Satellite Navigation Device Comparison.
As mentioned on the main Satellite Navigation page, one useful factor about having both the Garmin and the Noza Tec was that their different programming meant that they sometimes suggested different routes and one could make a choice as to which was more appropriate. The identification of the piracy problem meant that we no longer had a backup to the Garmin Camper which might provide such alternative routes. As it happened a small windfall came along so I started looking round at what else was available.
This article documents our real world (rather than scientific) experiences of using several devices.
I had been impressed by Mitac's MiVue 518 dash camera and found that they also had a range of truck sat navs. I contacted Mitac to ask whether any of their devices could handle third party POIs (including my own Motorhome Parking ones) and was advised to purchase the Spirit 6970 LM Truck as the most appropriate of their range. When the device first arrived (end of January 2016) it looked pretty good but when it actually came to using it on the road it crashed within a few minutes. Subsequent contact with Mitac suggested that it hadn't sufficient free main storage once the maps and POIs had been loaded, despite having a 32GB MicroSD card installed. It seemed that the software was not intelligent enough to reserve free space for itself and had installed all the data in main memory rather than on the card (even though it had formatted the card to receive the data). There was no way of forcing data onto the card through the installation program and it was not clear whether manually moving the data would work so the unit, regretfully, had to be returned for refund.
I decided some years ago that Snooper was no good to me because the company doesn't allow customers to load/update their own POI sets (obviously a non-starter for somebody with a big Motorhome Parking set). I have been told that Aguri has the same policy. I had looked at Falcon products at shows but been unimpressed by the screen responsiveness compared to other devices.
That, basically, left TomTom. There had been stories that when the latest range of devices was first released it was impossible to add third party POI sets. That had, apparently, been overcome though and the web pages for the Trucker 5000 and 6000 included the text “Upload your favourite community Points of Interests to your TomTom Trucker” alongside a graphic showing icons for them in the map. In the event I found (after buying a Trucker 5000) that whilst POI sets could be added there was no way of adding (and displaying) icons. Posts on the TomTom forum indicated that this was a long standing problem with only vague assurances that it would be solved. I contacted the TomTom CEO to complain and requested that TomTom purchase the Trucker 5000 from me as I had only bought it because the company misled me. Instead it was proposed that I return the Trucker 5000 and TomTom would send me a Pro Truck 5150 unit (only one of which was still in stock, apparently) from the previous generation of devices (which does allow and display POIs properly) to use until they fix the problem (which appears as if it might turn out to be permanent). Because we were going away at Easter it was agreed that I would use the Trucker 5000 on that trip and then send it back for replacement by the Pro Truck 5150.
When the Pro Truck 5150 arrived my initial reaction had to be “what a difference”. Quite apart from the fact that the Pro Truck 5150 handles third party POI sets correctly, the graphics are so much clearer and easy to understand than the Trucker 5000 (which are somewhat blocky and childish) and the menus are so much simpler to use. The overlaid/swipe menu on the Trucker 5000 is an over-complicated feature which replaced a simple structure when that was not needed. If one didn't know it to be the case it would be somewhat difficult to believe that the Trucker is the successor to the Pro Truck, rather than vice versa, because it is such a superior device.
The failure of the Mio Spirit 6970 LM Truck was disappointing as it seemed to be a friendly user interface so when (April 2016) a new Combo 5207 LM Truck was offered for auction on eBay I put in a relatively low bid and won it.
The first chance to compare the TomTom Pro Truck 5150 and the Mio Combo 5207 LM Truck with the Garmin Camper 760 LMT-D came with the trip to the 2016 Peterborough motorhome show.
On both legs of the journey the TomTom gave the closest estimate of the total journey time (about 5 minutes underestimate in the end). The Mio said 10 minutes less than the TomTom and the Garmin 20 minutes less. All three units followed the same route to Peterborough, the most logical one. At the start of the return leg, though, the TomTom disagreed with the other two units. We left the Showground at around 8:10am, exiting onto Orton Parkway. The TomTom recommended the first exit at the roundabout rather than the third. The fastest route, normally, is to drive south to the Fletton Parkway and then east to the A1 then turn north. Taking the first exit and then turning left onto Oundle Road across the A1 means using a right turn onto the A1 slip road just east of Chesterton which can be awkward when there is heavy traffic going toward Peterborough city centre. I assume there was probably a matter of seconds between the two routes but it didn't seem to take into account the ease of the former route for a large vehicle (being all dual carriageway).
The TomTom Pro Truck 5150 worked mainly as I wanted it to though I was unable to find out how to turn off speed camera alerts, which was a bit irritating (I've since found out how to remove the alerts). The graphics and screen layout are far superior to the Trucker 5000. I also realised (when the Garmin reported a broken down vehicle on the route) that the Traffic Service was not working. Happily I was navigating, rather than driving, so was able to investigate and try to turn the service on. I was surprised to receive a message "LIVE services are not currently available, Try again later." and even more surprised (when searching the forum later) to find that this is a somewhat common occurrence - i.e. Live services are often unavailable.
I informed TomTom of the failure of the Traffic Service and initially received a link to a FAQ which was basically useless as it only dealt with correcting errors connected to the device itself, not failure on the TomTom side. After further investigation I started to wonder whether something had gone wrong during the service activation process. My TomTom management contact got his technical team to reactivate the live services on my device remotely and that solved the problem. Unfortunately, in doing so the technical team removed the Lifetime Maps subscription – but it was reinstated when I reported it.
Initially the Mio 5207 LM Truck displayed the same fault as the Spirit 6970 LM Truck in that it calculated the route but then, within a minute, froze with an unresponsive screen. That was despite the fact that I had deleted all but the UK map and ensured that there was well over 3GB of free space on the internal drive. As I was navigating I was able to look at the settings and discovered that the problem was the result of the alert settings for the 16 custom POI categories I had loaded. They were all on the default setting of visual and audible alert. Resetting them all to no alert meant that the unit worked OK and the POIs close enough to the route showed up on the screen, which was what I required. That indicated that there must be a limit on the number of POI categories for which alerts can be handled but there is nothing in the documentation to indicate what it is.
There was another problem with the Mio on the return journey. We stopped to fill up with LPG and when we restarted the unit was unable to obtain a GPS signal. It took several tries at resetting the unit and switching it off and on to clear the problem. Strangely the problem did not reoccur when we called in for diesel just before we arrived home, the unit found the GPS signal just as it should have. Obviously, though, that sort of problem is one which needs a passenger to sort out and is something to follow up with Mio. Otherwise the Mio was easy enough to use and to follow.
I reported the problems to Mio but had to chase up the response a few weeks later as the request had been closed. Mio said this was a mistake due to to high support demand which had caused delays. They also said that it still sounded strange that the unit was freezing up with only 16 custom POIs while having only the UK map installed on it as, generally, the devices should be able to have up to 12,000 custom POIs installed on them. I explained that 16 is the number of categories of my POIs rather than total, that over the 16 categories there are a total of 24727 individual POIs and that they had been added to the device correctly. At the time of writing Mio are yet to comment further. It was suggested that the GPS location failure was probably a one-off and that appears to be the case.
I had also been experimenting with sun shades to reduce screen glare. We had a 7 inch shade which came with the Noza Tec and that fitted the Garmin well and was effective. I bought a 5” shade which fits with a spring clip (eBay item number: 181572440688) which fitted the TomTom (and the Garmin Nuvi 2569 we use in the car) well and that was also effective. Following a recommendation on Motorhome Fun I also bought a 5” and 7” shade from China (eBay item numbers: 262316031563 and 171909819085) which arrived whilst we were at Peterborough. The 7” one is more robust than the one I had and fits the Garmin Camper well. The 5” one fits the TomTom well meaning I could keep the spring clip shade for the Garmin Nuvi 2569. I did have a problem, however, with the Mio as the offset mount fouled the fittings of both the 5” shades. I solved that problem by cutting another slot for one of the clips at the centre. That holds the shade in place without the fouling. A trip to and from Wales at the end of April confirmed that the altered sun shade did prove effective, as did the unaltered similar one on the TomTom.
On the Wales trip both the Garmin and TomTom traffic features worked OK in that they gave advance warning of roadworks on the route but neither seemed as good as reports on BBC radio (combination of Radio 2 and local station reports). The Garmin is a lifetime feature but the TomTom has a limited life and, on the initial evidence, does not seem worth the cost of extending the subscription.
The ability of the TomTom to turn off display of built in POIs is an advantage over the Garmin, which does not allow that. The Mio automatically sets the maximum speed to 60 mph in Truck mode with no option for the user to change it. Speed warnings can be turned off but the screen shows 60 max even in a 70 zone.
The Garmin always calculates a shorter journey time, seemingly because it bases its calculations on maximum road speeds rather than expected for the vehicle type. The TomTom has proved pretty accurate in its journey time calculation with the Mio in between. However, all three units are supposed to learn from travel history so that might improve.
Lane guidance is good on all three units. Photo real varies for different junctions but is no problem.
The Mio battery tends to lose its charge if not used for a while whereas the Garmin and TomTom hold the charge well. That's a bit of a pain if the unit isn't used for a while and one wishes to plan routes at home as needing to be plugged in can make satellite visibility difficult.
On trips in 2015 we came across a couple of roads which we would wish to avoid in future. Entering them as specific avoidances is easy on the Garmin, frustratingly difficult (to the point of giving up) on the Mio and not possible on the TomTom.
On checking I found that the Mio camera had not recorded any of the journey to Wales and back. Investigation showed that the camera has to be switched on every time the unit is powered up if one wishes to record (unlike the Mio 518 dash cam I have which automatically starts when 12v power is supplied to it). The Mio camera initially proved fiddly to set up in general but that was soon overcome by repeated use of the unit.
On returning from Wales we decided to call at Teesside Park for fuel rather than leaving the A19 at the A1032 junction as programmed. The TomTom would have taken us onto the A66 and A1032 to compensate but both the Mio and Garmin would have taken us up the A19 to the A1046, round the roundabout and back down the A19. When we left the fuel station the TomTom directed us along the A66 and A1032 whilst the Garmin and Mio would have taken us north on the A19 to then swing back south to the A1032 junction.
Our next trip (to Hipperholme) gave an opportunity to observe the traffic warnings on the TomTom & Garmin resulting from an accident at the junction of the A1 and M1. The TomTom flagged the delay about 20 miles away and the Garmin about 15 miles away. The delay time on the TomTom started at 2 minutes, rose to 14 minutes at its highest and then fluctuated through the problem area. The Garmin originally gave a delay time of 5 minutes, which rose to 17 minutes and fluctuated through the problem area, more slowly than the TomTom. The actual total delay was about 25 minutes, obviously both devices were adjusting for delay left through the problem area.
Leaving the accident scene both devices flagged up potential delays – TomTom about 22 miles away (2 minutes) and Garmin about 25 miles away (<5 minutes). They were 2 different incidents neither of which caused an actual delay.
On the return leg of that trip it seemed that the devices had learned driving style because the three estimated arrival times were closer to each other than on previous journeys.
On playing back the Mio camera recordings from the Hipperholme trip I found that it did not link to Google maps properly as it does with the dedicated MiVue 518. I contacted Mio to ask their advice but, unfortunately, that ended up as anything but a straightforward process with the result that the Mio was not available for use on our next trip, to the south coast.
On that trip (where we stayed at five different places so had half a dozen routes to calculate) both the Garmin and TomTom performed reasonably well but did recommend different routes at times. The Garmin still tends to be more willing to use narrower roads which, though passable, some drivers would find challenging. There were a couple of instances where the TomTom recommended a route which was longer/slower than necessary. That could be due to settings but nothing obvious stood out so requires further investigation. The fact that the two units recommended different routes was useful because it prompted us to make more detailed checks.
One instance flagged up a problem with TomTom's traffic service. Our first stop (so the start of our second route) was at Brailes in Warwickshire, where mobile phone coverage is patchy. On starting off the TomTom failed to obtain a signal from Vodafone and continued to fail throughout our run to Salisbury. It did, however, pick up a signal properly when we left Salisbury.
Mitac have since corrected the playback problem (which lay in the viewer software rather than the software on the device) so we were able to use the Combo 5207 LM Truck on our subsequent trips. After initial problems with the UK support office the attitude of Mio as a company (including the personal involvement of the Service Director based in their Taiwan HQ) was very good, and a marked contrast to TomTom. I was given a second Combo 5207 LM Truck device in case of any further problems with the original one but have not needed to use it so far.
The next trip was up the A19 to Sunderland. When I input the coordinates of the destination at home, in preparation, I noticed that the Garmin chose the road off the A19 which I expected (A1231) whilst the TomTom chose the A1018 through the city (I didn't check the Mio at the time). On the actual journey, though, the TomTom directed us to use the A184 rather than the A1231, which I initially assumed was because of potential road works hold-ups. I noticed, though, that the Mio (which uses the same basic maps but does not have the same traffic facility and daily community updates) also went for the A184. In the event we went for the A1231, as we knew that route more or less, and although the Garmin had mentioned the road works it was only a mention rather than anything significant. On the return journey all three units recommended using the A184. That was not surprising for the Garmin and TomTom, as event traffic was heavy on the A1231 that day, but doesn't explain why the Mio chose it without benefit of traffic data. Presumably it was because the A1231 has a number of roundabouts which might make it more awkward for trucks.
The next test was a trip to Dalkeith. The route, initially, is up the A19 and through the Tyne Tunnel to pick up the A1 at Cramlington, but from Morpeth there are two main alternatives - continue up the A1 or take the A697/A68. A friend is well versed in both routes and confirmed that the A1 was preferable as it has less twists and turns. When we set off the estimated arrival times of the TomTom and Mio were similar (with the Garmin being over-optimistic as normal) but the TomTom recommended the A697 whilst the Garmin and Mio opted for the A1. Bearing in mind the advice received we opted for the A1. Given the small difference in estimated journey times we expected that the TomTom would quickly recalculate and opt for the A1 instead. In the event it took about 10 miles to do so, during which time the ETA increased by about half an hour. We were advised to take a mixture of minor routes and to turn back on ourselves as we progressed, neither alternative being appropriate for a large vehicle. Eventually TomTom announced that it had found an alternative route which was 14 minutes quicker - straight up the A1. When I opted to take that the ETA actually reduced by about half an hour, back to very close to TomTom's original ETA when we set off from Teesside. Strange, then, that it didn't recalculate more quickly.
A return trip to Ripon from Middlesbrough was interesting. The routes chosen by all three devices left the A168/A1 South at J49 but the Garmin opted for the minor road through Sharow whilst the TomTom and Mio went the expected route of A1 North to J50 and the A61. Returning, the Garmin initially went for the B6265 road to Boroughbridge and then (when that was ignored) the Sharow road and then a further right turn on a minor road to go through Sharow. Surprisingly the Mio also chose the Sharow road, only the TomTom opting for the reverse of the way in.
Reading a number of forums it appears that increasing the vehicle width and weight can help avoid minor roads but that may be at the expense of missing some which are perfectly usable. I decided to try it, though, and have increased the weight to 5 tonnes and the width to 8 feet (maximum which TomTom allows) on each device.
Our next two (round) trips were to Lincoln Showground and the NEC so no "challenging" minor roads involved. However, on the Lincoln trip the TomTom and Garmin both displayed inaccurate speed limits on the A15. Reporting that to Garmin (with a recommendation to contact Lincolnshire County Council for the details of the various limits on the road) was straightforward but not so TomTom. Because I hadn't been able to jot down the exact location of a 40 mph limit, which the unit did not show, I was unable to use their reporting tool. The only way of recommending contacting LCC was to raise a forum post in the hope that a TomTom staffer would pick it up. Unfortunately that sort of thing has proved not to be unusual with TomTom.
On the trip to the NEC I used the coordinates for the temporary camp site. Both theTomTom and Garmin recommended leaving the M42 at junction 9 onto the A446 whilst the Mio directed us to use junction 6. The latter tied in with the instructions provided by the Caravan Club (which said turn off the sat nav on leaving the motorway and follow specific signs) so we drove past junction 9 (both the TomTom and Garmin then changed to agree with the Mio) and left at junction 6. Unfortunately we missed a sign but, using the Mio, found our way again and arrived OK. Checking up, after arrival, we worked out that had we left at junction 9 we would have been taken to the correct destination anyway. The journey back from the NEC was uneventful, all three units giving the same route, but there was a failure in the much vaunted TomTom traffic information system. Some 35 miles or so from home the Garmin notified us of an accident, with lane closure, that had happened a couple of miles from our destination. A radio traffic report came on at about the same time. The warning was repeated as we came closer to the location. TomTom, however, did not notify us of the incident at all.
The main problem with the TomTom was the abysmal MyDrive Connect updating software. Eventually, in October, it became so bad that I told TomTom I really wanted my money back, to which they agreed. The Pro 5150 Truck was sent back to TomTom on 28th October and I received a refund.
The Garmin Camper 760 LMT-D is still our favourite device but the Mio Combo 5207 LM Truck is a useful backup.
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Last updated: 15 November 2016