it on though the charging light comes on. Is there a way to fix this without resetting the 930? I really don’t want to lose my inputs. Thanks!
Joel, you can tap the reset button without losing any data.
I own the TomTom 930T. After battling TomTom for the last few weeks, I have determined that this is the most expensive POS I have. 1- You cannot search for any address that contains a space or dash (the keyboard does not contain those keys). 90%+ of the addresses on the island of Oahu contain dashes. 2- Traffic feature is so undependable, that using it will granutee you will get stuck in traffic. The East bound lanes have been all but closed for the past 3 weeks on the H-1 Freeway here, but the 930 has continually showed no delays and chosen to route you right to it. 3- The cheap materials they use for the casing have already started coming apart after less than a months use. I will be seeeking a refund. TomTom is no doubt not ready to compete with the big boys.
Is there a way to edit the list of recent destinations, to delete ones no longer needed, but keep those that are needed? It appears that the only option is to retain or delete the entire list. I realize that I can save a destination as a Favorite or POI, but I would like to reserve these designations for truely useful Favorites or POIs, rather than an occasional destination I may use a few times over a brief time period, and then never again (e.g. when in a different city).
Howard, no. You delete all or none. I use the Custom POI feature to store “permanent” favorites. This also has the advantage of being backed up and transfered to new maps should you upgrade. Then I use “favorites” to store locations I might use once or twice on a trip and soon delete.
Thanks, Tim. That’s a very helpful suggestion.
Purchased the GO930 2 months ago after returning from deployment and researching reviews on personal GPS units. This was supposed to be the BEST unit to get and had the latest features for vehicle use. It has since been more trouble then it is worth. Will not reset, will not recognize computer and will no longer turn on. All this after downloading the latest update several weeks ago. No luck with TomTom support and have finally given up with this unit. Anyone reading this post, it is highly recommended that you do NOT spend your money or waste your time with any TomTom product. I have already been researching a Garmin unit. Hopefully the vehicle units are as good as their handheld Rhino units which I have used in the past.
I’m on my third device (second RMA) with the TT930. If you keep at it with customer service you can get support but you must dedicate a lot of time out of your work day to do so. Make sure you keep a scanned image of your receipt on your computer to email them when they ask for proof of purchase and expect each firmware update to destabilize the product for several weeks. Also you need to get an additional 4GB sd card if you intend to have both North America and Europe maps loaded at the same time. Otherwise, for the few times when it does work, it’s nice to have.
Hi Tim,recently I was in a city going through the poi’s and there was no listings for auto parts stores(ex. autozone,advance auto,pepboys..)there were only auto dealers and repair shops and none of the stores I needed didnt come up under them,is there any way to add or download a poi catagory that has then stores in it,I feel they are important poi’s when u are traveling from cict 2 city….Thanks
Anthony
I don’t know off hand, Anthony. But you can check in TomTom HOME as many people have added their own categories and lists.
Hello Anthony
I found autozone on my TT930 under the Shops POI. I guess they consider it a regular store rather than a separate category.
I am travelling to Eastern europe this summer. I would like to know if I can use Tom Tom 930 while walking in streets of Budapest and Prague.
Hi Tim
I was wonder is there a way to put my 930t on any kinda truck route so I can use it at work,if not what gps would u suggest for that cause the 930 won’t do me to much good if not.
Thanks Anthony
I have a TomTom GO 930 which until recently worked flawlessly with my AT&T Motorola Razr2 V9. All of a sudden, the speaker on the 930 does not work when calling or receiving call via blutooth link. The speaker DOES work with all other applications AND other cellphones. When I get a call, I have to go to the mobile phone screen and transfer the audio to my cellphone. No settings were changed…it just stopped working. Any ideas?
My TT930 did that as well right after the last application update. After a few weeks, and many resets, the handsfree mysteriously started working again. This isn’t the first time the handsfree stopped working for a few weeks after a firmware upgrade and each firmware update introduces some very annoying “features”. This time, the middle button on the remote now toggles between 2D and 3D view instead of pausing and unpausing the Jukebox. Given the tendency for the TT930 to somehow forget to unpause the music after some spoken instructions, it was convenient to be able to conveniently hit pause and unpause to try and free the jukebox from it’s locked state but now it’s just a useless toggle between views which really doesn’t make sense since people’s preferences would be to one or the other not to toggling between the two. The TT930’s weirdness is one reason that I did not bother subscribing to their map update program. I figure that by the time my map is a year or two old, I should be able to find something else that actually works.
TomTom didn’t release version 8 until a couple of months ago.
that must be the version. when i went on line for updates tomtom said my version was 4 months old.
its in the box for return to the shop tomorrow.
the errors are too much in the mapping. im sure the mapping in your country is 100%
tom
There isn’t any country where the mapping is 100%.
thanks for the info tim. the errors are too much. i tried the 930 in my known area. it was way out . ill stick with garmin because of the navteq good mapping in ireland.
hopefully ,soon , teleatlas will map ireland to the same level as navteq and then ill return to tomtom. i have a tomtom for use in north america.
tom.
ps happy new year to all