Traffic Receivers

cormie

Hi there,
I'm a bit confused with the whole traffic receiver situation on my GPS units. Unfortunately I've only ever had a chance to check the service out when in the UK so it's not like I can do any testing so I'm hoping somebody can clear it up.

Basically, I've 4 Garmin Nuvi 760 units. I've had 2 for a long time, both identical in terms of cables. They each have a cigarette charger with a cable going to the mount and a thinner cable with 2 tiny suction pads and a little square piece of plastic on the end.

The other 2 I've just bought recently (intended on buying 1 but Ebay'ing made me get two). I've received the first one today and the cable looks the same except there are no suction cups and no square thing at the end. Kind of like this: http://www.activegps.co.uk/accessories-spares/garmin-accessories/garmin-nuvi-760/garmin-nuvi-760-gtm-21-fm-tmc-traffic-receiver.jpg without the suction cups. The square thing at the end doesn't appear to have been cut or torn off, but just the way it may have come initially.

Now as far as I know, the 4th one coming to me, doesn't have this extra suction cupped cable at all but is said to include everything that it came with in its original retail packaging.

Can someone please clear up this for me? Do all the units have the ability to receive traffic updates? Do I need the suction cupped cable with the square thing at the bottom? What happens if I don't have this? Can I buy it new, cheaply or how does it work? What about subscriptions? I thought there was something about a 6 month trial or something like that but then I see mentioned elsewhere that it's lifetime? If I have that cable does it mean I have lifetime subscriptions automatically? If I don't have the cable what does it mean?

Just a bit confused, would appreciate any clarity!

cormie

Oh and if anyone knows if that new iTraffic service for Ireland is available for the Nuvi 760 and if I need traffic receivers and the cost etc, if you could share any info that would be great Still totally confused about the above though

CrowdedHouse

Is there a jack socket on the rectangular part of the lead ?

I have a 3790 - the sucker lead is separate and plugs into the rectangular part - you'd nearly miss it in the packing.

cormie

No jack part as far as I can see and there's nothing extra in the packaging. Quite confused about this now so if anyone can shed any light on the situation please let me know

stuff.hunter

well, never heard about any workin live traffic info in Ireland ..UK and part of western Europe only

cormie

I think that's the case alright, but I'm not sure if the unit itself can receive the traffic updates, or if it's the cable that receives them, or if the cable just means you get a lifetime subscription to the traffic service, but you can get a 6 months subscription and receive the updates, without the cable?

cormie

Got a response from Garmin, so it appears you must have the cable in order to receive traffic updates.

Thank you for contacting Garmin Europe.

I am happy to help you. In order for you to be able to receive traffic
information on the Nuvi you need to have a traffic receiver called a GTM
21. This doubles up as your in car charger too. Without this cable you
cannot receiver traffic information or have the option to divert around
traffic problems and incidents. More information about this cable can be
found at https://buy.garmin.com/shop/shop.do?pID=413.

>From what you are describing you have two GTM 21's and two standard in
car chargers. All the units can use the GTM 21 cable.

Please help us improve the service we offer you by taking our Customer
Support survey. Please click the following link -

Alun

Sorry, but I've only just seen this Seemingly there are two versions of the TMC adapter for the 760, the GTM 20, which is for the North American market only and which does NOT have an additional antenna wire, and the GTM 21, which is the European version which has an additional antenna wire with the two little suction cups on it.

Possibly the two you bought on eBay were North American (i.e. US and Canada) models.

https://buy.garmin.com/shop/shop.do?pID=403

https://buy.garmin.com/shop/shop.do?pID=413

cormie

Thanks for the reply

Well one of the GPS units only came with a usb charger, no car adapter at all so that's ruled out, the other one came with one identical to the one in your 2nd link, but without the suction cups. However, the ones I have already, are like this: http://www.tramsoft.com/gps/garmin_option-gtm21_big.jpg

see the very bottom left? The cable has a little triangley bit of plastic at the end of the cable. So I've

2 exactly like this: http://www.tramsoft.com/gps/garmin_option-gtm21_big.jpg
One exactly like this: https://static.garmincdn.com/en/products/010-00566-00/g/cf-lg.jpg
and then one without any at all

Do you know about the subscription side of things at all? I thought you got a 6 month trial or something, but my first Nuvi 760 has worked with traffic pretty much every time I've been in the UK (more than 6 months) and I hear some are advertised as lifetime sub, but I think the unit itself says something about 6 months? I definitely saw it somewhere anyway

So I guess with the above in mind, I'm just not sure whether the one I have without the triangley bit is missing an important part (the triangley bit) and won't pick up the traffic without it I wonder?

Alun

Mine has the little bit of plastic at the end and I don't think it has any relevance to the functioning of the antenna at all to be honest, it looks to me like it's only purpose is to stop the suckers falling off

As for the subscriptions, my 760 has a lifetime subscription to TrafficMaster UK (not that I've actually tested it though.) If you go to Tools > Settings > Traffic > Subscriptions (with the unit in the car and attached to a powered up traffic receiver) it will tell you what subscriptions you have.

cormie

Cool thanks for that Guess I'll only be able to tell in the UK so!

Hopefully the only purpose of the plastic thingy is indeed to stop the suckers falling off

Thanks again for the help

cormie

Aha, just got another reply from Garmin (I cheekily asked if they had any spares lying around the office could they send them for free since they are for a discontinued product :P)

Anyway, this is what I got back:

Thank you for contacting Garmin Europe.

The cost of the cables is increased by the subscriptions installed.
These cables contain a lifetime Trafficmaster subscription that is
retailed alone at £30, with the cable too creates the overall cost.
These cables are also available from third party companies so you may be
able to find them cheaper elsewhere.

We don't have any here I could send you I'm afraid.

So that's the story with the subscription All makes sense now!

cojones

cormie wrote: »

Oh and if anyone knows if that new iTraffic service for Ireland is available for the Nuvi 760 and if I need traffic receivers and the cost etc, if you could share any info that would be great Still totally confused about the above though

me too, confused about the above. But there's a list of compatible phones for the iTraffic service Twaffic Navigator over on https://www.twafficnavigator.com/itr1/site/compatiblePhonesWrapper.jsp

You can trial it on a smartphone for 5 days on https://www.twafficnavigator.com/itr1/site/portal.jsp and then buy.

For the iphone you can buy the app on iTunes which costs E50 a year

does that help?

KoolKid

I'd be waiting to see what DCC has to offer before forking out €50 ( if it ever gets going.):D

KoolKid

Update:

I emailed DCC re this. Here is the response I got.

In order for you to receive TMC alerts to your device the devices manufacturer would first have to release the new updated maps for Ireland.

These maps should be released in the next few months.

Regards

I replied requesting some more information.
If I find out more Ill post back.

edit:
Not forthcoming with any other info except to say
The system has not been officially launched as yet.

cormie

Does this mean that DCC (Dublin City Council I presume?) will be providing their own traffic service so we'll finally be able to use Garmins etc like they can in the UK with traffic receivers? Will it be a free service from DCC and will it only be within Dublin I wonder?

I don't know what "updated maps" have to do with anything? What do the maps have to do with the ability to receive traffic updates I wonder? Like is the Irish section of the maps on Garmin different to the UK section because parts in the UK can receive traffic updates? All appears the same

KoolKid

From what I am seeing this is not going to be great.The 1st of September has come and gone and DCC have not updated their website.Their Q&A section on this is very vague, as is their responses to questions.
Live services would be the better option, and one I wouldn't mind paying for.

cormie

Would the service in the UK be live services or what would the difference be? I know nothing about it other than when I've been in the UK sometimes the GPS redirects me due to traffic ahead. Sometimes there is no traffic though where it says there is..

KoolKid

Most European countries would have both.Live services would give many other services like fuel prices, weather, live Google search based on your location, sped cameras etc.

IrlJidel

cormie wrote: »

I don't know what "updated maps" have to do with anything? What do the maps have to do with the ability to receive traffic updates I wonder?

I know very little about TMC but I gather TMC transmits TMC location codes to identify a particular junction or road segment. You need updated maps that have these TMC location codes in its map data.

See http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/TMC/TMC_Import_Germany . ( TMC data is available in Germany so OSM are trying to tag the OSM data with the appropiate TMC location code)

"TMC messages contain:

* an identifier of the radio-station including a country-ID
* an event-code given in an ISO-standard
* a location-code to be deciphered using a location-table specific for a country and operator (usually only 1 operator per country)

The location-codes are given in a LocationCodeList (LCL)."