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| NanaimoRick |
Posted - 01 déc. 2009 : 00:28:30
UPDATED 20100619 : Rick's article is now available on the portal :ROAD TESTING - Garmin Nuvi 1490T and TomTom XXL 540s
ROAD TESTING - Garmin Nuvi 1490T vs TomTom XXL 540S
 
Nuvi 1490T - 5-inch display, Bluetooth® wireless, FM lifetime traffic, lane assist with junction view, preloaded street maps for North America, speaks street names, Where am I?, photo navigation, ecoRoute™, pedestrian navigation options
TomTom XXL 540-S - 5-inch XXL screen, No Bluetooth, 24/7 IQ Route Technology, Advanced Lane Guidance, preloaded street maps of North America, speaks street names, Help Me!, Tom Tom Map Share Technology, Easy Port Mount
Well here we go again! Hopefully you recall the 8700 mile, month long trip my wife and I took in May 2008 where we compared the, then new, Nuvi 780 and the TomTom 930T. If not, check out the blow by blow >> COMPARISON <<or the >> SUMMARY <<
Starting on December 5th, we are off on another GPSpassion comparison road trip. This time we are not traveling as far, only about 4000 miles, but the road test will run 3 1/2 to 4 months as we spend the winter in the American southwest. We've updated our GPS units for this trip to the Garmin Nuvi 1490T and the TomTom XXL 540S. As our trip, and winter vacation, progresses we would once again like to keep you posted on our findings as we use these 2 units, side by side.
Using this thread, we would also like to answer any questions you folks have concerning these 2 devices and how they compare in 'real world' situations. Like in our last comparison, we will cover things like:
- Ease of Use - Menus choices and layout, Configurability, ease of route creation, etc.
- Quality of Maps - including route calculation accuracy, poi database, etc.
- Screen - ease of viewing, night viewing, information on the screen, etc.
- Sound/Voice Quality - ease of hearing voice instructions, quality of TTS voices, speaker quality, etc.
- Miscellaneous Items - features available on one unit but not the other like Bluetooth and Traffic, are they useful, etc.
What we are looking for now, and as we travel, is input from you on things that you would like us to compare between the Nuvi 1490T and the TomTom XXL 540S. Just post your questions to this thread. We will be checking it daily as we travel and over the winter and will post a reply as quickly as possible.
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| 15 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| Andypd |
Posted - 20 janv. 2012 : 00:11:15
Thanks to all the advice on this thread, you helped me decide to buy a 540S for my trip to the US, it worked a treat and I managed to sell it for almost as much as I bought it on Ebay, bonus. |
| houdhoud |
Posted - 17 déc. 2011 : 02:24:15
je cherche le garmin city navigator europe nt pour un gps auto garmin 255 black...SVP.merci |
| NanaimoRick |
Posted - 16 févr. 2011 : 00:08:23
The new Nuvi 24xx series has custom avoidance's and detours so you may want to have a look at them. See http://www.gpspassion.com/forumsen/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=139205 for details and pictures. |
| jeffp25 |
Posted - 15 févr. 2011 : 20:21:20
Rick, thanks. That rules out the Nuvi and means I'll stick with Tomtom. |
| NanaimoRick |
Posted - 15 févr. 2011 : 18:53:46
The TomTom 540 does provide the "alternate route" option. Garmin doesn't have that option on the 1490. |
| jeffp25 |
Posted - 15 févr. 2011 : 18:37:16
One important thing missing from the comparison - alternate routes. I have a 920T and my wife is on her second Nuvi. When the 920T picks a route, I can ask it to show me an alternate if I don't like the recommended one, and I often do so based on my local knowledge. Alternatively, I can pick the original route and tell it to avoid one road/interection that I know will be problematic. On the Nuvi's, equivalent options don't exist - if you don't like the route, you have to live without the GPS until you've gone far enough in the alternate direction for it to change to what you want (and it may not do that). Is all this still true with these two models? |
| gpspassion |
Posted - 21 oct. 2010 : 21:13:56
For the time being...but they are working on making it more difficult (->http://www.gpspassion.com/fr/articles.asp?id=282) or even impossible (->http://www.gpspassion.com/fr/news.asp?ID=764 and http://www.gpspassion.com/fr/news.asp?ID=422) shooting themselves in the foot if you ask me! |
| cleo43 |
Posted - 18 oct. 2010 : 04:25:26
quote:
Originally posted by JimD
POIs for redlight cameras are better obtained (for free) from POIfactory. I don't know if they have files for TomToms but they do for Garmins. I also like to input "favorites" from Goggle and I don't know if that works for TomToms.
I am not trying to argue Garmins are better than TomToms, only that the one you first use may be a big indicator of which one you will subsequently use.
Jim
It's not that hard to convert Garmin POI's to TomTom POI's (there are many programs available for free).
Installation of POI's on TomTom is also easy, just a simple copy/paste. |
| NanaimoRick |
Posted - 14 oct. 2010 : 20:10:21
quote:
Originally posted by movrshakr
I am about to pull the trigger on a 1490T for $179, but am reading gripes on several sites about typing in street names being very difficult. Usually the comment is that you have to hit a letter multiple times for it to "take." Have you seen any typing issues on the 1490 in your tests?
With the latest firmware installed, most of the screen response issues have been addressed. It isn't anything that would keep me from buying a 1490T, particularly for the price you quoted. |
| JimD |
Posted - 14 oct. 2010 : 19:45:59
It seems like if your first GPS is a TomTom they are good enough you do not want to switch to a Garmin. I've purchased 3 Garmins and still use two of them (the other one is now my daughters) and would not switch to TomTom's for the advantages you cite. I know the Garmins will be optomistic on arrival times if the route includes traffic or stoplights. They are a little pessimitic on long trips depending on how fast you go and how often you stop. But I have adjusted and it does not bother me. My Garmin's occasionally give a poor routing but it is infrequent enough I am not ready to get rid of them. If you have a general idea of where you are going, they will typically get with the program. I doubt a TomTom would do better but maybe I'm wrong.
POIs for redlight cameras are better obtained (for free) from POIfactory. I don't know if they have files for TomToms but they do for Garmins. I also like to input "favorites" from Goggle and I don't know if that works for TomToms.
I am not trying to argue Garmins are better than TomToms, only that the one you first use may be a big indicator of which one you will subsequently use.
Jim |
| movrshakr |
Posted - 14 oct. 2010 : 19:43:41
I am about to pull the trigger on a 1490T for $179, but am reading gripes on several sites about typing in street names being very difficult. Usually the comment is that you have to hit a letter multiple times for it to "take." Have you seen any typing issues on the 1490 in your tests? |
| gpspassion |
Posted - 25 août 2010 : 19:01:03
3D with terrain as seen above ;-) Will try 2D the next time, it also helps on Navigon systems in urban environments, but I find that the view ahead is more limited in 2D and less "natural" and frankly it's a hassle to have to wade through the menus and switch modes because the designers didn't program it right. Ironically the 2D/3D switch is one tap away on current TomTom models ;-) |
| danham |
Posted - 25 août 2010 : 16:12:53
For predicting upcoming curves and intersections on winding roads (always a plus while motorcycling), I find that 3D view on my nuvi works a lot better than 2D. Which did you use?
-dan |
| gpspassion |
Posted - 25 août 2010 : 02:58:28
Not exactly a 1490/540 comparison but I drove 1000 miles last week with the 3790T and the XXL 540 side by side and thought I would share my notes (also posted in the 3790T topic)
I'm happy to report that both the 3790T and the XXL 540 did a good job on my 4 day 1000 (999.2 actually) miles trip to Eureka and Lassen last week. It was treat to look at the map on hilly highways like 101 North of San Francisco :
In comparison the map of the TomTom XXL (540) looked rather dull. On the other hand, the zoomed out map of the nuvi is still pretty useless when driving on winding roads where it's useful to get a sense of what the next turn will look like, the TomTom excels for that :
So as usual, there is no "perfect" GPS ;-)
It's a bit harder to pick a winner for the route choices, you'd really need two cars to follow both routes when they diverge. In the US I tend to follow the route offered by Garmin GPS systems as they are "local" and use the Navteq maps that are normally better around here, but with the power of TomTom's IQ Routes I'm wondering if that remains very valid. Driving back from Sacramento into Palo Alto, the 3790T had me stay on a very busy I-80 rather than the quieter 680 route that the TomTom was suggesting. Then in Oakland the 3790 had me make some difficult and potentially dangerous highway changes when the XXL was suggesting to stay on I-880 which loops slightly to the North. When the routes are similar, the ETA is close.
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| NanaimoRick |
Posted - 22 juin 2010 : 19:28:53
I know that certainly there are folks here that have found the same thing as you have, but in all our travels I can honestly say I can only recall two cases where the Nuvi routed us through a downtown instead of around a city (Baltimore and Seattle) and in these cases either way was on interstates and not city streets. The routes calculated were probably faster and shorter than the ring roads. Time of day made my decision to use the ring road anyway as we had no desire to face inbound rush hour traffic into downtown Baltimore or a 37 minute traffic delay being reported in downtown Seattle.
@spokybob, the GPX track log can be plotted in Mapsource and I also use Microsoft's Streets & Trips 2010 to plot these logs as well. The track properties for each log show the date and time of day for each track point as per the picture below. I don't use date and time so hopefully this data is accurate and what you were looking for:
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