Customer Reviews

TomTom GO 700 3.5-Inch Bluetooth Portable GPS Navigator

5 star:		(23)
4 star:		(17)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(25)

 

 

The TomTom Go700 is great! I own a Garmin c330 (also phenomenal product), but this one is equipped with excellent new features that keep it bleeding-edge car navigation.

First off, the Bluetooth connectivity makes this product a winner in itself. The phone calls are crystal-clear with my Ericsson T637. Callers also say they can hear me perfectly. The connectivity is awesome, plus with web access on your mobile, you can collect current weather and traffic data from TomTom. The voices are loud and clear, and the 3D navigation outperforms the Garmin.

Navigation-wise, the product is also awesome. Route planning is easy and intuitive. If you don't like a certain route, you can select alternate routes on-the-fly. You can select from a large number of route views (text only, map, both, etc.), and route demos can be sped up or slowed down (unlike c330).

Other awesome features include tips and tutorials for learning the intracacies of the product. You can also download new voices to the device (such as John Cleese) for added customizability. This is so much fun! The features go on and on....

All in all, this is a significant improvement over the Garmin c330. It adds all the functions I wished were available on the Garmin. This is so greatly customizable and easy-to-use. I consider it the Mac version of GPS car navigation.

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One week later...

After owning the product for a week, I decided to return it. I had a few issues with the unit powering up; I needed to reset it several times. I also found a few annoyances with looking up points of interest. Unlike the Garmin, you must first select a category before searching for a POI. This made it impossible to search for Dry Cleaners, Banks, and many other very necessary locations!

Map data is also a bit outdated. Entering my office address didn't work on the unit. It only registered a certain range of "house" numbers, with mine not being one of them. TomTom also uses TeleAtlas maps, which (in my opinion) are not as nice as Garmin's NAVTEQ ones. They both work, but I find usability easier and more efficient on the Garmin.

Also, reading cell phone text messages via the unit was practically useless. Messages were encoded with a string of strange text before the actual body of the message.

Many fun features (such as Traffic & new POI's) are not yet available in the US, either. This product is a little bit of everything rolled into one. It's a really cool unit, with tons of features, but I think it's a bit flawed. I hope TomTom continues to support many of the features it advertses (Weather, Traffic, Voices, etc.).

I used this product for about two weeks and decided to return it for three reasons.

First, whenever you are on the freeway and it tells you where to get off the freeway, it only gives you the exit number and not the name of the street. While that might be fine back east, here in California, the exits are marked primarily with street names, not exit numbers. In fact, several of the exit numbers that it has recommended were wrong (because the exit numbers had changed).

Second, when the system tells you to get onto a freeway (or change freeways), it almost never tells you which direction you are going to go (i.e., north or south on the I-5), making it difficult to figure out which lane to choose? Sure, you can figure it out by carefully studying the map while you barrel down the highway, but I'd rather just have it tell me which direction and then read the signs on the highway to select the correct lane...

Third, there is absolutely no support for this product. You cannot reach them by telephone, and although I sent a message through their website more than two weeks ago asking if there's a way to fix these two issues, there has been no response at all.

Ultimately, I replaced this with a Garmin product, which does not have any of these issues.

After weeks of research, reading reviews, and comparison shopping between the Lowrane IWay 500c, the Garmin StreetPilot 2270, and the Tomtom go 700, I finally decided to plunk down $800 for the Tomtom Go 700. Following a week of use including a roundtrip from Sacramento to LA, here are some of my findings.


Pros:
Start-up time is quick. It typically only took 10-15 seconds to start up and an additional 10 seconds to accurately find my position. I imagine the 12 receivers help to find your position fairly accurately and quickly should a couple satellite signals be too weak or not within line of sight of the unit.

The user interface is fantastic. The layout of icons and and GUI is very intuitive. It's easy to save destinations, POIs, adjust your preferences etc.

The audio cues are great too. Audio output from the speaker is amazingly clear, and the language selections are extremely comprehensive.

The predictive text feature is also very accurate although sometimes you may get two results. For example, if you type in Walnut Street, you might get two options N. Walnut and S. Walnut, traditional maps or even addresses of businesses often times do not make this distinction (which isn't necessarily their fault) When I looked at the street signs at the intersection, the sign simply said "Walnut Street."

The 3D map is helpful for gauging future turns and provides a better perspective than your typical 2D or bird's eye view of the map.

If you are able to pair your cell phone using the integrated Bluetooth feature on the Tomtom go, you'll find that the hands free audio quality is impressive as well.

Another big benefit is that the Tomtom Go 700 is truly portable. Since there is a battery in the unit you can take it with you on walks while on vacation through San Francisco, NYC, etc. The Garmin StreetPilot 2270 or the Lowrance Iway 500c do not have this feature.


Cons:
I found the maps to be slightly outdated. It's my understanding that the maps used by Magellan and Garmin are more recent and tend to be more accurate.

The Tomtom 700 does not have WAAS (Wide Area Augmentation System), which provides a more accurate position within 3 meters. Sometimes after starting the Tomtom 700 on the freeway,it would tell me that I was on a suface street close-by and parallel to the freeway. The Garmin StreetPilot 2270 does have WAAS.

I live in California and most of our exits are labeled with street names, not exit numbers. Unfortunately this is one of the major flaws with the Tomtom systems as often times they only provide an exit number and not a street name. There were times where it did offer both, but having the street exit names in the map database would be helpful to me.

As with many other GPS navigation systems, the Tomtom's screen tends to get washed out in direct sunlight. It's not unreadable, but direct sun will definitely hinder your ability to quicly glance at the display and read any helpful information or prompts.

The POI database is fairly comprehensive but there were exits along my trip to LA that did not list gas stations close by where I could visibly see gas stations present. Also it's fairly difficult to search for a particular store or restaurant since when you select the POI database it lists POIs in increasing distance based on your present geographic location or city center. Not the easiest way of finding what you want when you know where you want to go.

The assisted satellite navigation (ASN) feature is pretty much useless as on the satellite signal, the GPS system display's you going in all sorts of directiosn until you're out of the tunnel.


Conclusion:
I found the Tomtom 700 to be a competent automobile GPS system, however if you're considering buying it, I'd select the Tomtom Go 300 instead as the only feature it's missing is the hard drive and ability to control via the wireless remote which is an option with the 700 model. With the 300 you still get the entire map database of the US compressed into a SD card, where as with the Tomtom 700 it takes a long time to back up the map database to your personal computer and it takes a vast amount of hard drive space (3.5GB). The 300 also has a slightly slower processor but I expect performance to be fairly comprable to the 700 model.

I for one will probably exchange my 700 for a 300 model or wait and hope that Garmin comes out with a battery powered model with an integrated speaker to suceed the Streetpilot 2270 in a few months.

Tom Tom is one of the newer GPS makers to do business in the US, and I was very pleased to get a chance to try out the GO 700.

First, a discussion of basic usability: it's very good! The box promises that you can just turn it on and go, and it's true. You don't need to hook it up to a computer first, and there is no aggravating "activation" step.

The user interface is very different than what I am used to from competing products, being as it is all touch-screen aside from the power button. The tasks and various preferences are also arranged differently than I am accustomed to. Not that it's bad . . . just different. It is at least the equal of its major competitors in ease of use, and probably better in customizability, such as map colors.

Speaking of the map, it has a pleasant smooth scroll as you drive, and an easy to read 3d perspective mode. All of the text is sharp and readable, though some fiddly bits like satellite status numbers are rather small.

The windshield sucker mount is great. It's the best I have seen on such a product and it may even be better than my trusty old RAM mount.

The built-in Bluetooth speakerphone should work with most Bluetooth mobile phones. It did not have a problem with my Sony Ericsson S710a, which is relatively new as of this writing. Sound quality for both parties is quite good, but there is no support for my phone's voice dialing and answering features-I suspect that all phones with voice dialing will suffer this way. But fortunately the GO 700 will grab your phone's address book and let you choose a number from it on the touch screen, which is an adequate compromise for the lack of voice dialing. Answering (or rejecting) a call is just a matter of pushing a big button that pops up when a call is coming in.

So that's all good, but there are two other very neat things about the GO 700. For one, the voices. They are very clear and high-quality, noticeably better than anything else I have heard in a car GPS. You can purchase additional fun voices from the TomTom web site, if you want. One of them is even John Cleese, though it will cost you about $10 to get him. The other voices are about $5.

The other simple yet very pleasant feature is the built-in rechargeable battery. When fully charged off the included auto adapter, the GO 700 will run for a few hours all by itself. That means you can take it for a walk in the city, or grab it for a trip in someone else's car without worrying about power.

Speaking of trips, I would put the quality of the routing and verbal directions on par with everything else I have tried. Honestly, all the major makers seem to do a good job with this. Of course for any GPS product there is local variation in the quality of the maps, but in my area (around Seattle and Los Angeles) the GO 700 is fine though I did not get a chance to test LA freeway exits much. Quality of the GPS receiver seems to be very good.

On the down side, we have the screen. I have read other reviews that state it is unusable in sunlight, but I find that to be an exaggeration. There is certainly a drop in contrast, moreso than I see in the big competitors, but I find the screen to remain usable in all lighting conditions, even direct sunlight. I would not rule the GO 700 out for this reason, but it is something to be aware of.

What about reliability? Well, no problems so far. The device uses a 2.5 GB hard drive, not flash memory. Hard drives can die, so caveat emptor.

Now, a big part of the Tom Tom offering is their "plus" service, which is premium downloads straight to your GPS over your mobile phone. That's points of interest, voices, extra maps, and real-time traffic information. Pretty cool, but this service is not for everyone. For one, you need a GSM mobile phone and an active data account... that's at least an extra $20 on your phone bill. For another, the services themselves are not cheap. A yearly subscription to UK traffic is over $60, and American traffic data is not even available yet. Same with POIs . . . UK safety cameras are over $70 for a yearly subscription. I didn't see any US POIs.

Now for a constant business driver, that could be worth it... but if your main use for a GPS is to not get lost when driving to some new spot across town, these advanced data features are not worth their additional cost. And more to the point, they aren't even available in the US. (Tom Tom is a European company, but I had hoped they would have better data support for their US customers.)

Speaking of POIs, this is where I found my one and only "hate it!" issue. You can't look up POIs by name alone. You must specify a category first. So is that big museum downtown a, uh, Museum? Cultural Center? Exhibition Center? Or maybe a Tourist Attraction? You won't know until you search each of those categories.

Lastly, the included PC software will let you back up your settings to your PC. (The GO 700 shows up like a USB drive under Windows.) By the way, if the thought of downloading a high-quality voice over your mobile phone data connection freaks you out, you can do Tom Tom Plus data transfers through your PC instead.

Other than the disappointing Plus services, I was pretty impressed with the GO 700. The quality of the hardware and software is very good, and it works as advertised. The next time I have to recommend a car GPS to someone, the Tom Tom GO series will be a serious contender.

I bought a TomTom 700 from a local wholesale club and took it back after a week.

There were a lot of things I liked about the unit. The 3D graphics were good, and its size was appealing. Its offline navigation software runs on PC or Mac, although product firmware updates were available only PC.

The unit has a suction-cup mount that worked well and has a rechargeable battery so that it doesn't have to have to be plugged in all the time, especially for short trips.

The major flaw in the device is locating destinations. In some cases the device could not locate the destination by address at all, and in other cases it would incorrectly misidentify the location as being several blocks away. The audible directions were also confusing, though the display always seemed to give pretty good guidance on turns, etc.

The maps were missing some major roads in my area that have been around for at least 5 or more years. When I looked for updates on the website, I noticed, first of all, that prices were in Euros. That makes me wonder if this product is just emerging in the U.S. and whether or not TomTom is equipped to support U.S. customers.

While perusing their site, I also noticed their website indicated map updates would be available in 2006. If the older map updates on their website are any indication, updating the North America maps will be pretty expensive.

Another annoyance is that one has to set the clock manually on the device. GPS works by using propagation delays on atomic clocks, so it baffles me why the device needs me to program in the current time.

I bought a Garmin StreetPilot 2720 (which can be found for about the same price, maybe a few dollars more) after taking this unit back, and I recommend Garmon to others considering this product. It offers the following advantages over TomTom:
* More accurate maps and navigation
* Clear voice instructions with better text-to-speech navigation ("Turn right on Elm Street")
* A great trip meter that gives miles traveled, current speed, and elevation
* A display more readable in bright light that automatically adjusts its settings at night
* Easier route planning
* Remote control included

The Garmin has only a couple downsides compared to the TomTom
* No battery
* No built-in speaker. Its speaker is attached to the dc power adapter.

The TomTom 700 has a lot of potential, and I believe it will be a serious contender in the U.S. market in a few years. For now, though, you'll want to look elsewhere.

Evaluation of the TomTom Go 700 GPS

I have read that a lot of folks thought tech support was not responsive. I did not find that to be the case. Tech support responded to my question in a reasonable time, about 24 hours. I did not like their response, but they did respond. Here is the exchange.

To technical support:
I just purchased the 700. So far I like the unit but when traveling, I very frequently need to find a bank or ATM. I find no POI category for banks/atm's on the 700.
Is this an oversight or am I doing something wrong?
Surely this is not an intentional omission.
Thanks,

Dear Mr.
Thank you for contacting TomTom Customer Support. Due to the great demand for our products, we were not able to answer your mail sooner. Please accept our apologies for the delay. We do not provide ATM POIs yet. However, lots of websites on the net offer a wide variety of POIs online. We hope we have answered your question. If not, please contact us again.
With best regards,
The TomTom Customer Support Team

Below are my findings after using the unit for about a week.

The first hour that I used the unit I was quite pleased. The audio is great and the turn by turn instructions when accurate are better than most. The Bluetooth cell phone function turned out to be an unexpected positive.
However, once I started to navigate using the unit, glaring deficiencies became evident. Although the unit has a few nice features, bad design and major deficiencies far outweigh any positive features. Below are the problems I found using the unit.

1) Has no WAAS

2) Cannot receive (display) altitude data

3) Time does not set using satellite data, you have to set time manually - a pain when driving through different time zones

4) Other units I have used use the Naviteq databases which are definitely better, more detail and more accurate than the database used in the TomTom (TeleAtlas)

5) POI's must be accessed using categories. There is no ability to find a destination by name. This is a Major Deficiency

6) POI categories are sparse and not pertinent to US users. Example, when is the last time you needed to find an embassy? Embassy's are listed, however if you need a bank or ATM, you are out of luck (see letter to tech support). On our trip for example, we were in Ashville NC. We wanted to visit the Biltmore Estate. There was no way to put that destination into the GPS

7) Screen washes out in most daylight conditions - worse than most - screen not bright

8) Screen display much smaller than other 3 1/2" units. This because data is displayed at the bottom of the screen which takes up about 25% of the screen. This data cannot be made transparent or eliminated which reduces the usable map display considerably

9) Many roads are not in database including major interstates, I-185 out of Greenville SC for example.
More than once the unit "got lost", became confused and left the user clueless on how to navigate. A few times, the unit tried to have me turn on roads that did not exist. A few reviewers have said they expect some roads to be missing. Those reviewers are more forgiving than me. I don't expect a GPS to miss much and certainly don't expect to receive wrong directions or directions that are sometimes dangerous

10) Unlike other GPS units, the map display does not show much detail - i.e.; lakes, rivers, airports etc. Most other GPS units give a good overall view of the terrain. And this is in the non-3D mode on the TomTom. The 3D mode is even worse.

11) When trying to set the map display scale by using the (+ -) on the display, the screen automatically goes back to a factory preset scale in a few seconds, not allowing the user to keep the scale chosen

12) The remote control is not included and a $50.00 extra

13) The CD that comes with the unit will not install properly (Windows XP)

This is not meant to be offensive to any previous reviewer, but to give this unit a good review tells me that the reviewer is not familiar with other GPS units on the market.

Don't buy the TomTom. To say it is not ready for the US market or any market for that matter would be a gross understatement. It has so many deficiencies that I believe the company should do a complete revamp of the software and choice of mapping database.

Final conclusion - the TomTom Go 700 is a NO-GO

I purchased this product on the recommendation of Amazon.com and have regretted it ever since. It's the worst consumer electronic item I have ever purchased. No wonder the price has dropped 50% since my purchase. They probably can't give them away. After about 90 days, the product goes completely dead. After contacting customer service, I was told to reset the product. Two weeks later it went dead again. The last time I went to the manufacturer's website, I couldn't even find any contact information for customer service. They must have so many complaints that they can't handle them. Not to mention product returns. Save yourself some money and a lot of grief. Buy a Garmin system. The graphics aren't as good. But at least it's reliable.

I purchased a TomTom Go and have had problems with the touch screen ever since. It malfunctioned within 6 months of purchase and I had to send it in to be repaired, they said they were unable to repair it and sent me a brand new one. The new one began malfunctioning in exactly the same way within another 6 months. After the subsequent 6 months, I sent it back again for the same problem and they told me it was out of warranty and they no longer repair the TomTom Go but they would send me a newer model for an additional $300-400. Ridiculous, I have been trying to get some sort of satisfaction to no avail. I paid nearly $1000 for this unit when it came on the market and it never worked more than 6 months at a time. It would be best if this company went out of business in my opinion especially after reading the other reviews listed here. I am now having to "trash" my unit and buy a different, more reliable, brand.

My husband bought me this for Christmas because we were moving to a new city. He picked it out because unlike Garmin and Magellen it was created from the ground up for use on the road. The features are easy to use, the directions are great and when you need a new route because of roadblock or traffic - it really comes up with a great plan. However - my first one lasted 3 months before it died, I then replaced it with another one and it died 3 months later as well. I was very reluctant to buy a different brand - but had to for dependability. I still don't like my Garmin as much - but at least it works. Come on Tomtom - get the electronics working as well as the maps and directions.

I have owned this product for about 4 months. It works reasonably well for the US business trips I take, but I would not purchase it again. I am travelling to Australia in July, and as far as I can tell, there is no map available for Australia for the Tom Tom Go 700. The map of Australia on their web site is priced at an astonishing Euros 199, but doesn't appear to work on the 700.

My screen almost immediately developed what appears to be a stain under the touch screen. On-line support is not very comprehensive or helpful. I have not tried the customer support number for the USA, mainly because it is not available when I have free time, nights and weekends.

My advice is try the Garmin, it has better customer support and map availiabity and updates.