Nav system disappointments (long)
 

Coming back from Long Island to Albany NY, we took the Port Jeff Ferry b/c the LIE was backed up for 10 exits or more. No main road connects Bridgeport CT to I-84, but WTH, I've got the new funky Audi Nav system, right? I program in for Albany, set the thing in motion, and away we go, right.

Well, this thing dragged us over every tiny rutted little two lane up and down every hill and dale in CT, completely ignoring logical roads like Rt. 8 or Rt. 25 or even Rt. 58, just one back road after another, all zoned 30 MPH and so twisty that even the S4 was hard pressed to speed. (However, these were neighborhoods, well estates, really, of million dollar homes with acres of grounds, so it was a pleasant enought ride, just pointless). As soon as we (finally) found I-84 with the help of a local (yes, men CAN stop and ask directions), the first thing the Audi girl wanted was for us to get off on one of the back roads ASAP!! When we missed the turn, she insisted that we "make the next U-turn" presumably to go back and make CERTAIN that we get lost again. Needless to say, she got shut up in a hurry.

My review:

Voice system. Well thought out and useful. "prepare to turn right, right turn in 1,000 feet, make the next right turn etc." Very useable. And your eyes stay on the road!

Display. Shows the name of the road you're on (reinforces perception that you're on the right track). Also when announcing turns, shows the name of the road to be turned onto. Neat. Reinforces decisions being made by driver. Shows ETA, fairly accurately for "all highway" trips, distance, distance to next turn, etc. Nice.

GPS. Shows position accurate to the second i.e. 40 degrees, 15 minutes 30 seconds N etc. Interesting, but useless. When it says 1,000 feet to turn, though, it's right on the money, also mileage readings to turns and towns etc are dead-on accurate to my odometer.

Database. Definitely lacking in city roads around Albany, missed fairly basic shortcuts in favor of larger roads. Says "off road" when out of the database. On Long Island and in CT, it seemed to know every podunk little two track in the county. Wierd. Database of "interesting places" i.e. restaurants, the ferry, gas stations (why only Sunoco and not Mobil, I wonder?) airports, etc. is pretty impressive. Enter a destination and it can zero in on a street address and bring up the database of everything nearby that you might want to visit.

Route finding algorithm (sp)?? Crazy. It has choices for "shortest, fastest, toll, freeway" etc. I've tried them all and it still seems bent on putting you on the shortest distance, even if that means cutting through some people's driveways and backyards. Either I need a better lesson in how to use the system (Definitely) or the system could really use a better brain. I wouldn't trust it for anything important.

Overall impressions. This is a $1,280 toy that has little functionality. If I were able to get the color I wanted without it, I would have, but I wanted the immediate gratification, and I was willing to pay $1,300 more to get the right color combo (no regrets, silver is awesome!). So I'm not feeling like "dang, this nav that I've been drooling over really s*cks." Instead, it's like, cool toy but I wouldn't DARE start leaving the maps at home. Cost of map -- $2.95 accuracy 99%; route finding- excellent. Cost of Nav - $1,280; accuracy 100%; route finding -- "improvisational at best." better find your own way through the woods to grandma's house.

Would love comments from others who have figured this thing out. I readily admit that with only 750 miles on the car, I don't have it nailed, but the nav in my friend's Lexus LS400 is awesome! Audi's just doesn't measure up (and not because of the screen either).

Tommy T
00 S4 silver/onyx/nav-sort of

Re: Nav system disappointments (long)
 

Hey, Tommy...

I live in Danbury, Connecticut, but work in Lower Westchester County, New York. Do you recommend the system or not? I've played with the BMW GPS on a 328i, and it is amazing. I'm hoping this "toy" will be just as entertaining on my business (and leisure) trips...

Also, do you have any pics of the nav main screen? Thanks in advance! Your post was very informative, by the way...

Sincerely.... anxiously waiting for the New England Winter to go away so he can get his silver bullet, Rooster

go to settings and tell it you want freeways an other options.

Gosh, Danbury was the town where we finally picked up I-84 (answers to questions inside)
 

<center><img src="http://www.a4.org/model/s4/gallery/readers/jg/jg2.jpg"></center><p>This picture is the best I could find quickly, maybe someone else can get you a better one. The display is in the small rectangular area between the speedo and the tach. It is maybe 9 or 10 lines of LED with mostly numbers and data. The turns are fairly large arrows.

The nav system has a dial mounted next to the hand brake. You are given a menu of choices that you spin the knob to scroll through. Push the knob to select your choices. Destinations can either be the preset ones from the database, or you can narrow choices from the list by selecting one letter at a time -- i.e. A-L-B then scroll through the nearby choices to arrive at Albany, NY. It's not as tough as I thought it would be without the touch screen. Someone stayed up late thinking this one through., but you wouldn't want to fiddle with this in traffic (probably at all). You can program common destinations, i.e. home, office, etc. The book also says that you can ask it to recalculate routes if you encounter traffic.

Is it worth it? So far, no. I'm perfectly willing to admit that I don't know what I'm doing. The instruction booklet was for a previous generation, so the pictures don't match just right, and it looks like it was written by someone who translated (loosely) from the original German (or Swahili or whatever). Some awkward grammar, etc. Definitely a 4 on a scale of 1 - 10.

Is the hardware all there for this to be an awesome system? Yup. The GPS seems dead-on accurate, the database is extensive, the user interface makes a ton of sense once you're used to it, and the voice keeps your eyes on the road.

But if the road you're keeping your eyes on is Stone Hill Road (or any of those other teeny tiny roads we took to get from Bridgeport to Danbury), what's the point?? I want a nav system that will get me from point A to point B in the fastest manner possible. If I wanted to just navigate by direction, I'd simply keep the sun to my left and back and keep turning away from it, regardless of the road that put me on. A nav system that takes you from somewhere, through nowhere back to somewhere had better save you some time for your trouble. This one choose the slowest (if perhaps most direct route).

Best indication of how useful it is: my boss and I started mocking the system every time she gave us a command (gender police, please note system uses a female voice, that's all I'm saying, nothing else intended to be implied), then got so fed up ("congratulations on finding I-84, please take the next exit and get lost on East Podunk road again") that we turned her off once we stopped and asked for directions.

I'm willing to stand corrected on my use of the system, but so far, no way is $1,300 justified.

Tommy T
00 S4 silver/onyx/GPS (Nav would be an overstatement)

Tried this as well as other options, maybe I'm doing it wrong?

Sounds like you had it set for a "no freeway route", which forces back roads.

Any idea how to shut this off?

My nav experience. . .
 

I've had a bit better luck than you, Tommy, although I've only used it to test routes I already know, rather than actually find my way through strange territory. When I've asked it to plot my route home from a variety of locations or to work, it seems fairly spot on (as they say).

I did have one strange experience that sounds something similar to yours. I was traveling from Boulder to Denver between locations I know well. The nav chose a different route than I usually take, so I thought I'd just see how it did. It actually found me a faster route than my usual with one exception. I'm driving East on I-70 (the major East-West highway in the area). I know that my destination is requires me to exit and go South about 5 miles ahead. Suddenly the Nav lady tells me to take the next exit 1000 feet ahead. OK, I'm game. At the exit ramp it tells me to take a left (North). OK. I drive for about a block and it tells me to make a U-Turn and then turn left on the entrance ramp to take I-70 East once again. The rest of the trip was uneventful. Perhaps she was just curious to see what it would be like driving under the I-70 overpass?!

Sandy
'00 S4

If this is true, than your post is really meaningless and reflects little more than...
 

...your lack of knowledge about how to properly operate the nav system.

Not trying to flame you, but perhaps next time you should attempt to assess the problem yourself before posting a misinformed "negative review."

No flame taken, but I did spend a lot of time with the (poor) manual and tried a number of options
 

but just couldn't get this to work properly. I think I was pretty up front about saying that I'm aware of the fact that this could be just a user error problem, but I think of myself as a reasonably smart guy and if I couldn't figure out how to use it, well, that's relevant information for a review as well. At some point you decide that it's not you, but the system. I guess I'm at that point, but keeping open the possibility that others may have had breakthroughs.

A gadget that can't be used is almost as bad as a useless gadget. Or something like that.

Tommy T