[spark227]

It's frustrating that I can't navigate by Point of Interest (POI) with this GPS unlike with my last Nissan and Infiniti vehicles. For example, if I want to go to "Shooter's Paradise" in Woodbridge, VA, but didn't know where exactly it is, I should be able to plug in the city and state and then spell out the business name. Not with BMW. I have to go to INFORMATION and then look for the POI through the various POI categories. And the results aren't sortable by alphabetical order either, but in terms of distance from the center of the city. This makes you waste time by scrolling through the entire results list. I also can't click on a POI to see the street address before determining whether it's the actual destination I want. So in the end I wasn't able to find where I even wanted to go to.

Another good example of how GPS should work was when I was in the mood for a meatloaf carver sandwich from Boston Market, but didn't know any in the area. With Infiniti's GPS, I just typed in the state (and/or city) and then "Boston Market" in the POI and the results showed every location by distance.

I also don't like how the map can't easily be nudged around to see street names or details in a desired direction that's off screen. Zooming out doesn't help because then detail is lost. I have to move the idrive cursor to the left menu, and then scroll down to the appropriate icon in order to have that functionality. I usually like to do this at stop lights, but when traffic starts moving again, I have to jump through hoops to get back to the navigation map screen.

The GPS screen is so damn small that enough detail cannot be seen unless zooming in at 800 feet. I got more detail at a 1/2 mile zoom with Infiniti's 7" screen, and 15-20% of the bottom was covered by radio and climate control status, too.

It takes so damn long for the GPS to calculate a route. idrive is pretty laggy in the first place, but the GPS is unbearably slow. Wish I could give the idrive like a 2GB memory upgrade or something.

I've also heard the complaint about the voice and arrow instructions not informing whether a destination is on the right or left upon arrival. Another negative is the inability to navigate to a destination through a phone number. I must agree with these issues.

I really hope there are some firmware or software updates to address these things in the near future.

[BeeEmDubU]

I agree completely. BMW navigation is pretty shitty.

[poiney]

preaching to the choir. Same old complaints. I hope BMW is listening. Fix some key features and they'll increase revenue.

[ironic]

the system isn't that bad, it's just the features they have to work on

it's my understanding that all of our complaints can be rectified by software - that hardware wise all of this is possible, bmw just hasn't done it yet

[SeattleSE]

Originally Posted by BeeEmDubU

I agree completely. BMW navigation is pretty shitty.

+1

[soma4u]

preach on!!!!

[LEDZEP]

I would sincerely hope... that IF or WHEN they do fix these issues and enhance the system, they make the updates available to all customers currently under vehicle warranty free of charge. I have been disappointed in the past with BMW's "too bad for you, you bought your car yesterday" attitude about such things.

[SteveMD]

Originally Posted by LEDZEP

I would sincerely hope... that IF or WHEN they do fix these issues and enhance the system, they make the updates available to all customers currently under vehicle warranty free of charge. I have been disappointed in the past with BMW's "too bad for you, you bought your car yesterday" attitude about such things.

It would be nice but I somehow doubt it. It takes a day to upgrade the software on a 3 series (and I assume 5,6,7s also). Unless there is a specific fault with the iDrive, I can't see BMW giving free upgrades just to keep us happy. It would tie up a lot of service bays once the word gets out.

Should a software revision become available, I'll be taking mine in with the old 'iDrive keeps rebooting' complaint

[bakdraft]

Originally Posted by SteveMD

It would be nice but I somehow doubt it. It takes a day to upgrade the software on a 3 series (and I assume 5,6,7s also). Unless there is a specific fault with the iDrive, I can't see BMW giving free upgrades just to keep us happy. It would tie up a lot of service bays once the word gets out.

Should a software revision become available, I'll be taking mine in with the old 'iDrive keeps rebooting' complaint

It will NEVER be improved. All of the faults were present on the E46 DVD Nav.. and yet they carried them over to the E90..in fact the E46 was better.

They have had plenty of chance to improve it already... and nothing yet..

Be assured there will not be any fixes... Grim Eh!

[LEDZEP]

They should have a way to update the iDrive and Nav via the DVD, and let customers do it themselves. Even if they made us pay for the DVD.

[SteveMD]

Originally Posted by LEDZEP

They should have a way to update the iDrive and Nav via the DVD, and let customers do it themselves. Even if they made us pay for the DVD.

I agree. I have two Garmins and since I've owned them, both have been given either new or improved functionality via a firmware download from Garmin's website. I even have Karen speaking to me (she is Australian) although I occasionally use Emily (British) and plain old Jill (American).

As an electrical design engineer it absolutely boggles my mind how the nav in the iDrive could have even hit production with the basic flaws that it has and knowing how brilliantly simple my Garmin is.

[LEDZEP]

Yep. Karen and Emily are my favorites too! Although I use Jill more now because I sometimes have trouble with the brit or aussie accent on the pronounciation of street names.

I'm sure a specially made DVD that contains autoexec software could easily be used to update the entire nav and idrive systems. Taking the car in for a full day (or more) of service time is stupid.

But let's face it, this is BMW we're talking about. Cutting edge techno has never been their strong suit.

[dhmilosr]

Not to defend BMW, but the DVD that came with my Nav system was made by a contractor of BMW's by the name of "Navteq". Their web site is www.navteq.com. BMW probably should have given Navteq better requirements for their Nav system.

[BzsBimmer]

It isn't a bad system but I agree with the OP.
Also has anyone tried to look for a tire or auto parts store? What category is it under because I couldn't find any. BMW figures you have RFT's - no need to buy tires anywhere.

There are def. some shortcomings with the nav but I would still buy it again just so I can have the screen for all of my other "info" visible.

[BK]

Originally Posted by dhmilosr

Not to defend BMW, but the DVD that came with my Nav system was made by a contractor of BMW's by the name of "Navteq". Their web site is www.navteq.com. BMW probably should have given Navteq better requirements for their Nav system.

Navteq provides the map and POI information. They provide this info for most major GPS software manufacturers. I don't know who does BMW's nav software, but that's where the fault lies. I wish they could just hire some Garmin software engineers to design the interface.

[Raayman]

Originally Posted by poiney

I hope BMW is listening.

Lol, that's like going on to a windows forum and hoping that some of the people from the Microsoft development team are reading a specific topic asking for a change. What do you think the chances are?

Instead of complaining/moaning on a forum, why not try posting it on the BMW forum, or even better yet: write a mail to BMW with your complaints and suggestions for improvement and who knows if they might forward it to their development team. I wrote a mail with some suggestions and at least received a response that they would look in to my suggestions.

Bitching about a problem withtout telling the manufacturer is quite pointless imo... (and don't tell me that the manufacturer is reading here. It's not impossible, but also not very likely).

[SteveMD]

Originally Posted by dhmilosr

Not to defend BMW, but the DVD that came with my Nav system was made by a contractor of BMW's by the name of "Navteq". Their web site is www.navteq.com. BMW probably should have given Navteq better requirements for their Nav system.

Navteq provide the map data for BMW and other manufacturers, Garmin, Magellan, even Google Maps. They have nothing to do with how the Nav system functions in the car.

[poiney]

Raayman,
Well kudos to you for relaying your thoughts to the manufacturer. Maybe I'm naive, but given all of the negative publicity about Idrive, I would have thought BMW would consolidate repeated complaints covered in popular news groups. It's quite efficient in the electronic age with fast search engines (but then again that doesn't seem to be BMW's strength based on the OS of my Navi! )

Why do they even need this feedback? Can't they try a Garmin and quickly realize most of their design flaws immediately? It seems they must know the weaknesses of the system, but to fix these must not be as profitable as it seems. I just can't understand it.

[NFS]

Originally Posted by spark227

It's frustrating that I can't navigate by Point of Interest (POI) with this GPS unlike with my last Nissan and Infiniti vehicles. For example, if I want to go to "Shooter's Paradise" in Woodbridge, VA, but didn't know where exactly it is, I should be able to plug in the city and state and then spell out the business name. Not with BMW. I have to go to INFORMATION and then look for the POI through the various POI categories. And the results aren't sortable by alphabetical order either, but in terms of distance from the center of the city. This makes you waste time by scrolling through the entire results list. I also can't click on a POI to see the street address before determining whether it's the actual destination I want. So in the end I wasn't able to find where I even wanted to go to.

Surely you would just navigate to Woodbridge, then select 'information' then 'on destination' then the relevant POI - you would get a list of POI's to choose from then sorted by distance from your destination.

Originally Posted by spark227

Another good example of how GPS should work was when I was in the mood for a meatloaf carver sandwich from Boston Market, but didn't know any in the area. With Infiniti's GPS, I just typed in the state (and/or city) and then "Boston Market" in the POI and the results showed every location by distance.

I also don't like how the map can't easily be nudged around to see street names or details in a desired direction that's off screen. Zooming out doesn't help because then detail is lost. I have to move the idrive cursor to the left menu, and then scroll down to the appropriate icon in order to have that functionality. I usually like to do this at stop lights, but when traffic starts moving again, I have to jump through hoops to get back to the navigation map screen.

From atlas mode you just need to press the i-drive in once to bring up the sub menu then again on the backslash to return to the nav view. You could also use the voice command 'map' to return to your last map view.

Originally Posted by spark227

The GPS screen is so damn small that enough detail cannot be seen unless zooming in at 800 feet. I got more detail at a 1/2 mile zoom with Infiniti's 7" screen, and 15-20% of the bottom was covered by radio and climate control status, too.

It takes so damn long for the GPS to calculate a route. idrive is pretty laggy in the first place, but the GPS is unbearably slow. Wish I could give the idrive like a 2GB memory upgrade or something.

Seems about as fast as my TOMTOM system was - and it is less prone to losing synch with the satellites.

[mikepinkerton]

Originally Posted by needforspeed

Surely you would just navigate to Woodbridge, then select 'information' then 'on destination' then the relevant POI - you would get a list of POI's to choose from then sorted by distance from your destination.

That's the main problem. What subcategory would that be in? And since they're sorted by distance, not name, you can't tell if it's in that category w/out scrolling through the entire list, which could be long.

It's like finding a needle in a haystack, while driving. Hardly the best design.
-Mike

[BeeEmDubU]

sometimes it takes me so long to enter/calculate a route that by the time i finish entering a destination, I'm already at my destination.

[MacAttack]

Yep...