Another Tour, another frustrating App/Android Auto experience
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I Used Navigation Next at the weekend on a two day tour or Wales with routes meticulously researched and planned. On the whole what I intended to ride was what I planned so that all worked out well. My fellow 13 tourers were provided with the routes through various ways, i.e. GPX files, MRA export etc. Their experience was mostly positive with the only issues experienced by those that imported the GPX rather than those that exported via MRA Gold. The leanings therefore have been encouraging those that don't have MRA Gold to become subscribers.
While my own experience was OK, but there are still a few moments related to the App reliability, these are summarised as follows;
Waiting on the route to be calculated even though there's clearly a Data connection.
Online/offline, Track/Route combination settings, starting with a data connection, the route is calculated fine, stopping in area without a mobile phone signal even though the app hasn't been closed, suddenly not being able to calculate a route.
Switching to Offline mode and a warning popping up about riding in Track mode.
Sudden App freezing (Yes I will report these)
Zoom settings with a mind of their own, I had the App and AA running together side by side on the ride, without warning I had a top down view on AA and/or the position indicator located half on/half off the bottom of the screen on the phone app
While clearly there have been many improvements to the App and AA integration, its still not the polished app it could be.
In summary when the app works (including using with AA) it's great, but when these niggles appear it so frustrating. These frustration still require me to have routes loaded into TomTomGo as a back up, and at the weekend I needed to use TomTomGo on multiple occasions.
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I agree. Very frustrating. I desparately want to see this app working properly with Android Auto. Like yourself I lead ride outs and have to carry a back up app as MRA still can't be fully trusted. It has improved considerably, but the freezing issue causes uneccessary frustration and annoyance and can ruin a pleasant ride.
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Hi, whilst it has improved further the biggest frustration still is getting the correct zoom/tilt on the Android Auto. The default settings on the phone then do not look right on AA so I have to trial and error adjust the Zoom/Tilt settings to closely mirror how it looks on the phone.... the only other thing I rely on which hasn't transferred to the AA version is the next Waypoint info and ability to skip by long pressing. It's only the slow incremental improvements to the AA version that keep me interested otherwise I would have ditched months ago. AA is fast becoming more popular because it's by far the most affordable way to use MRA Next on a larger screen, therefore demand for greater AA integration will increase.
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I use the app with AA on my Honda Africa Twin. I always Navigate Offline and over the last few months I've had very few glitches using the app. I think offline operation helps? Also the Honda AA screen (which is made by Garmin!!) has a built in GPS antenna so I never have had the position indicator lagging behind the actual position either. The Carpuride W702 does not have a dedicated GPS receiver as far as I'm aware?(not that it should be a prerequisite as the app seems to work well natively on a phone). Though I do believe that the Chigee units have.
