TomTom Start Classic Series WE

I bought this sat-nav for my daughter who does quite a lot of fairly long distance driving between home on the outskirts of London, university in Birmingham, her boyfriend in Manchester, and his parants in Lancashire.First impressions are very good. The box contains the sat-nav unit, a windscreen/dash suction mount, a USB cable, and an in car power adapter for the USB cable. It feels solidly made and looks very robust. It arrived almost fully charged so we were able to have a play with it straight out of the box. Satellite lock was very quick indeed and it even managed to lock on to eight satellites indoors!The instruction booklet it very minimal, but it is so simple to use that you really don't need anything more.It has a basic selection of voices already loaded (male/female, English, Irish and a few Europrean langauages too), and these are actually some of the nicer sat nav voices to listen to. You can download alternative voices from the Tom Tom web site, including "funny" ones should you wish to do so.Overall: 5 stars - This is a terrific entry level sat-nav that also has European maps. My daughter has already used it to drive the 270 miles from home on the outskirts of London to Lancaster and although she now knows this journey, it made her feel more comfortable in case of road closures etc. The route guidance was accurate, clear and concise. Highly recommended indeed.

Bought this as two of my Garmins have stopped working and I'm too busy to go through the elongated Garmin repair system (they always tell you to push buttons and turn it on and off etc, but of course you can't because you've already told them the thing has simply stopped working - so I can't turn it on and off can I?!?)I'd read some iffy reviews here of TomToms and had been put off trying one. But, for this price I figured if it stopped working or wouldn't take an update, then it's not the end of the world.As it's turned out, I'm very pleasantly suprised. This is a good value item, with just about all the knobs and knockers you get on a much more expensive Garmin. Also, it's easier to attach direct to the windscreen than the Garmins. The size isn't a big deal. As it's so small and easy to fit, you can have it on the right hand side of the windscreen, so it's close to you as you're driving. Also, very good sound quality.All in all, a very good buy. I'm intrigued and may not even send my other Garmins back, but just buy two more of these.....

I have always resisted the urge to buy a sat nav due to the fact that I would rather use my brain than rely on a machine. I was driving in Spain for the first time this year and knew that the junctions around Barcelona were a bit tricky so decided to buy this one, one of the cheapest available.I have to say that the documentation lets it down a bit, there was not much documentation supplied. I had no problem connecting to the interenet for my free upgrades. The problem I found was that it could not locate a GPS satellite when I was in my house. I was thinking that maybe the unit needed a clear sight so went outside and still it did not connect to GPS. The unit needs the GPS to work out a route, so i was thinking of sending it back. I decided to try it in a car and it connected and worked out a route. I have been impressed with it ever since, everytime I have used it there have been no problems with working out routes or connecting. When I was in spain, even though the spanish pronunciation was a bit dodgy (the sat navs not mine) and the road numbers didnt seem to match what the sat nav was saying, it was an invaluable aid getting round Barcelona. It tells you what lane to be in on the motorway, what exit to take etc etc and the lane diagram was very useful.So after some teething problems I am glad to say I got used to its little characteristics and its simplicity and let it do the work.

Bought this sat nav a little while ago but only just used used it seriously on a trip to Brittany in France.I found the unit very easy to set up. Just needed to download TomTom's software onto the laptop and it updated the maps without any problems at all.In use, it quickly picks up the GPS satellite signals and programming in the address is very straightforward using the touchscreen. My only gripe is that it is easy to hit the wrong letters if you have big fingers but then again, it is only a 3.5" screen! A feature we found very useful is the ability to scroll around the map and search for your destination. We used this a lot as often we didn't have an address for places we wanted to visit but knew where it was on a map.If you want to avoid toll roads, the sat nav gives you this option and it is quick to find an alternative route if you take the wrong turning or encounter traffic.All in all, the unit didn't let us down at all during two weeks of daily use. Sometimes it was a bit slow refreshing the image leading to a couple of hairy moments navigating through towns but nothing we couldn't live with.In short, if you're after a basic sat nav with European mapping at a decent price, you can't go far wrong with this.