TomTom ONE 3rd Edition Portable GPS

[unknown]

it is only the LE that can be hacked for TTS?

I have the One 3rd


How To Add Itinerary Planning to TomTom ONE 3rd Edition
http://www.gpsreview.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=2707

 

[StormRider]

Interesting info about the TTS hack. I'm a bit leary about trying it though -- it seems some people have problems with it. Some have reported that the computer speech lags a little. The last thing I want is to have the turn instructions come too late. But who knows, maybe I'll try it out anyways.

After some more usage I noticed that the text of the display is sometimes a bit too small for my eyes. On the Magellan, the text for the "current street" and the "next street" is big and clear enough for me to see but on the TomTom it's a bit too small for me.

 

[bigben2wardpitt]

Originally posted by: StormRider
Interesting info about the TTS hack. I'm a bit leary about trying it though -- it seems some people have problems with it. Some have reported that the computer speech lags a little. The last thing I want is to have the turn instructions come too late. But who knows, maybe I'll try it out anyways.

After some more usage I noticed that the text of the display is sometimes a bit too small for my eyes. On the Magellan, the text for the "current street" and the "next street" is big and clear enough for me to see but on the TomTom it's a bit too small for me.

so does TTS just take whatever text is on the screen and turn it to speech - including street names. Because i thought the garmin 200, tomtom one le, tomtom one 3rdE all had that ability, to speek the directions - just not the street names.

I am probably going to get either the garmin nuvi 200, tomtom LE and tom tom3rdE for christmas, but i do not know which one to get.

The maps now seem to be the same
Garmin seems to have superior POI - but that isn't too much of a big deal for me - especially with the user corrections and stuff - and can't you download more POI? - see tomtom seems more expandable to me than the garmin 200

so, what is the difference between the 3rdE and LE?

 

[bigben2wardpitt]

any comments?

 

[StormRider]

Yes, TTS basically will read the street address from the screen and turn it to speech. So, it will say, "In 500 ft, turn right onto Main Street". All GPS's I have seen have speech and provide voice prompts, which says, "In 500 ft, turn right". Those units with TTS can say the street name. I like TTS because I think it's safer -- you don't have to look at the screen as much and can pay more attention to the road.

I would definitely prefer the One LE over the One 3rd -- because of the SD slot, it is more expandable. With the SD slot you can download more POIs, maps etc. The main difference is that the One LE has an SD slot and Bluetooth while the 3rd has a live traffic.

Last night I had my TomTom One LE route me to Staples and it was the first time I encountered a problem with the maps. It told me that I had arrived at my destination but it was about 1/4 to 1/2 mile away further down the road. My unit had the 7.05 maps and last night I just upgraded to the 7.10 maps. It would be interesting to see if that fixes the problem.

I didn't try the Map Share feature yet to correct the mistake.

My Magellan doesn't have Staples in it's POI. My Magellan doesn't seem to have individual stores in it's POI -- only shopping centers. So I guess my Magellan and TomTom both aren't perfect but are still great.

 

[bigben2wardpitt]

the 3rd has live traffic and the LE has the expansion.

well you have to pay another $130-150 for the actual receiver, so i guess its nice that you can at least upgrade it - thats a plus, but you also have to pay for the traffic info I think.

what would you need expansion for if you can just download new maps online? I plan on staying in the US, so I won't need more maps of other countries. Anything else it would be crucial/used for?

Also, do you have to pay for the maps you download online? sounds like you can only get updated maps for 30 days or something before you have to start paying.

and after reviews, the 3rdE looks like the better product... especially sense i dont see the value of an expansion port and more value in a port for a traffic receiver.

 

[StormRider]

The SD Card expansion gives you more memory space for stuff like additional voices and POIs (in addition to maps). Both the 3rd Edition and LE come with an internal memory space of 1 GB. You can buy a 2 GB SD Card and plug it into the LE. This memory replaces the internal 1 GB (it hides it). After that you have twice as much room to load more stuff in. I haven't tried the TTS hack on my LE to see if its worth the trouble but I think the TTS hack might not work on the 3rd Edition because 1 GB isn't enough to hold it. I guess it depends on your needs. For me, I didn't really need a traffic receiver so the LE was a better fit for me.

 

[StormRider]

BTW, I upgraded my LE to the newest map (v7.10) and it still has that problem with the Staples store. But I think I figured out how Map Share works and I will correct the mistake and hopefully be able to share this correction with the worldwide TomTom community. After playing more with the TomTom One LE, I am beginning to like it more than my Magellan. The user interface on the TomTom is snappier and more responsive. I just noticed that my Magellan misinterprets my finger taps a lot and seems sluggish compared to the TomTom One. I didn't noticed this before because my Magellan 2200T was my first GPS unit and I had nothing to compare it to. The TomTom is also more "fun" with more stuff to customize.

One thing I don't like about the TomTom is the POI system though -- it could use some improvements in the way it works. It's not that intuitive to me but maybe I'll like it better when I figure out how it works. My problem is that I can't figure how to locate POIs that isn't near me. It only seems to list POIs that are near me. What happens if I am visiting another state and want to go to a Best Buy in that other state? BTW, one cool thing about the new 7.10 maps is that some POIs get custom icons on the map. For example, McDonalds, Best Buy etc. have custom icons. Pretty neat!