More expensive than car - only uniys, but worth it
Recommend to potential buyers:
yes
Full review
Satellite navigation is rapidly becoming one of the latest 'must have' accessories for motorists, the TOMTOM rider is one of the best on offer to the biker.
I'd like to think my sense of direction was better than average, I tend not to travel very far from my accustomed routes and as I'm pretty conscientious about sticking to speed limits, I wouldn't necessarily fit the marketing profile for 'early adoption' of 'satnav' technology.
Around eighteen months ago I acquired a BMW bike - 1100ccs of sheer extravagance - which, except for a couple of trips of around 100 miles, and one of 500 it's rarely been more than a few miles from home.
I've always intended to get out and about a lot more, but one of the things that has held me back is the inconvenience of faffing about with maps, and constantly keeping an eye out for speed cameras - my greatest fear is that somehow I miss a road sign and find myself bearing down on a 'Gatso' 10mph faster than I should be! - my licence is clean, and I fully intend to keep it that way!
Then there's the 'missing your turnoff' scenario - you're tootling down an unfamiliar road, you kiinda think you should be heading off in another direction, and you see a road sign, but it's indicating a place name you don't immediately recognise, to you go past, and only realise later that you should've turned off, do you turn back, or carry on to the next exit?
That nicely brings you to the next problem.
Like most people I don't always set off with a full tank, and even then, would an unscheduled detour be enough to drain whatever spare petrol you have - whilst I can put 21 litres into my tank, which will get me around 160 miles on a warm engine, I'm always nervous that on a long run my amber light goes on, and I'm miles from the nearest petrol station.
If you're one of the 1% of the population who never experiences any of these worries, you have no need for satellite navigation. For the remaining 99% of us, read on.
Motorcyclists represent a tiny minority of road users. Most satnav equipment isn't 'ruggedised' and frequently expects you to be able to hear instructions in the quiet and comfort of a car.
Most manufacturers don't expect you to be wearing thick protective gloves either.
Instead of a jumble of wires and an internal speaker, the unit
Out goes the fiddly buttons, the internal speaker or jumble of wires.
In goes a water resistant case, touch screen, internal batteries and a wireless link to a headset (which saves you from being linked to your machine by an umbilical cable).
The standard TOMTOM RIDER package includes the base unit itself, a CD, connecting cables to your home PC, maps on an SD memory card and a mounting kit. It also features a Bluetooth headset specifically designed to go inside a helmet.
There's an optional 'car mount' kit to allow you to use four wheeled transport, this includes a suction mounted bracket, and power lead allowing connection via your cigarette lighter.
The first time I used my RIDER was in a car. I wanted to travel to a destination on the other side of town which I hadn't visited in around twenty years.
I punched in the address, and in a couple of seconds it'd worked out the route - not a very good one admittedly, but one I was confident would get me there.
The trouble with the routing algorithm is that it tries to get you onto the nearest main road, and then use main roads to get you there and only take you onto side streets at the very last minute.
It doesn't understand that traffic lights add extra time to your journey, especially at busy times.
Still - it got me there, to within 50 metres of my destination.
On the way back, I decided to take my own route home. In spite of it's protestations to turn around at the next available opportunity, in a few hundred metres it had worked out where I wanted to go (well nearly) eventually our planned paths converged and I ended back at my starting point.
The use of Bluetooth isn't just limited to the supplied headset. The Rider can pair with a mobile telephone.
This has two purposes, the most obvious one is that it can reroute calls from your mobile to your helmet - incoming only if you're on the move, but you can also transfer your phonebook, and make outgoing calls when stationary.
The second feature is to use the data link to TOMTOM - that way you can pick up traffic and weather information in real time - you have to subscribe to this service, and you have your mobile phone bills on top of this.
Even though it offers a one-month free trial, I've not taken the plunge yet.
The second time I used the Rider was still in the car, but the journey involved crossing a toll bridge, and returning at night.
It asked whether I wanted to avoid toll roads (as it would involve a 25 mile detour, I declined the offer) but took very much the same route I would have chosen myself.
In darkness, on the way back, I chose to use the 'night time' colour scheme (not as bright, and in more subdued colours) - what I especially appreciated was that I could see when side-roads were coming up, and more importantly, when they weren't - I was home in around 80% of my normal time, without breaking the limit.
Over the next couple of days I got to know the unit pretty well - I worked out how to switch in and off various 'points of interest' datasets that came with the device.
TOMTOM offer a subscription service which provides details of traffic cameras, but I was able to find a couple of sites on the internet which offered this information for free (including cameras).
I even managed to find a way of extracting data from 'Google earth' and converting it into a compatible format for my TOMTOM - so now I've got railway stations and cameras loaded!
Additional maps (for different countries, or even the whole of Europe) can be bought directly from TOMTOM - if you know where to look, you can even find pirate copies on the internet, along with licence key generators - but of course that's all illegal, so I don't recommend you do that! Besides, you'd need to buy bigger SD-memory cards for that, and whenever you sync the TOMTOM with your PC it checks back with TOMTOM, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!
I finally got around to fitting the unit to my bike.
The kit includes a number of mounting plates and adapters.
Unfortunately my BMW didn't offer standard 'round' handlebars, the option which used the switchgear as a mounting point wasn't right, and I didn't trust the 'double sided sticky fixer' which was offered as a method of last resort!
Instead I opted to drill a couple of small holes in the somewhat substantial screen of my bike (it was scratched and cracked by a previous owner, and I was likely to replace it in a few months anyway)
Judicious use of rubber grommets and nylon lock-nuts (not supplied) has allowed me to make a pretty firm fixing, which isn't hugely affected by vibration, but that's more by luck than judgement.
The Bike Kit comes with a power lead which clips onto the holder - something I was less than entirely impressed with was the fact it didn't have an inline fuse!
Luckily, the people at BMW thought of everything (well wouldn't they!) and provided an accessory socket on the bike, I patched the cable to the power lines, and have the satisfaction of knowing that it's fused, although if that one goes, my bike has no electrics!
I mounted the headset in my helmet and took the bike out for a spin, I hadn't positioned the loudspeaker properly the first tome, so when I was coming up to a junction, I was vaguely aware f a distorted noise in my left ear, but couldn't quite make it out! - one stop and a more careful repositioning later, I could at least make it out!
Supposedly, the unit is able to determine how fast you're going, and anticipates the amount of noise you're likely to be experiencing. I can't say with any honesty that it made a great deal of difference, but I wasn't going that fast either. At the very worst, at least you know you should glance down at the screen because something important is coming up.
Even if you don't have a bike, the unit is pretty versatile in it's own right - the internal batteries give a claimed life of over three hours The routing software is designed to use roads- so you could conceivably use it on foot, although extended hikes could be a problem!
Manufacturer's RRP is around £400, the 'street price' is nearer £230 - the people I bought my system from (globalpositioningsystems.co.uk) provided a car mount free of charge - so that's worth checking out.
It's waterproof, integrates seamlessly with the supplied headset and your mobile phone, and can be fed with 'free' information from third party sites.
By any measure, this offers a seriously high level of functionality which doesn't just restrict it to bike use.
About the only criticisms I would care to note is that the unit isn't secured by any sort of key - that means even if you were just paying for petrol, you'd have to remember to undock the unit and take it into the kiosk with you.
In spite if this, it's one of the best units available for the biker, and offers plenty of options for the car driver as well.
More details
Durability & Robustness
Very Strong
Battery life
Excellent
Display size
Excellent
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