TomTom One 3rd Edition GPS (page 4)
Favorites One neat feature in GPS Navigators like the TomTom is the ability to store favorites so you're not stuck typing in the destination address each time you want to go somewhere. After initially entering the destination address, you can click a few buttons to add to your favorites. Then when you want to choose a route based on your favorites, you simple select it from the favorites menu in the "Navigate To.." screen. You can store as many favorites as you want. It would be nice to be able to organize favorites by category -- I could see how after adding 50 or 100 it could get cumbersome to navigate them in a hurry.
Points of Interest
Ever get into an area where you wish you had a computer so you could look up the address of the nearest grocery store or shopping mall? Well the TomTom has that covered too! It comes pre-installed with points of interests to all kinds of places -- tourist attractions, shopping malls, parks, gas stations, rest areas, hospitals and more! You can add additional compatible points of interests on the web and download them to the TomTom. And if you want, while you're driving, you can have the TomTom notify you that you're coming up on one of your favorite points of interests. Want to be notified every time a rest area is nearby? No problem. What a great idea and handy way to get around when you're in unknown territory.
Advanced Options
There are plenty of advanced options to explore on the TomTom. A couple of them have been mentioned in this review -- color schemes, switching between a 2D and 3D map display, adding the name of the next road in your route to the screen. You can add additional items to display on the screen -- like trip information that estimates your arrival time and shows remaining miles, time of departure and arrival, MPH. You can set it up to calculate the shortest route, fastest route, etc. You can turn voice indicators on or off, adjust the volume of the voice, and change the navigator's voice accents. You can download new voice accents from the web or make your own and download them to the TomTom. You can have it warn you if you exceed a set speed limit or set the language, units of measurement and display brightness. You can set your home address so you can navigate home at the touch of a button from anywhere. Again, you have much customization over this GPS, but if you never customized anything you would be just fine. There's even an option to see your entire route listed turn-by-turn so you can view the route the TomTom has calculated for you and choose an alternative if you don't like the roads it has selected.
You can pair the TomTom up with the optional RDS-TMC Traffic Receiver and get traffic updates in real-time while you're driving. TomTom will then route you around each incident and include time of delay and distance to the incident. You can view additional detail on the incident, like the cause (accident, construction work, congestion, etc), duration & length of the incident. A premium service subscription is also required with this receiver, but 12 months is included for free when you buy it from TomTom. This is a totally optional accessory and not necessary for the TomTom to navigate you properly, but if you drive a few hours to and from work each day through busy highways, you could easily justify the cost of this accessory.
