GO 740 Voice Command Problem "Navigate to Favorite"

[Germerican]

I've noticed something strange on my 740 when I use the voice command to navigate to a favorite.

The initial process works fine and goes like this...

I tap the voice recognition icon and state "Navigate to a favorite". The unit confirms if I indeed want to navigate to a favorite and then asks me to make a selection from my list of available favorites by stating one of the corresponding numbers, which is listed in front of each favorite. Let's assume I want to go to work and the destination "Work" is at the third position in my list. I then state "3" and the unit confirms "Do you want to navigate to Work?"

The unit actually confirms the destination by "speaking" the name of the favorite, which is a nice feature because it lets you know that you made the right selection. Now here's where it get's strange though.

After confirming my selection (by "speaking" the name of the destination) the unit picks another favorite from my list and routes me there instead. This morning for example I used the voice recognition feature to map the route to my work but instead the 740 routed me to my wife's grandparent's house in Florida. I'm in Illinois!

The same happened on my way to pick up my daughter from daycare. Instead of the daycare it tried to route me to another favorite destination.

The only way for me to navigate to a favorite destination right now is to do it the old fashioned way.

Has anyone else experienced this? As with most problems of this kind, I suppose it's a software glitch but if anyone has any fixes it would be greatly appreciated if you could share them.

 

[mikealder]

As I recall the device will choose the favourite directly above the one you select when using ASR (Advanced speech recognition) - I never use it to be honest as it can't understand my accent - Mike

 

[gatorguy]

Yes, I have had the same happen with me. Numerical street names are sometimes a problem too. I don't bother with it at all anymore. Too much trouble and aggravation, and really takes longer than the traditional entry methods.

 

[Germerican]

I agree that under normal circumstances it would be quicker to just add the favorite route the "normal" way but I tried to use the feature while driving when it would have been the most useful. It's not really a deal-breaker for me anyway, I was just testing different features. I use a remote with my 740, which is more useful than the speech recognition. At least in my opinion.

The voice command feature does work for me most of the time, the one thing I find most aggravating with it though is the fact that when you activate the feature to give a command and you get interrupted by the unit announcing a turn, it doesn't go back to listening mode again. This has happened a couple of times.

 

[Germerican]

As I recall the device will choose the favourite directly above the one you select when using ASR (Advanced speech recognition) - I never use it to be honest as it can't understand my accent - Mike

I tried it again this morning because I didn't recall whether or not it did indeed pick the favorite directly above the one I selected. It didn't. My work location is #5 in my list and it always picks the location at #2 in the list (my wife's grandparent's house). This is very odd, especially since the unit confirms your selection correctly.

 

[mvl]

Voice navigation to the wrong favorite was a known bug introduced in app 8.350, and is still unresolved in app 8.370. If you downgrade to the preinstalled app 8.312 you shouldn't have a problem (you made a backup, right?)

In fact a lot has gotten worse in the new app - particularly the bluetooth handsfree memory leak that causes crashing after a couple of days.

Personally on my 720 I've downgraded to app 8.302. The pros of stable bluetooth outweigh the cons of a missing fm transmitter.

I don't know if 8.312 works with the latest map, Gator had some problems in the past. You may want to try it out (after a backup).

 

[Germerican]

The first thing I did was to make a Explorer backup. The problem is that the day after I made the backup the motherboard on my notebook gave out and I hadn't had a chance to do a backup to my external hard drive. I expect to be able to recover the TomTom backup but just in case I can't, is there any other way to get the 8.312 app?

 

[mvl]

To get your files back, go pickup one of these at your local computer store. I bought one at Microcenter for under $15.

I am unaware of a link to app 8.312 on the Tomtom servers. Maybe someone here can send you a copy of their backup. Just use your own current map folder (North America 2GB), as maps are serialnumber locked so someone else's map won't work on your 740.

 

[Germerican]

Thanks for the link. I have to run to Best Buy tonight anyway, so I'll look for one.

Regarding the app, if anyone has it and would like to send it to me, it would be greatly appreciate it. I could always run 8.312 on a SD card and 8.370 on the device. I'm not too worried about the voice recognition/favorites glitch but it would be nice to have bluetooth working properly.

 

[gatorguy]

I've probably got it. Send me a PM with your email and I'll check later tonight.

 

[nealh]

well this explains some of the VR issues. For me VR is almost worthless. If TT introduced this bug and BT issues they better fix them or risk more share loss to Garmin.

I bought a BT remote and this works well except for scrolling on my phonebook entries. No matter what I do the remote will not move around the screen to allow me to find other entries except the first one on the list.

Also the volume on my calls is lower than voice for navigation... weird.

So far BT(remote and iPhone) has worked fine with no issues on my 740

 

[mvl]

I bought a BT remote and this works well except for scrolling on my phonebook entries. No matter what I do the remote will not move around the screen to allow me to find other entries except the first one on the list.

Downgrading to app 8.312 should also fix the scrolling issues

Also the volume on my calls is lower than voice for navigation... weird.

While on a call, tap on the lower left of the screen. The volume slider that shows up is a separate one that will adjust call volume. When not on a call the volume slider (although it looks the same) instead will adjust navigation voice volume

 

[nealh]

Downgrading to app 8.312 should also fix the scrolling issues

Thanks as always

I do not have app 8.312 and as I understand unless someone can upload it, TT does not allow you to download and revert back.

Also is there a special poricedure to downgrade to older version.