Best Sat Nav / radio head unit ?

[Russ M]

Hi all.
buying a new motorhome which doesn’t have a radio / Nav unit fitted . It comes with a hole in the dash as I didn’t want the one that could have been factory fitted . Zenec - Not very good and far too expensive for what it was .

needs to be “truck Nav “ type as the motorhome is 8.5 m long and 3 m tall.
also want to get a reversing camera with it .

so what are your thoughts people ?
which make and model do you recommend please ?


many thanks for any advice .

 

[cmcardle75]

Hi all.
buying a new motorhome which doesn’t have a radio / Nav unit fitted . It comes with a hole in the dash as I didn’t want the one that could have been factory fitted . Zenec - Not very good and far too expensive for what it was .

needs to be “truck Nav “ type as the motorhome is 8.5 m long and 3 m tall.
also want to get a reversing camera with it .

so what are your thoughts people ?
which make and model do you recommend please ?


many thanks for any advice .

Getting truck sat nav on your head unit usually results in a very expensive, poor quality, dead-end, expensive and hard to upgrade system, unfortunately. I'd just get an Android Auto/Apple Car Play system and hope they eventually allow Tom Tom or someone else to supply truck sat nav as the navigation app. Until then, download it and use it standalone on your phone.

I wouldn't waste my money on a standalone truck head unit.

 

[cmcardle75]

Getting truck sat nav on your head unit usually results in a very expensive, poor quality, dead-end, expensive and hard to upgrade system, unfortunately. I'd just get an Android Auto/Apple Car Play system and hope they eventually allow Tom Tom or someone else to supply truck sat nav as the navigation app. Until then, download it and use it standalone on your phone.

I wouldn't waste my money on a standalone truck head unit.

New ways to reach more drivers on Android for cars

News and insights on the Android platform, developer tools, and events.

android-developers.googleblog.com

It looks like Tom Tom are an early access partner for Google's new navigation APIs. (Although I'd call it an "about bloody time, scared of a billion dollar EU anti-trust prosecution" access partner rather than "early")

 

[10tenmen]

Kenwood use garmin for navigation and mine has the ability to put motorhome measurements in, comes with car play etc, 3 years free map updates.

 

[two]

Everyone has a different idea of "best".
I've tried many different SatNavs and am still looking for a "good" one.
So far, they've all been pretty poor.
What do you want? Something that looks good or something that gets you to your destination?

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[Abacist]

I have the Zenec but won't change it as everything apart from the radio works fine and I just put my iPhone or iPod on random play which have about 3,000 songs from the sixties onwards.

 

[Russ M]

Getting truck sat nav on your head unit usually results in a very expensive, poor quality, dead-end, expensive and hard to upgrade system, unfortunately. I'd just get an Android Auto/Apple Car Play system and hope they eventually allow Tom Tom or someone else to supply truck sat nav as the navigation app. Until then, download it and use it standalone on your phone.

I wouldn't waste my money on a standalone truck head unit.

Thanks for this .
Hadn’t thought much about using a standard head unit with Apple play , and then broadcast tomtom to the display . good idea .
next-question therefore , is does anyone recommend a good quality head unit , that has a large display , Apple play , and the usual bluetooth connectivity with a dab radio .
there are loads to choose from so was hoping for a recommendation from someone who’s got one
cheers

 

[cmcardle75]

Thanks for this .
Hadn’t thought much about using a standard head unit with Apple play , and then broadcast tomtom to the display . good idea .
next-question therefore , is does anyone recommend a good quality head unit , that has a large display , Apple play , and the usual bluetooth connectivity with a dab radio .
there are loads to choose from so was hoping for a recommendation from someone who’s got one
cheers

Most aftermarket ones are double DIN, so fairly small 7" displays. The cheapest usable one I found was the Sony XAV-3005DB. It is OK, but has a couple of issues. It is fussy on cables, the screen is quite dim and has a resistive touch screen. On the plus side, DAB is very good, user interface good and sound quality good. Pretty quick start up, too. Obviously has rear camera support. IR remote control available (not included) if you want to use it for habitation. Some of their older, cheaper ones have Apple, but not Android support. However, they have much less powerful processors.

For a bigger screen, ironically, single DIN is better. You get units that fit in a single DIN slot, but have a screen that overlays the surrounding dash. i.e. Sony XAV-AV8050D for a 9" screen. Not had any experience, so don't know if the screen is brighter/capacitive. However, much of my problem with the dimness is that it isn't pointing in the right direction and this one has vertical tilt adjustment.

 

[Metamorfosis]

 

[Cairngorm]

I’ve bought one. Fingers crossed it all goes well.

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