The "New Toys" Thread

Perc said:
I don't really understand why satnavs have batteries to begin with. They're supposed to be plugged in, that's how it works.
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People tend to take the off when not in use, either for esthetic/visibility reasons or so that no one breaks into the car to steal it (probably no longer common), so you don't wanna fiddle with cables for a quick trip somewhere unfamiliar. Also you may not have enough power outlets, so rather than have to decide whether to navigate or charge your phone you can unplug it for a bit and give your phone some juice.
 
So you can jump into a taxi/uber and make sure you are not being kidnapped before it is too late. To jump into a bus and make sure you are going in the right direction, and sometimes even see the routes. So you can listen to the music/podcast/etc. after you leave the car. I am sure there are more too.
 
GRtak said:
So you can jump into a taxi/uber and make sure you are not being kidnapped before it is too late. To jump into a bus and make sure you are going in the right direction, and sometimes even see the routes. So you can listen to the music/podcast/etc. after you leave the car. I am sure there are more too.
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IIRC Some portable units support "walking directions" so you can take the sat nav with you
 
The "New Toys" Thread

The "New Toys" Thread

Mine supports walking directions, cycling and bus rides. Also parking spaces near your destinations and of course every kind of special destinations. You can also type in coordinates or simply choose the destination by tipping on the map.

Map upgrades are for free and of course it recalculates your route permanently according to the current traffic situation - construction sites included.

And correct me if I'm wrong but in order to use your mobile phone as a navigation device, you need a fast internet connection, right? Now I don't know about other countries but you don't have 3G or LTE everywhere here.

So in the end I still think you're better off with a device that directly locks into the GPS signal.
 
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Tomtom is but one app that offers offline maps. There's cygic, Navigon, here maps, the list goes on. All available for a lot less than a dedicated unit, some even for the low low price of free.
 
MacGuffin said:
Mine supports walking directions, cycling and bus rides. Also parking spaces near your destinations and of course every kind of special destinations. You can also type in coordinates or simply choose the destination by tipping on the map.

Map upgrades are for free and of course it recalculates your route permanently according to the current traffic situation - construction sites included.

And correct me if I'm wrong but in order to use your mobile phone as a navigation device, you need a fast internet connection, right? Now I don't know about other countries but you don't have 3G or LTE everywhere here.

So in the end I still think you're better off with a device that directly locks into the GPS signal.
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Phones also directly lock into GPS signal.
 
MacGuffin said:
And correct me if I'm wrong but in order to use your mobile phone as a navigation device, you need a fast internet connection, right? Now I don't know about other countries but you don't have 3G or LTE everywhere here.
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Only for live updates really, like others already posted there are a ton of offline apps. You won't get real time traffic and the like w/o a connection for obvious reasons.
 
Even the "online" apps do a reasonable job of pre-loading the route in case signal is lost.
 
IceBone said:
Try the app Automate, it's designed for ease of use in the car and based on the design of Android Auto (but even now it's already surpassing it in functionality).

Still in beta as of now, but official apk mirrors are up in case you don't want to sign up for the google+ beta program: https://plus.google.com/u/0/communities/102908788212710276577
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Tried it with not such good results today, I know it's a beta but many many functions, while awesome as an idea, just don't work.
It keeps giving me Google Maps as a default navi app despite the fact that Here (which I use) is supported and selected. Since I don't have a data plan Google just won't work, same thing with the audio player, it keeps giving me Spotify which doesn't work without a data plan. Don't get me wrong, the idea is great but it's far too "beta" for me at the moment.

On a related note, and I think I've covered this before : I prefer audio, phone and GPS to come from 3 different sources too. I know my phone can do all at once but it's such a struggle to hop from one program to another while on the move. It's also a giant pain when someone calls you when you're using your phone as navigation, as it won't do both at the same time.

So huge 64 GB USB drive in the car + seperate satnav in the car at all time + seperate phone in a holder with charger would be ideal for me. Call me crazy (and you will) but I prefer it over one system that can do it all. Show me one in car system that shows your nav AND your song library while calling via BT and I may change my mind...
 
I tried that, but there's a few issues with that, most notably
NooDle said:
So huge 64 GB USB drive in the car
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That would hold less than half of my music collection. So I stream it from Google. Tomtom wanted ?75 a year for map updates last time I checked, so I got sygic with lifetime free map updates for ?35.

Since I do have a data plan, Automate does work for me. Going to play around with it for a few more days, and I just might decide to get the premium features too.
 
MacGuffin said:
Map upgrades are for free and of course it recalculates your route permanently according to the current traffic situation - construction sites included.
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And that does jack shit. City planning over here is such that there is only one good way to get somewhere, the other options are either slower or you get rerouted through one-way streets back to where you started.
 
Adamar said:
And that does jack shit. City planning over here is such that there is only one good way to get somewhere, the other options are either slower or you get rerouted through one-way streets back to where you started.
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/me looks at your location, you sure you not in NYC?
 
True, my music collection is over 10 times that, but I don't need to have it all with me at all times :dunno:
 
NooDle said:
True, my music collection is over 10 times that, but I don't need to have it all with me at all times :dunno:
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I hate having to make a selection, because it's usually the usuaul suspects that end up in those selections, and I miss out on the rest of the stuff, all the rarities and b-sides and stuff that makes me download a complete discography with singles for the artists I really like. So I decided that I'd rather pay a little extra on my data plan to be able to stream about 2.5-4GB of music per month, than having to go through that process of trying to make a fair and balanced selection every other month. And Google Play music is much more suited to handling a large music collection than most car audio systems are.
 
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My Mi Band finally died after it's first charge.

Screenshot_2015-05-27-00-49-48.png



For those who missed it 3 months ago it's a 41 Mah battery.
The Mi Band is brilliant, I wanted the band for the sleep part and that is pretty accurate. I've only had one issue and that is the strap which failed after 2 months, replacements are as little as ?1.


It does sleep and steps, thats it. Theres no screen, it doesn't need charging every 4 days, you don't have to tell it when you want to sleep, it doesn't tell you how many calories you've eaten, it doesn't sample your hemoglobin levels 300 times a second. It does sleep and steps, if thats all you want it's pretty amazing.
 
I'm at 40% Battery after 30 days on mine, but I sync the sucker fairly frequently... maybe 4 or 5 times a day, so there's that. Still, I'm perfectly happy with the battery life, I have to say :D
 
eizbaer said:
I'm at 40% Battery after 30 days on mine, but I sync the sucker fairly frequently... maybe 4 or 5 times a day, so there's that. Still, I'm perfectly happy with the battery life, I have to say :D
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Why so often? I will sync once a day. Sometimes once every 2 days. (I think it stores for about a week?)
 
No idea, I'm occasionally curious about the number of steps I've taken at certain times of the day :dunno:
 
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