We took our first longish trip in our new B8 yesterday... from Cincinnati to Indianapolis and back. The new 3G MMI nav system is far superior to the 2G system I had in my 2005 A6. But the nav system did have one rather entertaining hiccup as we were driving home. Instead of telling me to drive north on I-275 toward Dayton (Ohio), It told me to drive north on I-275 toward Daytona Beach!

I could have headed north toward Daytona Beach, but it would have taken me about 20,000 miles out of my way.

--Phil

I have the 2G in my 2009 A4 Avant. I'm very disappointed with it. Even the mid range portable GPSs now have text to speech with street names and at least when announcing your arrival, it says on the left or right. The Audi GPS is quite lacking in that regard for a system that costs 10 times more than a portable.
I hope that was upgraded with the 3G.

The "on your left/right" is a notable absence. It was there on my B7.

The 3G system does let you know if your destination is on your left or right. And it does have text-to speech for street names, although sometimes the pronunciation is a bit entertaining. 3G is a giant improvement over the previous nav systems. I'm very pleased with it, even if it does think that Dayton Ohio is Daytona Beach.

--Phil

Phil,

I was going to Cincinnati from Indy last weekend and my nav said the exact same thing! Glad to know that I am not the only one.

I have the 2G in my 2009 A4 Avant. I'm very disappointed with it. Even the mid range portable GPSs now have text to speech with street names and at least when announcing your arrival, it says on the left or right. The Audi GPS is quite lacking in that regard for a system that costs 10 times more than a portable.
I hope that was upgraded with the 3G.

It was also 7 years old when the new B8 launched last year.

Phil,

I was going to Cincinnati from Indy last weekend and my nav said the exact same thing! Glad to know that I am not the only one.

And so both of you need to please submit the error to Audi/the Nav maker who will then fix the problem in 2011 but charge you $500 for the updated disc/files. :mad:

This is what I hate about the Nav system makers. When something is so clearly an error, there is no way for them to fix it other than rolling it into their standard release which forces you to pay way more than necessary to fix it.

My 2006 Acura TL couldn't handle the Bush-imposed DST changes, even though they were announced way back in 2004. Was this a defect that was covered? No. But they did offer a $25 discount off the new navigation disc that fixed the problem. No way that I was going to pay $275 to fix an issue that shouldn't ahve been there. Irritating!!

Is it possible to upgrade to the 3G?

It's theoretically possible but it would be much cheaper to trade your current car in on a '10 that already has 3G.

Converting a 2G Nav car to 3G will cost many, many thousands of dollars.

For what we have to pay for these factory navigation systems, the first few map/software updates ought to be free, IMHO.

--Phil

The reason I don't have NAV built in my car is that the technology changes faster than I trade my car. A hundred dollar Nuvi sitting on a bean bag does the same thing as the Audi version. I can load new data or points of interest like red light camera locations from a SD card. I can also take it out of the car so I don't get lost while riding an elephant in Thailand. Next week when I rent a car in DC, I'll just plop the bean bag on the dash of Hertz car of the week and navigate to Culpeper. The hotel and location will be preloaded from my laptop so I don't need to use a funky interface to input the data. Sweet.

I believe Navteq supplies the data for most nav systems. I know they need to make a few dollars for all the work it takes to update the data and correct errors. How much does that cost? My company spends $100 million or more to make a movie, but anyone can own a copy on DVD for $20 and a trip to Wal-Mart.

What gives these Goniffs the stones to ask $ 200. for a DVD? That is the direct price from Navteq.

Garmin only charges me 50$ for this huge 4+ gb download every 2 years I have done it for a while now. How does it cost 200 for the nuvi?

The reason I don't have NAV built in my car is that the technology changes faster than I trade my car. A hundred dollar Nuvi sitting on a bean bag does the same thing as the Audi version. I can load new data or points of interest like red light camera locations from a SD card. I can also take it out of the car so I don't get lost while riding an elephant in Thailand. Next week when I rent a car in DC, I'll just plop the bean bag on the dash of Hertz car of the week and navigate to Culpeper. The hotel and location will be preloaded from my laptop so I don't need to use a funky interface to input the data. Sweet.

I believe Navteq supplies the data for most nav systems. I know they need to make a few dollars for all the work it takes to update the data and correct errors. How much does that cost? My company spends $100 million or more to make a movie, but anyone can own a copy on DVD for $20 and a trip to Wal-Mart.

What gives these Goniffs the stones to ask $ 200. for a DVD? That is the direct price from Navteq.


You drive other cars more often than I do. I perhaps drive a vehicle that isn't mine, 5 times a year. 4 of those times is just in town to go to Walmart, or the bar because someone had my car blocked in the garage and it was easier to just take theirs.

I really dislike my TomTom's for screen failure. I had two digitizers die on two units. I used to drive a non-Nav car, and that thing didn't get used very often. When it did, it would give me bogus directions in major city downtown areas because it'd be confused when highways mixed together. I never got to use it outside of the car because the battery on it was always dead.

Other people's experiences with more expensive GPS units may have been much better... but I hate my TomTom One (I bought it back when the "cheap" one still was $299.99 on Buy.com)

I have no experience with the Audi navigation system and have been using Garmin products for the past 4 years or so with no complaints whatsoever. I would have preferred the built-in system for the convenience factor, but the cost was more than I could justify. I just upgraded to the recently dicontinued Garmin Nuvi 760 ($199 on Amazon) with wide screen and real time traffic reports. It can use the car's speakers when tuned to an unused FM fequency, which works great when I'm listening to Sirius or Media -- I just hit the FM button whenever I need to pay attention to the Garmin's directions. It has Bluetooth which is redundant of course in the A4, but comes in handy when we use my wife's Tucson. It's portability comes in handy in pedetrian mode when navigating the streets of Boston or Paris and could even be used when biking (although that's a bit of technological overkill where I bike). Like many other things we discuss in this forum, it comes down to cost and personal preference.

I couldn't agree more with all the posters not interested on the built-in navi systems (any automaker's). In my driving, I know very well 90% of the roads on trips up to 3-4 hours duration - I've lived in the same general area the last 25 years. If I am going (once every two months or so) to a totally new place, then I pull out the Garmin, stick it on the dash and follow the instructions. I also use the Garmin when driving in Canada since you can set the mph to kph and that helps me avoid tickets. You don't need a route for this, just turn it on and select show map then click on the time at the lower left and you get the speed.