problems with TomTom

Anybody else have this problem? From a little internet research, I can see I'm not alone. Wife buys me a TomTom for Christmas. Works great. Kept getting the message to hook it up to my computer and have it updated. My wife, being much more computer savvy than I am, does as TomTom recommends. Instead of "updating", it wipes everything out. Unit won't even turn on. Spend hours on the phone with TomTom tech trying to reboot my GPS. Final solution is to mail it back to them and for a fee, they will fix it. One year warranty wasn't valid because I didn't register it on the computer with them as soon as I opened the box. "We have no way of knowing when you bought it unless you register it or can produce the receipt." A quick scan of Amazon yields tons of results for reconditioned units. Guess I know why.

Use your iPhone, it works much better.

I'd be literally lost without my iPhone or at least today I would have been.

"We have of no way of knowing when you bought it...."

Yeah, right. What they want to say but won't because you may not like to hear it is something like " ....you didn't register it, so how do we even know it's yours?"

With codes on food nowadays, I laugh at the suggestion that a manufacturer of ANY consumer good wouldn't be able to have a clue as to when you MIGHT have bought it.

That said, I'm bad for skipping the "initial" registration route, too.

I did this to my knock-off GPS

http://netfresco.com/MioPocket/default.aspx

Same experience here tr8todd.

Tomtom had the audacity to send me a "write a review for your device" link, I did surprisingly they didn't publish it.

Avoid Tomtom GPS's they suck, here are some of the issues:

-Won't route from one side of a city to the other (Mississauga, ON)

-They bricked the unit on a support call, I convinced them to at least send me the old map so I could try and fix it.

-Won't find a street name in the city of Toronto unless you know the name of the former suburb first (the amalgamation happed in 1998 - you would think plenty of time to update maps)

-POI's suck. It thinks mosport international raceway is at the intersection of a concession road and train tracks, it can't find major hockey arena's.

-It doesn't recognize the difference between streets that have an E/W designation (sure it lets you select one, but don't expect to take you to the correct one on the map)

-The on/off switch sucks

-The map guarantee didn't apply in my case as it was a gift (although I was talking to tech support on the 2nd day I owned it and gave them all my info, I couldn't supply the receipt), but I could pay more and buy a map update.

This is all at the top of my head, so in summary if you want a device that might (or in some cases won't) get you to where you are going buy a tomtom, in all other cases buy something else.

Grtechguy wrote: I did this to my knock-off GPS http://netfresco.com/MioPocket/default.aspx

That looks interesting, but I can't quite figure out what you gain with it. So you hack a GPS, ok, so what?

I had the same problem with two identical Tom Tom units. Tech support sucked, making me mail back their crappy unit on my own dime and stipulating how it was to be packaged.

Bought myself a cheap, entry-level Garmin 3 years ago at Christmas that is still working fine, and bought a nicer Garmin with lifetime map updates for 100 bucks this year.

Couldn't be happier.

I would like to hack my GPS to just be a in dash monitor. I have high technology dreams in a sledge hammer reality.

foxtrapper wrote:

Grtechguy wrote: I did this to my knock-off GPS http://netfresco.com/MioPocket/default.aspx

That looks interesting, but I can't quite figure out what you gain with it. So you hack a GPS, ok, so what?

Fixes a lot of issues and adds MANY features (routes, waypoints, etc)

My Tauntaun has been acting up too.

Oh. Wait.....