Rand McNally TND 700

try www.dieselboss.com for reviews on all GPS's

Thanks,
Mark

 

I'm going to have to respectfully disagree with Diesel Boss since the Cobra isnt even mentioned in the Truck GPS.

Its been my personal experience, from owning both the RM TND 500 and the Cobra 7700 that the Cobra without question is the better TRUCK gps.

my opinion of course, the TND 500 is still far from being finished, should have never been released to the public....... also my opinion.

 

He is still working on his review... usually takes a couple of weeks to do all his testing.

Thanks,
Mark

 

Whats wrong staying with the old school ways, ROAD ATLAS and MAPBOOKS?

 

To answer your question ... why are you using a computer to gather information and post here? What's wrong with "old school" of using smoke signals? (Not trying to be a wise #####, but you get my point?)

GPS systems are another tool for the professional truck driver. Look at a GPS system as an electronic mapping system, that not only provides you with an electronic atlas, but also acts as co-pilot for you letting you know when & where to turn, traffic and construction advisories, and POI's, (rest areas, truckstops, etc), as well as the most direct routing possible.

No one is forcing a driver to use a GPS system ... but those that do have discovered an entirely new world of ease, safety and profitability when using one of the GPS Systems designed for big rigs.

There are now 7 units on the market ranging in price from $189 (PC*Miler Nav 430 - closeout) to $499 (Rand McNally TND700).

There are a few retailers that carry ALL the systems ... at very competitive prices.

 

No offense taken. I've talken to a few drivers that use them, and love them to death, but mention some downfalls on a few brands. I personally will probably in the future purchase one once they take the bugs out.

 

I did the old school way for most of my professional driving career, until I decided to join the 21st century a few months ago, and so I bought a TND 500, since after all it came from Rand McNally. Big mistake as it turned out to be the most frustrating experience of my entire driving career.

Anyway, after a trucking buddy showed me that you can just plug in your company supplied truck routes into Streets & Trips, which was the way I had been used to operating in any event, I made the switch and never looked back.

Why is Street & Trips better than a Road Atlas? First of all, it’s because Streets & Trips has street level mapping, whereas the Road Atlas only shows major roads. Thus, I can actually follow my final directions to my shippers and consignees beforehand and learn if they are right or wrong before I ever drive them. Hence, I have plenty time to get them corrected long before I actually drive them and find out the hard way that they are wrong. Not to mention that I don’t have to use a magnifying glass anymore to see the maps.

Also, if you do a lot of night driving like I do, you will love getting turn-by-turn directions in adverse winter driving conditions when you can barely see the roads much less read the road signs. Excuse me but I’m not as young as I used to be and I appreciate that luxury.

Thus, after doing old school for most of my driving career, I wish I had joined the 21st century much earlier, although I wish I wouldn’t have wasted my time and gave myself brain damage by making the mistake of buying the TND 500.

 

What didn't you like about the TND 500? I ask because I'm planning on buying the TND700 in august.

American Trucker

 

The routes the TND 500 calculated were never the same as my company supplied truck routes and usually ended up being quite a bit longer. The GPS unit would reroute you every time you entered a rest area, truck stop, weigh station, etc. and would end up adding many more miles to your already too long routes. It would take forever to calculate a route and you couldn’t search for POIs while it was calculating. The POIs also weren’t that accurate and I ended up driving out of route a couple of times looking for a place to turn around. You couldn’t customize the routes in any kind of way and were forced to accept its routes or nothing and a lot of time I couldn’t use them. Despite its claims, it routed me to low clearance bridges, down restricted routes, through residential areas, down narrow back roads when it could have routed me on major roads instead, etc., etc., etc. A lot of times it would give me full screen warnings that I was on a weigh-restricted road and tell me repeatedly to do a u-turn when I wasn’t, it would tell me to go pass a truck stop I wanted to go to and then tell me to turn around and go back, some times the display would slow down dramatically and would actually be 5 or more minutes behind, it would flat out tell me sometimes that there wasn’t a truck route available to such and such place, a lot of small towns I go to weren’t in its database, it would crash sometimes for no discernible reason, and crap like that.

Additionally, be prepared to spend all your free time uploading updates, so you better have an aircard and plenty of free time. Indeed, I could use a pen, paper, and road map far faster and with a lot less hassle than I could the TND 500. In other words, the product is not nearly ready to be released and in reality is not worth a crap. However, they made it sound good though and I had to find out the hard way.

Anyway, I returned it and got my money back and thanks to a friend I now use Streets & Trips with the Truck Stops Plus add-on. I simply plug in the truck routes that my company prefers me to drive anyway into Streets & Trips, which is what I was used to doing before except on paper, and now drive far less miles. You couldn’t do that with the TND 500.

Not to mention also Streets & Trips is far more flexible and easy to use with respect to customizing your routes. Plus it calculates the routes instantly instead of it taking hours like in the TND 500. You can also zoom in the maps and see as much detail as you need and you couldn’t do that with the TND 500. It also has the aerial overhead Bing map pictures feature, which I love and use all the time.

In other words, Streets & Trips just works without all the hassles and bugs that you get with the TND 500, and with the Truck Stops Plus add-on, which I love, it’s far easier and faster to search and route to truck stops and other POIs and its also has far more POIs that are far more accurate. Also, you can see the POIs on the maps. Finally, it cost me about $60 instead of $500, and next year it will cost me around $40 because I won’t have to buy the GPS receiver next time.

Therefore, in August be prepared to start pulling out all of your hair while absorbing an enormous amount of brain damage at the same time. Good luck.

 

Sounds like maybe you had something in route settings set to avoid. I have mention in another thread that version 1472 route settings cannot be set to avoid. It has an issue and has been fixed in the next released verison.

The updates you refer to are simply POI, Global POI and construction updates, not version updates. The downloads are not all that big and will not eat up your aircard time.

If you have any issues with the TND 500 please contact me.

Thanks,
Mark