Product Description

The ultimate car navigator including free traffic updates for life.  4.3' wide touchscreen, Full European mapping (31 countries), IQ Routes for fastest possible routing, voice address input, Bluetooth with hands free calling and many other great features.  Product comes complete with safety camera locations,   TomTom latest map guarantee and TomTom Mapshare.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #14605 in Consumer Electronics
• Brand: TomTom
• Model: 1CH7.013.00
• Released on: 2007-05-05
• Dimensions: .0" h x .0" w x .0" l, .49 pounds

Features

• TomTom Go 730T»Satellite Navigation
  • TomTom GO 730T Europe satellite navigation system with voice address input, Map Share technology, traffic information, weather reports, built in FM transmitter, 4.3 inch touch sensitive LCD screen and Help Me

Manufacturer's Description

Your device couldn't be simpler to use - just plug in and tap the touch screen. You will be on your way very quickly with our intuitive user interface.		A larger speaker gives you the best audio quality, eliminating distortions so you hear your instructions loud and clear.		Make sure no-one else can use the information in your TomTom device with a secure PIN lock.		You can find help with local emergency service information at your fingertips. From hospitals to roadside assistance, this information will be useful in any area.		Make corrections to your own map and benefit from thousands of corrections made by TomTom users every day - free of charge.
Your device comes with fixed safety camera alerts pre-installed, to help you drive more safely and responsibly.		Everything you need to keep your TomTom device up to date - get new software, download new maps, access free content from the TomTom community and subscribe to services.		Touch screen technology gives you the easiest operation to make using your device a pleasure.		Plug in your Traffic Receiver and as soon as an update comes in, your device will recalculate travel time and suggest alternative routings if they are better.		Calculate your routes based on the real average speed measured on roads rather than the maximum speeds. This will always provide you with the smartest route, saving you money, time and fuel.
Clearly shows which lane to take at junctions so you don't miss your turning, allowing you to drive relaxed and safe.		Compatible with Bluetooth enabled devices for transfer of photos and MP3s. Optional Bluetooth remote control so you or a passenger can operate your GO from anywhere in the car, making the journey easier and safer.		No need to take your eyes off the road. Speech technology can give you directions, inform you of the latest traffic messages and even read your SMSs.		Play the music on your device wirelessley through your car stereo, adjusting music volume so you don't miss spoken instructions.		Just tell your device the city, street and number you need to go to and let it do the rest.
Record your own navigation instructions using your own own voice, a friend's, or a family member's.		For easy connection of your GO to your PC or Mac and charging your GO in the convenience of your house or hotel. Comes with docking and USB cable.

TomTom GO perfectly engineered navigation. The new GO comes with a host of features which will give you the best possible navigation experience.

Easy to use Plug and go Award-winning software

Best maps Latest map guarantee TomTom Mapshare - update your map daily - for free!

Best routing and traffic Updates IQ Routes -always calculates the fastest route based on real average speed measurements offering most accurate time of arrival Free traffic updates for life with RDS-TMC (on traffic models only)

Leader in safety Pre-installed safety camera alerts Help Me menu Advanced Lane Guidance - makes complex junctions easier to navigate

TomTom is powered by Tele Atlas Quality Maps
Tele Atlas is a leading worldwide map data provider for personal navigation solutions. In a rapidly expanding industry and changing world, Tele Atlas continuously produces rich, fresh and accurate quality maps. Tele Atlas brand promise: find more, reflects how we see a world where people do not just want to move from A to B, but want to find interesting things and paces on the way; restaurants, hotels, petrol stations, museums and so on. It's not just guiding users to destinations but also helping them to easily find the people, places and products that interest them the most.

Box Contents

• TomTom GO 730 device
• Windscreen mount
• Desk dock
• Car charger
• CD-ROM & documentation

Customer Reviews

Very good unit, but....
My 3 previous units have been Garmins and until my last one (A Nuvi 610T. Look at my review on the relevent page) I was very happy with them. After using a Tomtom for a while while my Nuvi was off for repair (again), I must say I was very impressed.
However there is one point where the Nuvi beats the 730 hands down (and probably all Tomtom`s), and that is in the screen brightness. The Nuvi, even with full sunlight streaming on it remained perfectly clear and bright, and that was with the backlight only set to 80%. It was quite a disappointment going back to an "old tech" screen, having to hold a hand over it to shield it from the sun to be able to see it. A few smudgy finger marks only adds to the problem. Sunlight readable screens are mainstream now, not just the preserve of the marine and aviation markets, so there is little excuse in my opinion!
Apart from this issue (which Tomtom must address if they want to hold on to my custom in future!) it is a very impressive satnav, with a wealth of well thought out useful features.
So come on Tomtom, sort out the screen brightness and make a very good unit a superb one!

Motorway lane feature is fantastic
Like many people I spent a long time agonizing between the TomTom 720 and the Garmin 760. I decided to go with the Tomtom and as luck would have it the day I wanted to order, amazon were out of stock of the 720 so I plumped an extra £140 for the 730 instead. It was way more than I wanted to spend on a Satnav but I couldn't bear the thought of any more agonizing so I just bought what they had. For me this is a farily typical 'spend ages researching and then when it comes to it buy something different because what I eventually decided on was out of stock' scenario. I couldn't really find any real user reviews on the 730 so thought I'd write a few notes here to help anyone in the same situation as me. I've just come back from a 700 mile round trip to Disneyland Paris where we used the device heavily in the UK and France.

I'm really glad I went for the 730. To me, the killer new feature is the display which shows which lane you need to be in on a motorway. As you approach a complex motorway junction (which is almost all of them), the screen shows a static image of the road with all the lanes in, and green flashing arrows showing where you want to be. This makes navigating motorways absolutely as straight forward as it could be. Although I wasn't at all impressed by the sound of this feature when reading up on the 730, I have to say it is fantastic and the screen appears just when you are wondering if you are in the right lane.

There are a lot of details in the device that are really handy - for example if you have a lot of turns to make one after another, it combines the instructions in a way that is very natural sounding such as 'turn right at the roundabout and then turn right at the next roundabout'. It seems to know a lot of speed limits which is also unexpectedly handy. I had a go with the traffic sensor and amazingly it knew exactly where the roadworks were in France. Astonishingly we didn't get stuck in traffic anywhere so couldn't report on if it knew about traffic jams (it reported that there were none). However the antenna you have to plug in to get the traffic information is annoying and I'm unlikely to use it day to day.

It has been spot on at predicting the arrival time, but I haven't had much experience with previous TomToms to know if this is improved. It just works fine on this device.

When I was looking at the Garmin, I was very tempted by the better looking map displays, but decided to go with the TomTom because the screen refresh rate appears faster. I was expecting the 730's maps to be smoother (they mention a better graphics system) but unfortunately they aren't - it's the same tomtom jaggy map, however the benefit of this is that it does update the display very quickly and the device is very quick and responsive to use. Don't get me wrong - the map is fine, it just doesn't look as pretty as other devices.

I have been able to connect the device and update it using my mac which I didn't expect - it appears fully compatible with OSX via software I downloaded from the TT website. I've had no problems updating it and will routinely plug it in to keep it up to date as the process appears painless.

I have some minor niggles: The most obvious is that the screen doesn't have sensor to automatically set the brightness according to the ambient light, so to see it in bright sunlight you have to set it to 100%, which means in the evening it's distractingly bright. Honestly that's pretty much it at the moment. It did have some out of date map data regarding the roads within the Disneyland park itself, but I can forgive it for that because if you drive where you want it recalculates the route silently after about 20-30s. So it is easy to drive by road signs when you know where you are going and using the TomTom for directions when you don't know where you are going. It also appears to have a bit of an issue with turning itself on again after turning it off after using it for a couple of hours, but I'm guessing this is a glitch that will be fixed by a software update.

So in all I'm very happy and look forward to getting the hang of all the fancy features.

[update - a few weeks later...] After a few weeks using the device, I've found it actually does have (I think) some sort of ambient light sensor to switch between day and night views which does address my only niggle. However I've found the issue of it turning itself on again when you turn it off really quite annoying - it means the battery is pretty much always flat when I go to use it, so I have to use the car charger all the time. Also it's not very good at allowing you to input destinations in any other means than postcode or house number + street - so if you need to look something up like 'legoland' or 'Gildredge Park, Eastbourne' it just doesn't know what you mean, which has meant we've not been able to use it to go to either of those places. However, as far as I can tell this is something that all satnavs have a problem with (I guess we are just spoilt by google). If amazon let me change my star rating I'd change it to 4 stars. It's still excellent at motorway navigation, but if you need to go regularly to places for which you don't know the postcode, or good battery life is important I'd say look elsewhere.

TomTom GO 730T
I had (and still have) a GO 700 but as the windscreen mount was on it's last legs (having been glued back together a few months ago) and the maps outdated I decided to upgrade to a 730T instead of buying a new mount and maps. It's a decision I don't regret especially as I paid less than £220 thanks to accumulated Amazon vouchers.

It is certainly superior to the GO 700 and the additional features - lane guidance, Q route, MP3 facility etc are all very useful. The only feature I haven't used yet is the RDS traffic which I believe can be quite patchy but this is not unique to TomTom. GPS reception is superb, locating my position almost instantly.

I only have one major criticism (hence the 4 stars)and that is the screen brightness, which as in all previous TomToms, is pretty pathetic considering the screen technology available these days. In bright sunshine the screen is very difficult or impossible to see. Another more minor fault is the short screen mount which on modern cars leaves the TomTom almost out of reach. I intend to get round this by purchasing dashboard mounting discs and this in fact may assist screen visibility as well by bringing the device further into the car. Despite these niggles I am very pleased with this bit of kit.