iGo 8 and Primo 2.4 route calculations

Hi,

I know Primo is meant to be better visually but which in your experience is more reliable for route calculations or do they use the same software for route calculations? I'm in UK and device has 128Mb ram.

Thanks

Some users say primo 2 adds unnecessary turns into routes and igo8 is better.

I have not been out with primo yet but if sitting in the house and stick in a route it sends me the long way out my town even thou I set the software to shortest route. I do like the look of it though and have high hopes it works as good as igo8 did when I was in mainland Europe last month.

1888, so igo8 got you round Europe OK with junction signposts, eg stay in 2 left lanes arrows etc?

Only time it got me lost mate was looking for a McDonalds in Utrecht Holland that was just built this year however it got me in the area. I had 8 destinations programed in and it worked fine. As in what you ask about the arrow it was perfect at giving me a sign saying left/right in 100 yards. Only problem I had was using a smaill 3.5 inch screen sat nav. Bought a larger one now.

If you are running igo from a SD card why not get two and have one on each card and see for yourself.

It might be down to the map set in use, I favour navteq maps, and use primo 2 daily, I haven't noticed any peculiar routing.

I was putting it down to the sat nav sitting in the house being moved about in my hand rather than sitting still like on the dash in the car. I am going on a 50 mile round trip into Edinburgh tomorrow so I will give the primo a spin. Hope it works as good as it looks.

Thanks. I had been using TomTom maps as found they have more speed limits in towns but will try navteq

The discussion "TT or NT" is one of the oldest and most repeated ones on iGO forums. Any forum, not just this one.

Which one is best depends on where you are and what you like. The only important thing is that you get to your destination, whatever map you use. And I can imaging that that not only may vary on who and where you are, but also where you are going to, because over there, situation might be different.

That said, I read recently - again - that the latest NT maps still lack streets that do exist for many years while TT is more up to date. That can be true: using NT maps and just going to work, I must not take a street that NT shows but isn't there (never was). I do take a road that NT thinks is interrupted and my GPS protests every time. The street I take isn't and never was interrupted. Just one (there are more) example why I prefer TT maps for "daily" use. And I must add : HERE.
I can imagine the situation being very different elsewhere.

Oh, the remark about speed limits is correct. TT has more and they are more correct. (again : HERE)

I've never really used iGo8 for any long period of time, but I find that Primo's routing can be suspect at times, but it usually depends on what route settings you have enabled. Green, which is the one I like to use is horrible at times. I had it set to default once and it took me a ridiculous route to save about 2 miles in distance. I think Fast is probably the best for most people, but I always have the Route Alternatives setting.

Yes, Primo does strange things sometimes. But so does (did) iGO8, however more rare.
Primo1 did it all/most of the time. The reason why I did never use it, until Yurbuh Tuggly convinced me to try 2.0. I did not regret it. Neither did I regret using 2.4.

Well, I should take my device and set up a route I know I did have issues with. An unneeded detour, half a mile long. Instead of turning right, the gps took me to a roundabout (traffic circle), made me do a 360° and returned to take a left turn.
I can retest it with iGO8.3.5, Primo2.0 and 2.4 and a Becker Primo. But if I recall well, I did have issues on that route only with the Navteq maps I tested then. Which brings up the map quality matter again.




Can someone comment on this : We are discussing the matter of not logical routing and there is one issue in common: the route is not logical because we know it (the route). The main purpose of a gps is guide us when/where we don't know the route. The issue might be it takes us on a small detour (is that so bad? when you know better, you don't need any gps, right?) or it takes us on a route we better did not take at all (dead end street, missing bridge, .....). The latter clearly a map fault.
Also, it's a matter of settings. Which settings do you think are best?

I totally agree with your last point, and it's funny because we don't know the route quality when the destination is not somewhere we're knowledgeable of. The route I spoke about above (that saved 2 miles) was a route I'm well accustomed too, I was just being lazy and fancied following the sat nav to see if it had any better alternatives. Clearly not.

There's only been one occasion where the route iGo took me (where I didn't know the area), I thought "there has to be a better way than this" but I've used it hundreds of times and it's always taken me an excellent route, so I think it's just perception.

Regarding route settings I'm sticking with fast from now on. I find on British roads that fast is usually the most economical as well as the fastest, but if you use Route Alternatives, you can see if there Green Route has any major distance reduction. The most Green has ever reduced a route for me was just 5 miles.

OK I gave Primo 2 a bash. Not good.

So I sat and stuck in my destination and it calculated the route. Off I went but for some reason the arrow on the road was pointing in the opposite direction yet the curser arrow was pointing the correct way. That sorted itself after the first corner so ill say it was a small glitch.
Now I know where I was going and I know three different ways to get there. The sat nav was taking me the way I would have went. Half way I decided to go the wrong way and see how it reacted. It did well. Almost instantly it had a new route for me, however. About 2/3 miles into the route I needed to get on the motorway what I know is the shortest route. The sat nav wanted me to go out my way into another town what would have added a few extra miles. When on the motorway it wanted me to go off at the next junction and take back roads. The arrow was following the slip road rather than the main road I was on. The sat nav is set to use motorways. When I passed that junction it re calculated the correct route and by this time I only had around five miles to go. On the way home again I went the wrong way to what it was saying. It recalculated a route that was to way out my way. Had I followed it there would have been around five miles added onto my journey. So for me its pants and I am going back to iGO8. I just need a new skin as the one I have is kind of brown and dark. Yuk

Do you have historical traffic info? I've noticed since adding historical traffic that the unit gets a bit sketchy regarding motorways.

Green routing is all about efficient driving and fuel saving, I imagine it would favour cruising along the highway at a steady speed, rather than taking the short cut through twisty narrow lanes.
This may result in a longer but more efficient, and cheaper route