your Tomtom is shutting down 5..4..3..2

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Aug 6, 2007
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(I accidentally posted this on another forum here, so I apologize for the repeat)

We have 2 Tomtom 720s, one for each of us. My husband's was bought this past weekend and he is having a problem I haven't seen in the 4 months I have mine.

Even when plugged into the car's power outlet with the car running, he gets a darker screen saying the Tomtom 720 is shutting down 5..4..3..2..1. It happened several times the other day (when not fully charged and allowed to run down too far, I guess). But it also happened once today when fully charged over night and plugged into the car's power outlet (like a cig lighter plug).

When unplugged and checked, the battery was showing fully charged.

He has software 7.221 and map 705.1481

Anyone see this and have a suggestion?
 
Try switchng cig lighter plugs and see if it still happens.
The unit will shut down of power is lost to it. This means power from a charger and not neccessarly internal battery power. Something is causing the TomTom to think it power is lost.

this happened to my 910 when the mount wasn't pushed all the way into my unit.

You could also run the flash tool.
 
(I accidentally posted this on another forum here, so I apologize for the repeat)

We have 2 Tomtom 720s, one for each of us. My husband's was bought this past weekend and he is having a problem I haven't seen in the 4 months I have mine.

Even when plugged into the car's power outlet with the car running, he gets a darker screen saying the Tomtom 720 is shutting down 5..4..3..2..1. It happened several times the other day (when not fully charged and allowed to run down too far, I guess). But it also happened once today when fully charged over night and plugged into the car's power outlet (like a cig lighter plug).

When unplugged and checked, the battery was showing fully charged.

He has software 7.221 and map 705.1481

Anyone see this and have a suggestion?


That countdown appears when your TT is disconnected from a power source. Now there's a flaw in that feature and you've just discovered it.


When the battery is fully charged, it will not draw any power from the cig. outlet even though it's still plugged in so your TT thinks you've removed it from the power outlet and will shut down.

The same happens to me when I enable the screen to turn off between instructions. I have it plugged in and at certain times, it will shut off. It took me a while to figure out that the battery was fully charged so my ONE wasn't charging any more and if it isn't charging any more, it thinks I've unplugged it so it'll enable that sleep function.

Hope that made sense!
 
Powerdown

So are you saying that, if I use the 720 for a six hour drive and it starts out fully charged that I shouldn't plug it into the cigarette lighter until the battery starts to deplete or it will shut down?
 
So are you saying that, if I use the 720 for a six hour drive and it starts out fully charged that I shouldn't plug it into the cigarette lighter until the battery starts to deplete or it will shut down?

It doesn't matter. IF you have the battery saver thingy ENABLED then it'll turn off between instructions to save battery. To be honest, it's not too big of an issue for me since if it's 30 miles to the next instruction, that'll be 30 mins with the screen off at 60mph.

If you don't want it to turn off between instructions, then disable the battery saver feature.
 
We didn't enable the battery saver. I checked again and it is off. So it may be that the cord was not all the way inserted in the power outlet or something. Tomtom suggested using the flash program so I'll try that. I believe that the 720 worked all day today so maybe some glitch knocked itself out!

Thanks to all....
 
It is not the battery saver. I have a similar problem please let me know the fix. I tried phone support cannot wait more than 30 minuts.

Thanks

We didn't enable the battery saver. I checked again and it is off. So it may be that the cord was not all the way inserted in the power outlet or something. Tomtom suggested using the flash program so I'll try that. I believe that the 720 worked all day today so maybe some glitch knocked itself out!

Thanks to all....
 
I posted the question on www.tomtom.com after signing in, looking at sample questions and finding an email link. Their response was
"You can try a reset of the device, www.tomtom.com/7134 and scroll down to the unit and follow the instructions to reset it. You can also try a clear flash tool, www.tomtom.com/6221 . If none of these work, please let us know.'

It didn't cause any problems the 3rd time out so we have not tried the above yet. Nor have we tried to unplug and run on battery power (ours showed up fully charged when this happened.

Good luck - hope one of these works for you.
 
Have you learned anything more about shutting down while plugged into the car power? It was really bad yesterday. I am going to loan my own GO720 to my husband tomorrow and see if it does the same thing in his car. (I am retired and don't drive more than 15 minutes at a time but he drives around all day). I'll post results after that. And I have not heard from tech a Tomtom since reposting my question there.
 
one out of five of my 720 had the same problem and It could be a hardware issue. I have no problem at all after I did an exchange.
 
The good news: After talking with a Tomtom tech on the phone (as requested by their emailed response to me), we returned the unit to BestBuy (no questions asked by them within their 14 day return period) for exchange. We'll see tomorrow if it avoids a) asking if we want to connect to a computer (oin the car cigarette lighter outlet????) and b) if it stays on even when fully charged and plugged in.

The bad news: I rtried to use the old software but it is hard-wired to the device or serial number of the returned unit. I changed email addresses and it seemed to work. It downloaded the newest software update. Dreaded red X when disconnected.

So I used the disk in the box to install version 1.5x of TomtomHome. Still a red X that keeps you from using the GPS at all.

I followed instructions from somewhere on this forum (THANK YOU!) to delete the downloads folder and had to do it 3 times before I got the GPS working again. Next, when I have time, I'll have to go through the update again with my fingers crossed.

I love our 2 GO720s and so does my husband, who is on the road all day in NJ and PA, but Tomtom's server going down all the time (which seems to be whenever I get the red X after accepting the downloaded software) and getting the red X every 2nd or 3rd time I do an update make me so angry.

Thanks for letting me vent!

Tomtom - if you are reading this, please fix your connections and update processes.....
 
hi guys, i specifically joined this forum for help on this specific situation. i purchased my gf the TT720 and we ran into this problem the day we got it. same symptoms are similar and are as follows; connect the lighter to the device and it asks if you want to connect to a computer? wtf? i put no of course and procede to run a route and some time goes by.. then bam the countdown to shut down displays despite a route is still on going.

what is my BEST bet at this point, to upgrade the firmware OR just go to bestbuy and try my luck with another one?

asbaker, please let us know how that newer unit is working!
 
Sure sounds like something is wrong with your unit. I've used the 920T and the 720 and have never seen it think the auto power cord is a computer! The shutdown warning could mean that it's just losing power, but I'll bet there's a hardware problem involved.

If you can exchange for a new model I'd definitely do that; I think that should fix the problem... unless maybe there's something really strange about the power in your car. :confused:
 
I had the same problem. I seemed to get around it by doing just the opposit... When it asked me if I wanted to connect to the computer (when plugged into the Cig liter) I answered YES and have not had any shutdowns since.
 
I had the same problem. I seemed to get around it by doing just the opposit... When it asked me if I wanted to connect to the computer (when plugged into the Cig liter) I answered YES and have not had any shutdowns since.

That's very interesting. I wonder if this condition could be the result of removing the cable from the computer without properly dismounting the disk? Or maybe unplugging the GPS while it was still in the process of trying to connect to your computer? Certainly worth a try to see if it fixes your problem!
 
720 shutdown

Ok....after reading all the previous threads I thought I would throw in my 2 cents.

I have a brand new 720 (2 days old), and also have a new 2008 Hyundai Sonata Limited. We took the car out today 12/22/08, and plugged into the accessory outlet marked 12v/120w. Within 5 mins...shutdown. I hit cancel checked the connection...the light on the 720 was lit (green) for input power, and the plug was firmly seated. 5-10 mins later...shutdown.

Now...as luck would have it, the car has a cigarette lighter socket next to the accessory outlet. I plugged into the one and everything is fine...no shutdown.

While not a car mechanic, I'm pretty sure the cigarette lighter and accessory socket are wired the same..

So where is the problem...in the device, or in the car ?

Again from readin the previous posts, it would appear that it is a problem commong to all 720's.

I'll be checking the warranty and may just exchange for a Garmin, as it seems there is a design flaw waiting to be fixed, and I don't appreciate being a beta tester.
 
I bought my 720 on Friday and I'm having all of these problems. When ever I have it hooked up to the cigarette lighter, I'm getting the shutdown message. If I take the power source away it doesn't bother me.

If I have it hooked to power when I turn the unit on it asks me if I want to connect to a comptuer.

Finally, the real deal breaker. It's telling me verbally to turn right when it means to turn left.

This is going back for sure.
 
I bought my 720 on Friday and I'm having all of these problems. When ever I have it hooked up to the cigarette lighter, I'm getting the shutdown message. If I take the power source away it doesn't bother me.

If I have it hooked to power when I turn the unit on it asks me if I want to connect to a comptuer.

Finally, the real deal breaker. It's telling me verbally to turn right when it means to turn left.

This is going back for sure.

Some suggestions:
1) Under Preferences-->Battery Savings, do you have it checked to turn off if external power is lost? If so, try unchecking it.
2) In other forums, I saw the same issue (unit turning off) discussed. There is some opinion there that the power supply isn't being shoved in completely into either the powerpoint or cigarette lighter as the case may be. Others there feel the power supply isn't quite as strong coming from the powerpoint as it is from the cigarette lighter and the unit, therefore, is not detecting the prper strength.

Finally, about the text to speech saying to turn right instead of left...is the direction on the unit showing to turn left? If so, that is very strange. Which TTS voice are you using, Susan_US or the male voice (Dan?). If that is the problem, try removing the voice from the unit using TTHome and reinstalling or switch to the other tts voice.

However, if the voice is saying to turn right AND so does the map direction, that is a different issue. In that case, you may want to try using Map Corrections to rectify the issue.
 

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