TomTom ONE 3rd Edition 3.5-Inch Portable GPS Vehicle Navigator
by TomTom
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List Price: Our Price: $59.99 You Save: $190.00 (76%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: GPS or Navigation System See more product details |
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of TomTom ONE 3rd Edition 3.5-Inch Portable GPS Vehicle Navigator
Customer Review: Wonderful for GPS Newbies, Strong Mac Compatibility, Excellent Functionality
Summary: 5 Stars
I confess; I had GPS-phobia. Being a techie, this admission was embarrassing but seemingly well-founded: much of the GPS market features overpriced, clunky products bogged down by confounding user interfaces.
The TomTom One 3rd Edition (TT3), however, changed everything. This amazing little device is a GPS masterpiece; easy to configure, even simpler to use. Arguably the foundation of its success lies in the terrific PC/Mac-based, TomTom Home Software. (It's VERY Mac friendly) Regularly updated and fully featured, Home makes map updates a breeze, likewise the addition of different voices. Regarding the latter, there is a surprisingly rich selection of free voices provided by TomTom users. (You haven't truly experienced a road trip until Yoda insists on, 'left turn...you must make!') The TT3's crisp speaker admirably relays these voices even over excessive road noise.
The in-device menu system echoes its computer-based counterpart. In only a few minutes' time, it becomes second nature to customize appearance, find points of interest and/or edit existing maps on the TT3. The touch screen is very responsive, arguably the perfect combination between appropriate sensitivity sans hyperactive touch recognition.
Moreover, the TT3 is one sturdy device. I certainly don't baby the thing; it regularly goes on/off my windshield and into the glove compartment. Related, the TT3's USB cable port and accompanying charger are surprisingly durable. Not a sign of give and/or deterioration.
Still, the TT3 isn't perfect. It occasionally hiccups when initializing routes, requiring re-entry of the destination. Also - akin to any GPS - not every street is [obviously] featured. It is admittedly a bit disconcerting to find yourself on an unnamed path. Also, the TomTom Home software has a tendency to provide peculiar error messages when doing updates.
These shortcomings aside, the TT3 is a steal at Amazon's new price point. (I spent $45 more for my unit.)
Customer Review: Great, but some limitations
Summary: 4 Stars
The device is easy to learn and feature-packed. The maps are usually accurate, but in some backwater places, there are missing streets and streets that don't exist. The GPS grabs a signal very fast, too.
Navigating the maps on the device itself leaves something to be desired. You can drag your finger sideways, but during about 1/3 the drags, it leaps out of the drag mode and selects something. This is absolutely annoying and makes this worthless. Changing zoom levels is almost as difficult. When I'm on the highway (and someone else is driving), I'd love to be able to zoom in and out and move around to see where I am in relation to other towns. Because of the weird quirks, you really just can't.
Normally that doesn't matter much because 99% of the time, you're just keying in an address and following directions. The unit is fantastic for that.
The MapShare feature needs work. Marking simple streets is easy, but we have a piece of interstate in town that looks like a tangled up mess of snakes, and the construction crews are in the process of making major changes. You just can't edit something like that. There is no way to add roads that have any complexity at all. I think it might be nicer if the GPS would realize that I'm driving on a stretch of road that it doesn't know, record my course, and upload it. It's ridiculous to spend > $100 on a new map each year! I bought this unit for $100 refurbished (looks like new), and when I need a new map, I'll sell it on eBay and buy a new unit. MapShare could alleviate that pain of having out-of-date maps, but that pain is $$$ to the GPS companies, so don't look for MapShare to get too advanced.
The suction cup for the windshield works sometimes, and sometimes it falls off. I tried it on a few cars. If you clean it thoroughly as well as the glass, it helps a lot.
Considering that you can often get a refurb unit for $100, the device is a steal. For the price, I wouldn't hesitate.
Customer Review: Tom Tom is good good
Summary: 5 Stars
First of all, this is my first GPS and I have no others to compare it with so I won't be complaining that it isn't as good as "whatever". I got the Tom Tom One 3rd Edition as an early Christmas gift and have used it for about a week now. As my first GPS I am very impressed. The first day I used it we went to visit a relative someplace that I had never been before and I typed in the address and it took us right to the front door! Since then it has performed almost flawlessly as I have used it around town. The only issues I have had is that the battery life is pretty short at two hours, but the car charger works fine to compensate. It does not have my home address in the map. The house has been there for two years now, but it only has the cross streets and our subdivision does not exist according to Tom Tom. I have submitted a correction through Map Share, but who knows how long it will take to update. Since it is my home I just choose the crosstreets as my home address,but I could see how this could be a problem if someone was trying to use the GPS to find me since my address doesn't exist! Other than that, it has been a wonderful tool to have and is quickly becoming something that I always have with me. It has helped me find restaurants in the city, it even shows icons of restaurants like Mcdonalds and Wendy's and gas stations like Shell so you know when they are close to where you are. We wanted to go to eat while out of town and looked up Points of Interest and saw a Cracker Barrel listed, selected it and it automatically calculated a route from where we were right to Cracker Barrel's parking lot. Even my wife, who is a technophobe loved it. I would recommend the technology for anyone, but you will have to shop around to see what features best meet your needs. If you want a basic, inexpensive GPS then I would recommend the Tom Tom One 3rd Edition, but if you want more bells and whistles you will need to look elsewhere.Customer Review: The good, the bad ... but no ugly
Summary: 4 Stars
After having returned a TomTom One XL recently, of which you can read the review in Amazon I decided to try again the the TomTom One 3rd edition. I was very pleasantly surprised as it looks similar on the outside, but TomTom has fixed many of the serious problems with the XL version on the inside.
For $130 I am very pleased with this unit. It has the same feels as the XL version, but is night and day superior as the software is more refined to do a better job than the XL.
I don't want run down the feature list, but having owned 5 GPS's so far, this is the best and least expensive one. Buy this, and you'll be very happy.
My biggest complaint is with the design of the street finder. First you enter the city, then the street and then the number. That's fine if you live in one large city where the city name is a constant, but if you live in a city surrounded by smaller cities you may not realize that you're looking for street ABC in city B, but you think it's in City A. You just won't find it. Also, once you've found the street, it would be nice if the system gave the first digit or digits of that street's number. For example, if the street is numbered 4000-4500, it should show 4 as the first digit. That will make it easier to identify the correct street.
I'd like a display option for every street in a state to be shown, or perhaps within x miles of a selected destination city; something like that.
My only niggling complaints are that the charging LED which should change from red to green to show a full battery charge. It just stays green, which at least shows you that is is plugged in. The power cable plug should connect in the right side based on U.S. left hand drive operation, but it connects on the underside. Not a big deal as this is an international product.
On balance, a really nice product. Buy one, you'll like it. There's nothing ugly about this gem.
Customer Review: Easy and awesome.
Summary: 5 Stars
I bought the Tom Tom because I'm constantly driving to weird places for work. It has been a brilliant investment. It gets excellent GPS reception (at least in San Antonio and the surrounding counties) and is very easy to use. The maps are also excellent.
I immediately started testing it before I started relying on it. The Tom Tom not only knew all the quickest ways around town, but actually surprised me with a couple of easier routes that I had missed somehow. It also seems to update for construction fairly quickly, which is just incredible. San Antonio has been undergoing a series of massive construction projects and nobody really knows when and where streets will get closed. Because the Tom Tom accepts user updates and allows them to be shared, it catches the construction very rapidly. Similarly, I had to run out to a new club in an emergency and couldn't find it on google maps. Apparently, neither could our local taxi companies which is why my client ended up needing me. My Tom Tom knew where this newly opened club was and got me there quickly when I wouldn't have been able to find it otherwise (club was closed and I couldn't get directions).
It took me about a week to get used to the computer's verbal directions, but the maps were precise enough that I could follow my car visually in real time until then. I have fooled the Tom Tom a few times. It takes a few seconds to change routes when I mess up and can't really tell whether I've changed lanes correctly or not. Sometimes that can be a problem, but usually only because I messed up first. It also can't tell what direction you're facing when not moving, but I'm not sure how any GPS device could. The only consistent problem is that it never seems to get street addresses exactly right. Once I learned to start looking at addresses a bit early, it wasn't a problem. So, with these minor caveats, I think the Tom Tom is outstanding.