UK Mumsnetters needed to test TomTom’s top Sat Nav - the GO 5000 worth £259.99 NOW CLOSED

[AngelieMumsnet]

We have been asked by the team at TomTom to find 100 UK MNers to try TomTom GO 5000.

We're looking for Mumsnetters who are regular drivers.

TomTom says: "We all know that traffic jams can take seconds to build up and then last for hours. There is nothing more frustrating than sitting in a jam or in slow moving traffic and not knowing how long you will be there. Especially, when your time is tight and you have children to pick up or drop off.

TomTom satnavs know the precise traffic situation on most UK roads at all times, in real time. The satnav you’ll be given to test is a “live device,” this means it is constantly searching every possible route option to find you the fastest route available. So, if the traffic situation suddenly gets bad on your “normal” route, it will automatically search other options to find a new, faster route and give you a new arrive time."

If selected, you'll be sent the TomTom GO 5000 to try for a few weeks and so long as you add feedback as required you will be able to keep the product.

If selected, you will be sent the TomTom GO 5000 at the end of September, and asked to try it for two weeks. You will then need to try it and add feedback to a thread on Mumsnet. At the end of the testing period, we’d also like you to post a review on the Mumsnet review pages and fill in a short survey. In order to keep the product, you would need to add your feedback by the 26th of October, so please only apply if you are able to do this.

Please also note that TomTom may use your anonymous feedback comments on their website and social media channels, as well as elsewhere.

If you'd like to take part, please add your details here: www.surveymonkey.com/s/RKBRB3K

We will be in touch with selected MNers ASAP.

Thanks and good luck!

MNHQ

[ChippingInLatteLover]

lougle - yes, it's a bit of a worry that!

[MyNameIsInigoMontoya]

Mine is working OK now, although it annoys me a bit when it keeps repeating itself. I don't need telling to turn right twice on a road that's only 100 yards long! VR is working moderately well now.

I did mess up the other day when I took it for its first longer drive. I looked for the address and thought I had found it, as it looked right but I didn't realise there were a lot more results sort of hidden behind, which you had to scroll down to see. So I just picked the top one, which looked right and was in the right general direction (or would have noticed), but - unfortunately - was NOT actually where I wanted to go. Oops! But I admit it was partly my fault for not realising; and it did get me back to the right place once I worked it out.

I still need some more practise with looking for or accepting alternative routes, it tends to get me a bit confused if it suddenly proposes a new route, especially if it's in an area I know and I can't immediately work out where it means. Although so far it has mostly agreed with my usual choices.

I've also noticed one changed speed limit (not that recent though) which hasn't been updated yet, must remember to correct it on the website sometime.

[nightswift]

I've still not got mine working. Did the 5 hr update which then froze at 99% and never got to the second step of updating the device. Tried plugging it in a few more times and it just sat thete so I deleted the tomtom folder from my computer and tried again. This time it said only 1 update and just sat at 15%. My tomtom now doesn't work at all as it says it has no maps! This has all been on Chrome - going to try IE instead. Getting really hacked off with it now - if I'd paid for it I would be so pissed off and it would so have gone back.

[MyNameIsInigoMontoya]

Mine was same nightswift but did eventually get there with lots (and lots) of attempts, I now have maps again and it is fine so don't give up!

[VeryStressedMum]

I still don't seem to have any 3D effects and it doesn't tell me what lane I'm supposed to be in...it's a good Sat nav but at the moment I can't see how it's better than another one at less than half the price.
I do like the voice recognition though, I like the way I can just tell it to go home from wherever I am.

[iwantavuvezela]

Ok so my first thoughts are:
TomTom turned on and almost instantly found where I was (my old tomtom drove me mad as it would take sometimes 5-10 mins of switching on and off .... and I have had a few times when it could not find where I was)

Got the Voice recognition to work, and have realized that the Tom Tom is probably the one thing in our household who responds to me instantly, so love saying TomTom go home!

Not sure if I am been daft but if I am charging the Tom Tom in the car does that mean that it cannot fit in the stand? I cant seem to do both (push tomtom into holder and also have charger on?) If so, this is a problem as I normally charge tomtom while driving.

I have been using it for my usual routes to get used to it, but today will drive across London so counting on Tom Tom!!!

[MimsyBorogroves]

Iwant - charger can plug into the back of the stand too. That one had me mystified for ages too!

[Lookslikeimstuckhere]

I've used mine without the charger in and it lasts quite a long time. Which is good as my pet hate about say navs is the cables all over the car.

[iwantavuvezela]

Thanks for that Mimsy, will try on way home!

[alemci]

i always have mine charging on the stand.

[IAmAPaleontologist]

Tom and I went out today for the first time.

Nice and easy to get going, I typed in the postcode and off we went. I missed a turn where I got a bit confused by the instructions but Serena didn't yell at me and the route was quickly recalculated and it didn't seem to affect the estimated arrival time.

Tom took me by the back roads. I'm not sure about this for this particular route. I followed it because I don't know the back roads well and I figured I'd give it a go. I don't know that it would be any quicker, perhaps at rush hour as it does avoid a small area that snarls up a bit. I expect Tom thinks it is quicker but in reality although they are 60mph roads they are narrow, single track and full of blind bends so you don't actually go at 60.

Traffic was a bit hit and miss, there was certainly a longer tail back than he thought there was. I suspect this sort of info will be more accurate in more densely populated areas/more popular routes.

Got there fine. Parked. Attempted to remove holder from windscreen and left the sucker behind (did this again on getting home. How on earth do you remove it without pulling it off?) but thankfully this can be shoved back on.

Turned out the postcode I had been given was wrong. Got some help from some lovely ladies at the reception in a medical centre. Got the right postcode and thanked my lucky stars that I had Tom as I wouldn't have had a clue how to get there otherwise. Back in the car and Tom took me straight to where I needed to be and I got there as people were still registering for the day and having coffee. Phew!

Getting home again I decided to try voice recognition but I couldn't get Tom to respond to any "Hello TomTom", "Hey TomTom" or anything else. Once I selected voice recognition from the menu and it told me to speak after the beep etc then it understood "Go Home" but really it is a bit useless if you have to swipe at the menu first because you clearly wouldn't want to do that while driving which I assume it what VR is for.

Anyway so far so good. It doesn't really know where I live but nor does any satnav and it is pretty close. I correctly spotted a speed camera. Road speeds are a little hit and miss, it can be slow to update the screen. Though personally I think that is too much info on the screen and is a big distraction. As a driver you should be able to identify the speed limit you are in anyway and you should be using your own speedometer on the car for your own speed and not relying on a satnav to be accurate.

I found the little symbols on the right hand side distracting too, I don't know what half of them mean.

I've never had a sat nav before so I don't know what is normal to have on the screen and what isn't but I can't help but feel it all just a load of stuff for the driver to be looking at when they need to be looking at the road. If they need to find a garage or something desperately then surely they can pull over and ask Tom where the local ones are, or ask to plot the current route via a garage or something.

At the moment I can see it as being very handy when venturing into unfamiliar territory. Shall see if it makes any difference to normal commutes next. Not too sure about this week as I'm on long shifts so not going to be travelling at peak times but next week I have some days when I'll be out in rush hour.

Will be trying another voice out tomorrow. Serena is very calm but she realy irritates me with "The A one seventy seven, the B one hundred and sixty two" and all that gubbins. Can computer programmers not manage to make her say "A one seven seven"?

Need to try to get it speaking to my computer tonight. Have had a response from customer services about installing drivers or something so will have to fiddle.

[MyNameIsInigoMontoya]

I am starting to wish you could program it to not go down every little ratrun with 20mph limits and liberal sprinklings of speed bumps and small children, just to shave off a minute or two max. It may be faster in theory, but in practice I'm not convinced it is unless the main road was totally blocked or something (especially if there are narrow bits where you have to wait for cars coming the other way) and it's not good for the suspension, plus I kind of believe that if the council's gone to all the trouble of putting that in place there are probably good reasons and we shouldn't be encouraging extra people to go zooming past schools etc if they don't need to!

[AngelieMumsnet]

@SocksRock

Useless today. Wouldn't hold a connection to the traffic server, so no traffic updates. I'm in Oxfordshire, so not exactly rural... How do I get it to reconnect? This is recurring problem and VERY annoying.

When it is connected, it seems pretty accurate, got me to work this morning through heavy traffic in a decent time. But it only stays connected for the whole journey about 20% of the time.

TomTom say:

"Hello SocksRock, I’m sorry to read that you could not get any traffic updates. If you notice that the traffic is not connecting automatically, you can soft reset the device by holding down the power button for until you hear the drum sounds (about 30 seconds). This should not be a usual recurrence and if it persists please send us an email to [email protected] so we look into your specific situation and work on a solution. "

[AngelieMumsnet]

@ChippingInLatteLover

TomTom are there any settings we can adjust wrt the voice control? Many of us are struggling with the fact that you have to shout at it to activate it. Even sitting here, with it in my hand I am having to shout.

Also, why does VR go off when you turn it off? Why do you have to go into settings each and every time to turn it on?

TomTom have said:

"Hi ChippingInLatteLover, there are certain settings you can adjust via voice control e.g. volume, colours, 2D and 3D view among others. You can learn more on all the ways you can use voice recognition here: bit.ly/1CgkODD on page 68-71.
When you turn your device off, it voice recognition goes back to the default which is off. You can simply put your device to sleep instead of completely turning it off so that you do not have to manually turn voice control on every time. "

[AngelieMumsnet]

@BettyMoody

voice commands not working
i said ' go to nicks house'; - couldnt be clearer

TomTom have said:

"Hello BettyMoody, to navigated to a save place i.e. “My Places” the command is “Display My Places” and then you can say the specific place e.g. “Go to Nick’s House” if one of your places was saved as such. To learn more about the varied voice control options please refer to page 68-71 of the user manual here: bit.ly/1CgkODD"

[AngelieMumsnet]

@Pikkewyn

Tom's voice control is just useless! I turned it on, it said the where do want to go blurb - I said 'school' and it said 'turning map to 3-d and refused to respond further than that! I've given up on VC and will just type it in manually. I find the swipe across menu quite frustrating - 6 or 8 little squares on 1 screen was much more accessible.

TomTom say:

"Hello Pikkewyn, the voice commands have to be said in a certain way for the voice control. In the instance you gave, you would have to say “Display My Places” (if you have the school saved as your place) then you can say “Go to School”. To learn all the different commands your device accepts, please refer to the voice control section (page 68 – 71) of the user manual here bit.ly/1CgkODD ."

[AngelieMumsnet]

@whoops

Floralnomad there is a place on the Tom Tom website you can report road closures, changes etc, I sat and did a few the other night (you're not in Southampton are you?!) it's common for roundabouts to be replaced by traffic lights here!!

I'm having trouble getting on to this thread from my ipad and iphone app it's only this thread so I'm wondering if it's protesting about me not using maps for route planning now

I think I confused it earlier as it set to avoid one set of traffic build up then I started to go towards a different set of traffic build up so not sure where it was going to try and send me but I ignored it as I knew the way I was going was only because of the many sets of traffic lights on that road!

TomTom have said:

"Hello whoops, you can also report the changes on the device itself. To do so, you press and hold to select the location of the map correction on the map view. Select the pop up menu button and open the menu, then select “Report Map Error”. Select the type of map correction you want to apply and follow the instructions for your chosen type of map correction. You can read further on how to use the Map Share function on the device on page 72-75 in the user manual here: bit.ly/1CgkODD "

[AngelieMumsnet]

@Lookslikeimstuckhere

Chipping I have the same problem with trying to sort a route.

If I want to set a route from where I work to my mum's for example, I click on use this as start point but it actually used my house as the starting point, then making my work place a way point!? I've tried it several times but can't make it do anything else so I gave up. Am I being a complete numpty, TomTom?

TomTom have said:

"Hi Lookslikeimstuckhere, to plan a route from your work place to your mum’s, you have to select your workplace either from “My Places” or from the map and then click on “Use as starting point” You can then plan the destination as per usual. "

[AngelieMumsnet]

@SarahSnail

Love this TomTom, I haven't had any problems what so ever with the voice controls and its so easy to jump in the car and tell it where I want to go.
Not to sure on the traffic updates yet though....... seems it thought it was easier to keep me stuck in M1 traffic for an hour and half this morning rather than suggest another route?? so I don't know how the traffic updates are meant to work.

TomTom say:

"Hi Sarahsnail, what happened was that the device had calculated that staying in the traffic jam would still be faster than taking an alternative route. The device provides you the fastest route possible, thus if staying in traffic is the fastest way to get to your destination it does not offer any alternatives. While you are en-route, the device can calculate that if you take another route it will be faster, hence the suggestion.

Traffic information is constantly changing and device is constantly re-adjusting to that. You can still find an alternative route manually by clicking on the route you are currently on, selecting “Alternative Routes” then “Find Alternative”. The device will give you up to 3 alternatives which show the difference in travel time in a balloon. You can select your chosen route by clicking on the time balloon."

[AngelieMumsnet]

@MyNameIsInigoMontoya

Mine is working OK now, although it annoys me a bit when it keeps repeating itself. I don't need telling to turn right twice on a road that's only 100 yards long! VR is working moderately well now.

I did mess up the other day when I took it for its first longer drive. I looked for the address and thought I had found it, as it looked right but I didn't realise there were a lot more results sort of hidden behind, which you had to scroll down to see. So I just picked the top one, which looked right and was in the right general direction (or would have noticed), but - unfortunately - was NOT actually where I wanted to go. Oops! But I admit it was partly my fault for not realising; and it did get me back to the right place once I worked it out.

I still need some more practise with looking for or accepting alternative routes, it tends to get me a bit confused if it suddenly proposes a new route, especially if it's in an area I know and I can't immediately work out where it means. Although so far it has mostly agreed with my usual choices.

I've also noticed one changed speed limit (not that recent though) which hasn't been updated yet, must remember to correct it on the website sometime.

TomTom say:

"Hi again MyNameIsInigoMontoya, as you enter your address, predictive search provides a list of possible destinations on the left in order of distance from your current location. You can see all the suggested destinations by putting away the keyboard by clicking on the button with 3 lines on the bottom right of your screen.

You can also correct errors on the device itself if you press and hold to select the location of the map correction, then select “Report Map Error” from the pop up menu and select “Speed Limit” then scroll to the correct limit and select “Report”"

[AngelieMumsnet]

@nightswift

I've still not got mine working. Did the 5 hr update which then froze at 99% and never got to the second step of updating the device. Tried plugging it in a few more times and it just sat thete so I deleted the tomtom folder from my computer and tried again. This time it said only 1 update and just sat at 15%. My tomtom now doesn't work at all as it says it has no maps! This has all been on Chrome - going to try IE instead. Getting really hacked off with it now - if I'd paid for it I would be so pissed off and it would so have gone back.

TomTom have said:

"Hello nightswift, I’m sorry to read that you still have not been able to update your device. We would like to help you get the issue sorted out as soon as possible. Can you please send us an email on [email protected] so we can look into your problem and help with a solution?"

[AngelieMumsnet]

@iwantavuvezela

Ok so my first thoughts are:
TomTom turned on and almost instantly found where I was (my old tomtom drove me mad as it would take sometimes 5-10 mins of switching on and off .... and I have had a few times when it could not find where I was)

Got the Voice recognition to work, and have realized that the Tom Tom is probably the one thing in our household who responds to me instantly, so love saying TomTom go home!

Not sure if I am been daft but if I am charging the Tom Tom in the car does that mean that it cannot fit in the stand? I cant seem to do both (push tomtom into holder and also have charger on?) If so, this is a problem as I normally charge tomtom while driving.

I have been using it for my usual routes to get used to it, but today will drive across London so counting on Tom Tom!!!

TomTom say:

"Hi iwantavuvuzela, please connect the supplied USB cable to the mount so that your device can charge while in use. Ensure that the USB car charger and the USB cable are connected as well. "

[AngelieMumsnet]

Thanks for all your comments so far :) The feedback thread is now open here. So please do start commenting over there!

The Top 5 custom voices are...

Stephen Fry - with 28% of the vote
Brian Blessed - 22%
Yoda - 10%
Homer Simpson - 8%
Bert and Ernie - 8%

We'll be sending out the voucher for you to claim your free Stephen Fry voice download by the end of the week.

[whoops]

Thank you Tom Tom! I've just been reading the manual, found I can get to my places via voice control! And saw that you can report speed cameras and traffic! I presume we have to plug it in to get the maps updated though?

Off to read

[chickensandbees]

Had my first long journey today. TomTom performed well. Knew some shortcuts that I already knew but my old satnav didn't so that was reassuring. Got caught in a traffic jam on the m5 but the TomTom was good because I knew how long the jam was for. So didn't panic as I knew in 2 miles I would be through it.

Finally got the VC working and I like it. I think it takes a bit of practice as to what words you can use.

DD2 loves it and repeats the instructions. "Go left mummy!!"

I am liking it and can't wait to get Stephen Fry.