Smartnav

My Smartnav experience

I have used the Smatnav system for about a year now. Our company has three systems and has been a customer for about 3 yrs. I find the whole system intensely frustrating. Its is in essence a great idea but poorly exectuted and with an extortionate price-tag!
It always lets me down, whether in the middle of London or in an isolated rural location. The unit has a habit of losing its signal and telling me I have gone ‘off-route’. Because Smartnav doesn’t contain map info, it has to dial up and collect a new route, by which time I have, of course, missed my turn.

After six months of frustration they have told me the only solution was to have a visit from an engineer. This cost even more money. Time will tell if this solves the problem.

The screen is poor to say the least, especially in a premium product ( Ihave the old blue screen shown above). It is particularly bad when it comes to a multiple junction, it tries to represent where you turn but this often makes no sense when you arrive at said junction. I asked about upgrading and they told me a new colour screen that shows a map would be £480. This is for an existing customer and for a screen only, no map info etc. I could get a 42″ LCD TV for that money!

The Trafficmaster system is good, but can be slow to update. This said, it is the best traffic re-routing gizmo you can get and it is very satisfying not having to sit in traffic, but this is just not enough to justify the hefty price tag. Great idea, but could be so much bettter. The only reason I still have this in my vehicle is because of company policy.

By dave_the_rave on 16 November, 2009, 6:33pm