I just drove 1000 miles in my new silver bubble. I knew the route I wanted to take but the routing logic wanted to keep me on interstates no matter how far out of the way it would take me or what I did to try to get around this. The route I desired was a US highway, mostly 4 lanes. It was comical to watch the computer try to get me to turn around over and over while I took the short way home. The computer (I call her Rita) was quite stubborn and kept me company (in a co-dependant kind of way) all the way home. She finally gave in to my superior judgement after a few hundred miles of arguing. hmmm sounds familiar somehow. Another little quirk was this annoying habit she had of announcing upcoming small crossroads and sometimes even driveways as though they were choices I had to make, counselling me to turn left or right in order to stay on the current road. What's up with that? This was all during the hundred's of miles of driving across North and West Texas where maybe even the Nav computer was just bored. Does anyone know wat might cause these pesky little problems? Thanks, Ray
You did not state if this was the 02-03 or the 04+ NAV system. I have found that the 04 (GDT) NAV software is amost usless in my trips in West Texas. (Austin to Eunice NM) :cussing: Good thing I am from there and know my way around... One of the roads I travel is 176 and the 02 Prius (Navatech software) I had was always dead on on this trip, but the GDT systems thinks that road is Ranch Road 87 and has so many turns here bank there... one of the turns is into an open field. :cussing: Yea right.. Been on that road for over 40 years.. never has it be a Ranch road. On one other road, 71 from Austin to San Angelo the 02 version had the correct "slight turn to the right" GDT has it as a Right Turn..... I have so many data errors with the Prius 04 (GDT) that the NavaTech did not have that I have stoped counting, and these are not out of the way places and should route to correctly. And a big one I love the routing round the court house to the right to get where I need to go, when the correct route is "Left Turn"... is is truely as sw bug..... Sure I understand, can't route on a road it does not know about.. but that road has been there for 15+ years... the 02 had no problems (knew about the road...... and I feel that if the road is displyed then the SW should be able to use it for routing... It is starting to make me wish I had poped the DVD media out of the 02 to see it would work in the 04... Worst yet was it did not even (know about or would not route through) a US road, I think it was US 84 or 87... lets see a short road that ends somewhere near the Candian boarder, and starts at the Mexico line... You got to love a sytems that say the shortest route in 500 miles out of your way. Toyota PLEASE go back to NavaTech :guns: Time to get off the soap box now and get back to the fun driving of the Prius.
I have only played with the nav system on my test drive, but it appears to be an upgraded system of the lexus 2003 models. We have a 2003 ES 300. We have found some tricks to dealing with "hallie" as we named her. Turn her voice off until you get closer to your destination, because she will tell you not to turn at EVERY exit. She goes what is fastest and since your speed on an interestate is the fastest, she naturally tells you to go there. You can set her up to reroute you off your heading if you miss a turn which tends to help her telling you to turn around all the time. Also keep in mind she does not take speed bumps or traffic lights into consideration when she makes the route decision. We live right near the DC beltway and whenever we want to go somewhere Hallie insists that we take these side streets to get to the beltway. We tried her way once, there were speed bumps and a 5 minute light at the end of the street, so we now only go the way we want to. It was annoying at first, but now we are just used to it. I think I will be fine with my #9 when it comes in....if it ever comes in!!
I don't remember the exact buttons, off the top of my head, but you can go in and customize the NAV system to your preferences to avoid just the issue that bothered you. You can tell the NAV not to give preference to Interstates--the default is to take you on any interstate in the vicinity b/c it assumes you'll be able to travel faster. Likewise you can tell it not to use toll roads, you can change the average speed it uses to calculate travel times. What I'm saying is, get in there, dig around a bit and set it up to your liking and I think you'll find it will work better for you in most circumstances. Maybe we should encourage John1701a to do a document on how to set up the NAV.
Hi PJM, I live in Dripping Springs and US 87 is of course the road I had so many problems with. I had to go to Denver to get my car because there are just way too many environmentalists here in Austin to get a car here for 18 months. See ya on the road. Ray
Hey Evan Problem is that the preference isn't for Interstates, it's for freeways. Also, many roads hop on a freeway for a short time. I dug a little further and found a way to specify a route. I'm going to try that next time but I think the real problem is in the dvd not being written correctly, and the firmware has some glitch that causes Rita to confuse small crossroads and driveways with a need for direction. Know anything about upgrades? Ray
What Danny said.... Also, by changing that default won't prevent routing onto freeways/interstates, it just doesn't give them preference. Also, I always look at the "3 Routes" and choose the best from there. In no way is this NAV system perfect, and it does have lots of flaws, but there are also work arounds for most of the issues, it just takes time to study, practice and learn them.
Here's a prize-winning NAV routing: I was near Augusta, GA yesterday and wanted a Quizno's sub since I had a coupon. "QUIZNO" brings up a bunch of different spellings, and there is no GOOD way to sift through them by distance from where you are at that moment without it being IN a city on the city list (unless someone has the trick), so it took a while to find the one 5 miles away on Washington Road, which isn't "Augusta, GA" but something like Evans. So I let the NAV tell me where to go, and notice that a U-turn is coming up in about 4 miles. I assumed that it was a barrier or divider in the road so I wouldn't be able to just turn left. So I get the 1/2 mile warning, but still no divider, just a 5th lane. When I get the Turn Now chime, I see a parking lot opening and turn in and go back. Two-tenths of a mile back, it says I've arrived, but the open area at that point holds no Quizno. Ticked off, I go do some shoppiing at a grocery store I saw, then go back to look for the sub shop. Long story made short, that turn-around spot I picked to follow the directions was maybe 200 yards from the Quizno's. My biggest question is about the U-turn, where no U-turn was needed. It's like the road database was set up for some divided highway, but no divide existed EVER that I could see remnants of. Being off by a good distance is typical of a street-address screwup, but making me go back right at the correct place to turn into the lot makes this an error deserving an award...
