GPS: Airis T920 or Garmin Nuvi 310/360?

Cal

That unit will cover all your requirements.

Cal.

cormie

So there's not a separate one for Europe and UK/Ire? The impression I was getting from reading some threads was that you had to buy separate maps.

So a "Europe" one will cover everything in Europe well?

subway

i ahve the airis one so thats my experince,
the dvd it comes with has all europe maps on it.
these are divided by country-
uk/ire
france
germany
and so on

depending on the size of your memory card you install as many as you like.
you switch between them using the options in the unit

cormie

Ahh that's how it works:)

Why did you choose the Airis over the Garmin? It seems more people have chosen the Airis? Are they pretty much the same product but the Airis is cheaper or is the Garmin actually a better product for the €60 more?

Do they both have bluetooth phone capabilities and DIVX playback and aux input to connect to a car stereo? Or do neither?

I'd prefer as little gadgets in my vehicle as possible because I'm going to be doing courier work, hopping in and out of it quite a lot, the less that can be robbed, or the less I have to carry with me when I get out, the better. Already have my mp3 player and phone:rolleyes:

subway

i bought it as a christmas present for my dad.
i got it a about a month ago as i wanted to get it well in advance in case i needed tog et invloved with pixmania returns process.

at that point the airis only had the new maps available.

all ive done is set it up to make sure it works, so cant comment on the other sutff.

it seems simple to use, except for the bloody clicking noise it makes when you press a button.

Cmar-Ireland

Is the Garmin V9 software better than the Airis for mapping in Ireland?

podgeandrodge

subway wrote:

i ahve the airis one so thats my experince,
the dvd it comes with has all europe maps on it.
these are divided by country-
uk/ire
france
germany
and so on

depending on the size of your memory card you install as many as you like.
you switch between them using the options in the unit

I bought the dearer version of the airis - all of europe preloaded on a 2gig card. couldnt be bothered loading different countries when i travelled and the 2 gig card included sorta makes up a good bit of the difference in price.

subway

i dont know what the dearer version of this is but a 2 gig card costs about £15 these days so if anyone is planning on driving across the entire continent without a laptop that might be the way to go....

johnnyrotten

looking at the pixmania site FOR THIS it does'nt say what memory card comes with it???

Cal

johnnyrotten wrote:

looking at the pixmania site FOR THIS it does'nt say what memory card comes with it???

Johnny,

That is the unit being discussed here. It contains a 512MB Card. A 2GB card is more useful if you wish to use it as a divx & MP3 player. These can be bought from 7DayShop for about €30 delivered.

Cal.

cormie

So does the Airis do everything the Garmin does and visa versa but it's just a little bit cheaper?

Do they both have blootooth capabilities for answering phonecalls from a blootooth phone handsfree and do they both have AUX in for an mp3 player through the stereo, or do neither have these features?

How big is a map when loaded onto the memory card?

Cal

I've no idea about the Garmin unit. But the Airis has no bluetooth abilities, the unit can be connected to a stereo using the headphone output (I've no idea if is stereo output though), Ireland and England maps take up about 260MB.

Cal.

Cmar-Ireland

Just to throw another option into the mix. The Route 66 Chicago 6000 kit is available for e299. It uses the Navteq Q2 2006 sortware, has a bigger 4.3" widescreen and an MP3 player built it.

It looks pretty impressive to me, what do you think?

unklerosco

I got mine yest.. so far i fairly please. Works well around dublin.. I live in ashbourne.. The new N2 isnt on it which is strange, out around tyrellstown there's a few roads missing..

How do i find out if i've got the Q2 mapping???

subway

its in maps > options iirc
i can confirm when i get home.

should be like a "system" type option

Cal

Select Help from main menu. Then 'About Navigate' the bottom line should read 'NAVTEQ Q2/2006 2006/5/8 ENGLAND + IRELAND'

Some roads are missing even on the Q2 maps.

Cal.

cormie

What happens when you go onto a road that's not there?

So does the actual device itself make much of a difference or is it just the navteq software that's important? Why are more people choosing the Airis over the Garmin?

Cal

cormie wrote:

What happens when you go onto a road that's not there?

The map just thinks you are going cross country. It auto recalculates your route when you return to a known road.

cormie wrote:

So does the actual device itself make much of a difference or is it just the navteq software that's important? Why are more people choosing the Airis over the Garmin?

Bound to be quality differences. Mind you I'm happy with the Airis unit. I think that the DivX hack and the price is what has most people going with the Airis. The inclusion of full European Q2 Maps I'm sure helps too.

Cal.

unklerosco

Well it is Q2... Ah well, u cant have everything... Its a nice little unit tho.. Tried to confuse it by getting it to recalculate the routes but its very quick to do it.. Showed me a new way home earlier that i didn't know about.. Cuts out about 20-30mins of traffic.. Brilliant

found out my the 12v plug in my car is bust, gonna have to fix it at the weekend... Batter isnt the best but i was using it for about 2hrs n its just under half full...

cormie

Ah, so the other ones don't have as many maps included? Are these expensive to buy?

I think I'll either go for the Airis or else this one for €150 2nd hand.

Unkelrosco, do you have the Airis one too?

How come on the pixmania link for the Airis, it says it's 3.5" at the top, but 2.5" in the specs

Strange since they are so popular on this thread, that there aren't many on Ebay (only one when I looked).

unklerosco

Yep, for the money its a steal... dead easy to use, touch screen is good. easy to enter an addy, even with my big "man" fingers... the clicking doesnt really bother me... If u've a motorolla phone, the charger for it works with the Airis.. Charged mine over it last night..

An idea to get rid of the clicking...

When u explore the Os there's the usaual wav files for different sounds, maybe finding the click wav n deleting it would be a solution??

subway

good idea.

cormie

or replace it with a silent wav may be safer, just incase:)

Cal

I can't find any media file on the unit containing the click

Cal

Den4tennis

Cal wrote:

Define 'normal restart'.

If you mean using the slide button at the bottom then that is like a reset button and should only be used when you wish to reset the unit to factory settings. The unit can (allegedly) survive for a couple of weeks on standby (turning off with the side button).

Cal.

Hi,
Just got Airis 920 from pixmania. €256 only. All Europemaps + latest Ireland Q2 2006 included. Works fine...except..DAT BLOODY CLICKING everytime you touch the screen.
Does ANYONE at all know how to turn it down, without affecting the voice guidance level?
Help much appreciated. thanks.
BTW: Apple Mac folk dont need a PC to install maps onto SD card - just drag relevant files from DVD to SD card using a USB card reader:)

dal

Was looking on some french forums on how to suppress the clicking. It looks like it isn't a sound file but you can turn it off by going into the windows registry. Below I have translated the post I found:


[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ControlPanel\Volume]
"Key"=dword:00010002
"Screen"=dword:00010002
"Mute"=dword:00000007
"Volume"=dword:99999999

You have to change the key "Screen" and set its value to 0 (zero) for no sound or 1 for a quieter clicking

After this do a soft reset

The modification is permanent [DAL:I assume you can change it back though]

For the registry editor, you can use Microsoft Powertoys which has Pocket Registry Editor

Microsoft Powertoys for H/PC Pro ver. 3.0
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmobile/downloads/handheldpc.mspx


[DAL: Back to me now]

I haven't actually tried this as I don't have my Airis yet (another 2 weeks wait!). If anyone tries , let us know how you get on.

Cal

Edit: After thinking the registry edit failed I reported as much and then went back to the unit. The click is gone. It seems to take a minute after the reset to take effect.

Cal.

edit 2: Yes you can reverse the registry change too.

cormie

sheesh, is it that bad?

perhaps Airis would write a little ap you could run to turn it off?

dal

Cal wrote:

Edit: After thinking the registry edit failed I reported as much and then went back to the unit. The click is gone. It seems to take a minute after the reset to take effect.

Cal.

edit 2: Yes you can reverse the registry change too.

Cool, so did you just download the powertoys on to the sd card and then launch from within windows? Is it straightforward enough?

unklerosco

which is a soft reset???