TomTom One

[onetomtom]

Hi,
This is my first post, and would appreciate some advice please. My VW has an expensive satnav RNS510, but no audio alarm for POIs, e.g. speed cameras!

So I'm considering using an old Tomtom I have (spec TomTom One 2nd edition, App 7.903 9183/081205, map UK and Republic of Ireland v675.1409) running in parallel with the VW system, just to give the audio warnings. I currently don't have speed camera files but it seems I can buy/download a "Speed Cameras Europe" from Tomtom for £14.99. But can I be sure it would be compatible with my existing map? Also from what I've read the map version I have (7.903) is the latest? If so, the maps would be quite out of date, but would this matter?

Thanks for any comments.

 

[dhn]

The application on your device is 7.903, the map version is 675. That is over FIVE years old!

Personally, if the speed camera warnings are that important to you, I would think that having an updated (the current is 895 and 890 is due out in a month) would also be important.

Also, many have found that the speed camera data from Tomtom is not current or reliable. So, many opt for a 3rd party subscription and one I can suggest would be from Pocketgpsworld.com.

See here:
http://www.pocketgpsworld.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=66856

And, as a bonus, one of the mods at PGPSW is also a moderator here (Andy_P) and he can assist you with any questions you might have.

 

[Andy_P]

Hi. Yes another vote for the PGPSW data.

The camera warnings from TomTom themselves ONLY give you a warning chime as you approach a camera.

But the third-party "CamerAlert" data from PocketGPSWorld can have real voice warnings that tell you the type of camera and the speed limit as you approach (male or female voice, with or without a chime at the front).

Eg. "Bing, bing, bing... Fixed speed camera, 30 miles per hour"
or "Average speed camera zone, 50 miles per hour"

You can install the database for the UK only (in MPH) or you can add the rest of Europe (in km per hour) as well.

As the data is updated by the user-base and every camera is verified independently, they are also rather more accurate and reliable than TomTom's offering.

 

[onetomtom]

Thank you dhn and Andy_P, I'll take that advice and buy the PocketGPSWorld 'CameraAlert' system. Looking at their options of either Cosolidated or Speed Zoned, it's not clear to me why I wouldn't choose the latter (gives more information). Is there a downside, e.g. takes longer to install?
And just going back to the TomTom One itself, bearing in mind I'm not using it for navigation, only for speed camera warnings, is there any point in updating the map? In other words, won't I still get the audio warning even if the road is new or altered?
Thanks again.

 

[Andy_P]

Looking at their options of either Cosolidated or Speed Zoned, it's not clear to me why I wouldn't choose the latter (gives more information). Is there a downside, e.g. takes longer to install?

Exactly that....
Each camera type and speed has its own set of POI files, so for the "consolidated" set that means five sets for the 5 camera types (Fixed, mobile, redlight, SPECS (average) and "Pmobile" (which are potential sites that haven't had a second sighting yet)

But for the Speed-zoned set, each of those five (except redlight cams) is further split up again into the eight different speeds....20,30,40,50,60,70 mph plus "tba" (unknown) and "var" (variable limit)
That makes a grand total of 33 categories

When you do the original set-up for the camera warnings, you have to repeate the same set of button presses for EVERY cameta category you have. That can take a good ten minutes of repetitive button pressing!
Very boring, but it's down to the way the TomTom works, not the speed cam database.

Thankfully you only have to do it once... when you update the files every week you just copy and paste them on top of the old ones and that's it.

And just going back to the TomTom One itself, bearing in mind I'm not using it for navigation, only for speed camera warnings, is there any point in updating the map? In other words, won't I still get the audio warning even if the road is new or altered?
Thanks again.

Sort of....
When you do the set up for POI warnings, you get a choice of whether you want to be warned ONLY if the POI is "on the route" or not.

If you turn that option ON, then it will only alert you for cameras which are on the actual route you have got calculated. That helps to stop you getting spurious warnings from cameras that are on nearby roads.

But I don't think you are going to calculate a route on the TomTom at all, are you?

With that option OFF, it won't matter if the maps are totally wrong, it just goes by the distance settings you've put in for the warnings, but you might get the odd false alert from cameras that are only nearby (and within the warning radius you set).

 

[Andy_P]

One last thought...
If you've got an iPhone or an Android smartphone, you might wan to try the CamerAlert "app" instead. I think it's 69p (a few cents) from the app stores and uses the same data as the TomTom version, but it just sits in the background on your phone and sends alerts.

I don't think it needs a navigation app running at all (I could be wrong there...)

 

[onetomtom]

Andy_P,
Thanks for your help. I decided to go with the PGPSW SpeedZoned package, and initially couldn't get it to work on the TomTom One. But then I realised that I needed to transfer all the ogg files into the TT 'sound' folder, and now works fine!

 

[Andy_P]

That's good to hear that you've got it working successfully.

Normally the audio should work by EITHER putting it into the map folder along with the other camera files OR into the "sounds" folder.
If you do the first way there is a slightly odd and misleading screen on the "warn when near" setup pages due to a very long-standing bug in the TomTom system software.
That should be explained fully in the setup instructions, but it's easy to miss.

but I have heard of the occasional time when people haven't been able to get it going in the normal way. For those people the second method works fine, but it's often easiest to rename the audio files so it's easier to work out which is which on the TT screen (the long filenames get shortened in the display).