2010 Nav comments

[tpollard95124]

Maybe I came to this with too high expectations given what I had heard about the changes to the 2010 nav and what I got from my 4 year old $200 Garmin unit, but I am sadly unimpressed.

I figured spoken street names would be a given - but "turn right on road" for a major freeway intersection just doesn't cut it!

Also does anyone know if there is a way to get advance turn directions in the 2010 nav? On my old Garmin you just touch the little arrow at the bottom right of the screen and keep touching it to produce the subsequent turns. I can't seem to find a way to do this with the BMW nav

[Penguin]

The 2010 Nav system is abysmal. Having recently traveled from Chicago to Phoenix and back, I can say that the next time I will take my Garmin along and use it instead.

Someday I'll catalog all that is wrong with it, but for now here's a few:

(1) It often confuses what city things are in. If you want some fun, try looking up a hotel in Van Horn, Texas, and then route to it. It will then show the street addresss as being in Kent, Texas, all the while actually directing you to Van Horn, while telling you it is taking you to Kent (Van Horn and Kent are about 40 miles apart, so it's not like a suburb or anything).

(2) Several times the Nav randomly announced "prepare to turn Left" or "Prepare to turn Right" while the map showed absolutely no turns on the route for at least 25 miles ahead.

(3) Often fuel stations at exits were not shown accurately, with the Nav locating them smack-dab in the middle of the interstate. As a result, it would not tell you to take the exit. Clearly Teleatlas did not have the actual GPS coordinates of the stations, but just the exit number. So they just located it in the middle of the interstate at the exit location.

(4) The POI database is very poor compared to Garmin and others that use Navteq, rather than Teleatlas data. TeleAtlas is European-based, so I suspect BMW swithed to them from Navteq for the new GPS as their European data might be better than Navteq's.

I can only think of four advantages the BMW Nav has over Garmin:

(1) The screen is excellent, both in resolution and visibility in all light conditions,

(2) The Zoom function with the rotary dial is quite easy to use and quick, compare to the Garmin touch screen,

(3) It is linked to the audio system, so it will lower the entertainment volume when it speaks, and

(4) being built in, you don't have to store/hide it when you stop and leave the vehicle.

[ard]

I am very unimpressed with the Teleatlas dataset. I think this is the root of the problem.

German companies just cannot appreciate the importance to the consumer of these 'creature comforts'... they kind of view this as "well we need a Nav, how can we cheaply contract for a nav system" and then they run it as a vendor-based project. As opposed to other companies that recognize that the 'end user experience' will be comprised of driving AND 'surfing', and they therefore place as much emphasis on the electronics as the mechanicals...

A

[rh71]

turn by turn is "route list"... perhaps you have that in your 2010... I actually just found it today in an '08.

My biggest gripe with nav (yes it's the old version) is the search is horrible. I couldn't even drill down to specific streets in Dix Hills (huge town in NY). It would list 3 major roads and that's it. What use is that? Also have tried searching for businesses and the need to choose categories first make it impossible to find. Hope yours is improved that way at least.

[ABMW]

No problems in major cities, but in small locals, it has taken me off-course to a surprising degree.

It's always been relatively obvious, but I have TomTom's top-of-the line portable GPS unit, and have had a GPS on every vehicle I've owned since 2003, save for 1.

They've all had their flaws, and every GPS unit from the one on my iPhone to the one in my Nissan has had its share of issues.

If you're looking for 100% perfection, each and every time, within any GPS system currently sold to the general public, please let me know when you find it.

I'll agree that some are better than others, but the 2010 GPS is really no better nor no worse, than any other system I've used over the last 7 to 8 years.

With any GPS system, it's not a question of if it will send you off course, but when.

One thing that is noteworthy about the X5 is that accuracy to which it calculates when the vehicle is approaching a turn or individual intersection.

It's by far, the most accurate system, I've used. In fact, I don't know who makes the GPS receivers, but they're close to the level of the ones on my Meade 12" GPS - 200 Telescope (some will know how accurate those are).

I'm betting the GPS receivers are made by Sony or Philips, and are not made in Germany. I could be wrong, on who makes the receivers, but the point I'm trying to make is that the GPS, while it's not perfect, is satisfactory to say the least.

If you're resorting to the having to use an axillary unit, there may be an issue with your GPS receivers. They can be damaged, and they should not be sending you off course to the point that you're having to resort to 3rd party units.

I'd have BMW either calibrate your GPS receivers or have them diagnosed and possibly replaced.

I've had my 35d for 3,000 miles, driving in completely familiar terrain for the majority of the car's mileage that I've accumulated since taking delivery on December 21. If it's only sent me off-course once, that's not too bad.

For reference the location in which it sent me off course was in Sedona, AZ. With that said, Sedona is known for having some fairly aggressive magnetic disturbances which have been known to create malfunctions within GPS systems. On the other hand, my Nissan worked there without flaw (visit there 2 to 3 times per year).

[Penguin]

Originally Posted by ABMW

I'll agree that some are better than others, but the 2010 GPS is really no better nor no worse, than any other system I've used over the last 7 to 8 years.

Then you haven't had a recent Garmin.

I've compared both, and the Garmin Nuvi 750 is vastly superior to the 2010 X5 Nav system.


P.S. Go ahead and try my example of Van Horn and Kent Texas and see how the 2010 Nav changes the address from Van Horn to Kent when you use it as a route destination.

[ard]

Originally Posted by ABMW

It's by far, the most accurate system, I've used. In fact, I don't know who makes the GPS receivers, but they're close to the level of the ones on my Meade 12" GPS - 200 Telescope (some will know how accurate those are).

I'm betting the GPS receivers are made by Sony or Philips, and are not made in Germany. I could be wrong, on who makes the receivers, but the point I'm trying to make is that the GPS, while it's not perfect, is satisfactory to say the least.

.

Just a comment about "GPS Accuracy"...

Your indicated position on the display is a synthesis of several bits of data- in particular the system "knows" you must be on a street, so it places the car cursor on the street- EVEN if the internally indicated positon (in terms of lat and long) might have your off the road. The GPS system is pretty accurate in absolute terms- in fact it is more accurate than most of the maps. (Maps say the road is one place, when it is actually off by 10, 20, 50 feet...) Maps are made using plats from the USGS, County and City maps, and satellite data. There are errors. The software corrects for this and keeps you nicely on the road. AThe software also uses accelerometer data when GPS drops out, and uses incremental data (ie there is 1500 feet between the first left and the next left, he went 1100 feet so far, so 400 to go.)

Use a GPS that is not a "car only" system, and you will see it is actually rare to be on the indicated road all the time.

A

[Armand]

I see some folks are using Garmin as a reference here. I bought the top model about a year ago. It bugs the hell out of me. It takes five minutes (some times longer) to locate the signal and I live in a fairly flat area with no tall landmarks, smack in the middle of the San Francisco Bay metropolitan area. You can imagine how frustrating it could be if you had to drive aimlessly, waiting for the map to show up. I don't have that problem with the x5 Nav at all. I have to admit there are quite a few issues (Penguin did a great job documenting them) but the fact that I can access the map immediately and it has a huge screen and an easy to use controller/knob is a huge plus for me.

True it won't announce street names like Garmin (though it does announce highway names) but it does display street names on the nav. A quick glance at the Nav can solve that problem. I often use the map and zoom function plus the campus on the rear view mirror instead of the guidance. I also use the email feature although that feature is not a feature of the Nav itself but it does provide a great tool to transfer addresses to your Nav.

[Penguin]

Originally Posted by Armand

True it won't announce street names like Garmin (though it does announce highway names) but it does display street names on the nav. A quick glance at the Nav can solve that problem.

I've tried that, and if you soom in close enough to be useful in terms of seeing the label of the next street in cities, it typically is not smart enough to move the label in close enough to show in the screen. I have found that to ensure you can see the label of the next upcoming street, you have to zoom out so far it loses its utility for determining the next street (in cities).

But you can set it up so that the split screen will give you your latitude and longitude in degrees, minutes, and seconds! Quite useful if you're a boat.

As to the speed of initializing a position, yes, that is an advantage of the Nav over the Garmin that I forgot to include -- the X5 Nav clearly has much more computing power than the low-priced Garmins and has less lag for most tasks. The Garmin is reasonably quick to initialize if you are not moving, but does take some time if you are moving while it is initializing.

[Armand]

Originally Posted by Penguin

I've tried that, and if you soom in close enough to be useful ...

Penguin, I did not mean looking at the map for the street name. It actually writes the name of the street at next turn on the split screen with a close up drawing of the turn below it. You can read it very easily.