Are built in Sat Nav's worth it?

Are built in Sat Nav's worth it?

Author
Discussion

Barbarella

Original Poster:

6 posts

104 months

Friday 31st July 2015
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Many new cars have Sat Nav's these days, but some are optional. The basic ones seem to be £500 - £1000, with top of the range 'live traffic' ones costing up to £2500! Are they really worth that? Is not a Tom Tom or Garmin, or even a free smart phone one just as good?

Slushbox

1,484 posts

104 months

Friday 31st July 2015
quotequote all
Barbarella said:
Many new cars have Sat Nav's these days, but some are optional. The basic ones seem to be £500 - £1000, with top of the range 'live traffic' ones costing up to £2500! Are they really worth that? Is not a Tom Tom or Garmin, or even a free smart phone one just as good?
For some, blowing £1000 or more on the 'infotainment' system gets them an integrated dashboard and no wires strewn through the cockpit. Map updates can be expensive or not forthcoming.

For me, a Garmin Nuvi with live traffic, mounted on an air vent is neat, I can load in contour maps as well as street maps, I can plug it into my PC for the free lifetime map updates, and it works as Bluetooth hands free for the phone. Cost:£120.

But,I would prefer a nice Android screen on the dash instead of the old radio in there.

Aren't you getting a new Lexus? What does that have?

Barbarella

Original Poster:

6 posts

104 months

Friday 31st July 2015
quotequote all
Yes, well spotted. It's an optional extra at £995. I don't have to make my mind up yet as it can be fitted when the car is in. At first I did think I would just get a Tom Tom or a Garmin (like you have done) but the built in one is tempting, although I am not sure as I would rarely use it. Hence the post, I'm just not sure if they are worth the huge cost. If they are better then Tom Tom etc then maybe. I've never had one, so I don't know. I do have a very old Tom Tom, which I would upgrade if I went down that route.

stuartmmcfc

8,653 posts

191 months

Friday 31st July 2015
quotequote all
No, they're not really worth it.
My Wife has one fitted to her car and its not as user friendly as her old TomTom .
However it looks neat, as previously said.
The fact it was a company car and the addition of it didnt finacially affect us swung it.
If she had to pay for it herself then the decision would have been a lot harder.

Slushbox

1,484 posts

104 months

Friday 31st July 2015
quotequote all
Well, I still have the hots for an integrated LCD screen 'something' but for me that's only a £250 option.

Also the current sucker-mount jobs are very competent, my Garmin Nuvi 2597LMT has today just updated its Euro-maps for free, downloaded a language pack for Hungarian, which I'm sure never to use, and a system update, plus 2000 point's of interest (POI's) of European hotels which I do use.

I drive on the continent quite often, and the inbuilt Garmin POI's, particularly gas stations and restaurants are very useful (for me.) Also, I find the live traffic useful, though others say it's always too late, or they don't like being diverted when the sat-nav decides the road ahead is a bit slow.

It's this flexibility which might be missing in the inbuilt options, so I keep the Garmin and eschew the in-built. BlueTooth hands-free is must, though.

audidoody

8,595 posts

255 months

Monday 3rd August 2015
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No - they are not worth it. You are really just paying for aesthetic looks (integration, no wires) and higher resale potential (but not higher resale price).

Tom-Tom Live Traffic, Waze, and Google Maps are superior in the real world. And I speak as someone with a Mercedes with Comand who has just driven back from France using a TomTom Live Traffic Go60 which cost £125!

In a couple of years all cars will come with an integrated 'dumb' system that will link to iOS or Android smartphones.

Jonno02

2,246 posts

108 months

Monday 3rd August 2015
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Have one in my second hand Leon. Looks great with the touch screen etc and was a great help on a visit to Liverpool from Glasgow recently, but I wouldn't pay £1500-2500 for it on a brand new car.

Leeskiramm

36 posts

105 months

Monday 3rd August 2015
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audidoody said:
No - they are not worth it. You are really just paying for aesthetic looks (integration, no wires) and higher resale potential (but not higher resale price).

Tom-Tom Live Traffic, Waze, and Google Maps are superior in the real world. And I speak as someone with a Mercedes with Comand who has just driven back from France using a TomTom Live Traffic Go60 which cost £125!

In a couple of years all cars will come with an integrated 'dumb' system that will link to iOS or Android smartphones.
Waze is IMO the best sat nav app. Admittedly my car doesn't have an inbuilt, but it beats my dad's S80 inbuilt sat nav because it actually has all the roads that exist. Oh and it has amazing crowd reporting of anything from police to debris on the road. Case in point; on the Paris ring road it brings up that there are police sitting on the on slip, Audi goes past 20kph over the limit, they catch up and pull him over. Could easily have been us without Waze.

hman

7,487 posts

193 months

Monday 3rd August 2015
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Buy a tom tom or use your phone, then which ever car you drive (your car, wifes car, hire car etc etc) ALWAYS has sat nav.



jonwm

2,504 posts

113 months

Monday 3rd August 2015
quotequote all
I have built in navs in both my cars (1 Company, 1 Private) they both came included with the spec, I probably would have specced it in my company car as I like it when I’m in an unfamiliar place and can easily flick it on and have that comfort of getting home etc, I think the wife has used it once in the leon, its quite basic compared to the Audi system and the touch screen can be an effort, only does 5 digit post code too.

I find if the traffic is bad the Audi system just tells me about it, very rarely diverts me, last week when the M1 got shut I flicked in my google maps on the iphone and it guided me all through the countryside down to the M25, my in built was constantly taking me back to the closed M1 grrr.

I still have my tom tom for when I go abroad and get hire cars etc, seems most cars that appear on my company car list have them as standard now, I guess it’s the lure for the reps, most models have “business editions” and satnav is always included.

hman

7,487 posts

193 months

Monday 3rd August 2015
quotequote all
BUT!

If its a company car then the optional £1000 for sat nav is added to the purchase price - and its the purchase price including optional extras which you then pay your BIK tax on.

fk paying BIK on a £1000 extra which are generally a lot less use than a £80 tom tom.




waremark

3,241 posts

212 months

Tuesday 4th August 2015
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I have the built in ones in our cars and would not buy an upmarket car without.I also have a top of the range stick on (currently Garmin 3598 LMTD).

Advantages of the built in ones:

The dash looks prettier
It is pretty to have a large map up even when you are not using it
No trailing wires, nor need to have the compartment containing the lighter socket open
They often come with better phone integration
They are always instant on whereas stick ons sometimes take time to find themselves
They know what direction you are facing when you start off from stopped
They keep going fairly accurately even in tunnels whereas stick ons can get confused when the view of the sky is obscured by high buildings
They never fall off the screen!
Vonce directions come over multiple speakers. You can choose whether the hifi sound is lowered or muted for directions
Key directions are often duplicated in the centre of the dash or in head up displays.

Advantages of stick ons

Easier and quicker to set destinations
Better traffic in my experience - well worth getting one with Live Traffic (TT) or Digital Traffic (Garmin)
Generally more features (I require the ability to create a multi stop route on Google earth and transfer it to the satnav - not possible on most built ins)
Easy and cheap/free to update the maps (which generally include a speed limit display, which is useless if not updated)
Easy and relatively cheap to replace when a better one comes out (I am a sucker for the latest toy)
Equally good or better navigation
You can set up your destination over breakfast

Edited by waremark on Tuesday 4th August 10:12

Slushbox

1,484 posts

104 months

Tuesday 4th August 2015
quotequote all
Most of the Garmins will display two or more maps at once. So you can add contour maps to the street level map screen, for instance. Or, you can switch from one map to the other very easily. A MicroSD card is mostly needed to add storage.

Free maps for Garmins from OpenStreetMaps are available for most countries of the world from:

http://garmin.openstreetmap.nl/

as well as routable bike maps.

Also the Garmins work well with BaseCamp, the free Garmin PC app. BaseCamp is not much loved but it does let you back up your waypoints, transfer them between devices, create new ones and plan routes. Also it will update the maps and voices in the sat-nav very easily and display OpenStreetMaps from the device.

There's log file graphing and so on.

Interestingly, my Garmin 2597 LMT even 'works' under water; in the Channel Tunnel it extrapolates from the last speed and position and continues to display a moving position on the map even halfway to France. Spooky to watch.

Edited by Slushbox on Tuesday 4th August 10:10

Nimby

4,572 posts

149 months

Friday 7th August 2015
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Map updates for built-in units can be very expensive (£150 for mine, and £25 just for a speed camera update). Both are proprietary format of course, so you can't use anyone else's data.

Slushbox

1,484 posts

104 months

Friday 7th August 2015
quotequote all
The young and wild are now fitting Chinese £200 touch-screen Android radios.

There are plenty of apps like 'Maps for me', with free OpenStreetMap mapping, which is down-loadable and doesn't need online data. Internet radio with a gazillion stations, MP3 players, the lot.

Park outside your house and use your own wifi to update, for free. :-).

Coupled with Android 'dashboard' apps like Road Sidekick and Torque; the engine management OBD reader app, you can build a flight-deck like a 747, even with a £60 Android tablet.

BlueTooth it to the basic OEM radio and your phone, and there's enough nerdery for anyone.

ClaphamGT3

11,269 posts

242 months

Friday 7th August 2015
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You try selling on any decent car without sat-nav....

djglover

423 posts

216 months

Friday 7th August 2015
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Not worth it, from a user point of view. I got it in my BMW for 2 reasons. 1 resale, 2 neater

We got a tom tom for the yeti and it's simply a much better unit as a sat nav than what comes with a bmw


Goggy

16 posts

108 months

Friday 7th August 2015
quotequote all
It is a right bag of worms.
For:
Fitted, so no wires.
Looks great.
Better when selling the car?
Against:
Cost - it can be silly money for what you get. A Tom Tom or Garmin is much better value for money.
Expensive updates compared with Tom Tom etc which are often free.
Not as easy to use (in some cases).
Not portable.
If you keep the car long term, having Sat Nav will make little difference when selling the car, as in say (7-10 years) technology could have made the current systems obsolete. Or so I read.

If you will use it a lot, then fine. If it for occasional use only then a Tom Tom/Garmin, or even a ap for your smartphone will do the job just as well or better.


HairyMaclary

3,649 posts

194 months

Tuesday 11th August 2015
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Yes it's worth it.

I have a TomTom live built into my Laguna 3. Bit peeved to pay £18 for 18 months live traffic and £29 for all of europe map update.

bad company

18,484 posts

265 months

Friday 14th August 2015
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ClaphamGT3 said:
You try selling on any decent car without sat-nav....
That's what I was thinking. yes