Faulty Tomtom 710 : maps not covered by warranty ?

[asadmm]

I've been given a Tomtom 710 sat nav unit by my cousin to sort out for him which has stopped working. The unit came with a 2 year warranty and is now about 14 months old.

This is one that comes with the Tomtom software and maps installed on an SD card. Not sure exactly what happened (can it crash ?) but while running once it stopped working. After that when you switched it on it does not start and comes up with a picture/animation showing the SD card with a big red cross through it and indicating to remove and replace the SD card.

I found this as the problem and its solution in the FAQs on the Tomtom website. It recomended reinstalling the Tomtom software. So I hooked the unit up to the PC with Tomtom Home software and downloaded and installed a newer version of the software on the unit.

Now the unit comes on and goes a bit further past a copyright message but stops coming up with a message "No maps found". I was expecting that the Home software would allow me to download and install the missing maps but it doesnt have an option to do this. I phoned the Tomtom technical support team and basically their answer was I could download and install the latest maps but I would have to pay for them ! Alternatively I could send the unit and SD card back to them and they would install a version of the maps that were originally on there but that would cost me about £50 !

They said they wouldn't repair it under warranty as that only applies to the hardware not software and maps. They say the recomendation is that you should hook up the unit to a PC and make a backup of all the software which you can restore in such a situation. My cousin who isnt really that PC literate did try to make a backup of it when he got it but ran into some problems. Is it fair to have such a requirement for a consumer unit aimed at non-techies ?

If I look at the SD card in Explorer it looks like there is no maps folder there is a large folder called Found.000 with a lot of .chk files. If I remember correctly don't you get a lot of .chk files on Windows if some sort of corruption has happened.

So question are Tomtom being reasonable in saying software/maps are not covered by the warranty ?

Because its worse than a brick without them. Presumably the files on the SD card became corrupted due to some sort of hardware glitch anyway. As the software/maps are proprietary and other sw can not be installed on it should Tomtom not be responsible for hardware + software ?

So what should I say to them to get the maps within the warranty?

Has anybody else had this problem ? How did you get it sorted ?

Can I "fix" the corrupt files in anyway ?

Or should I just stump up the cash for new maps or tell my cousin to get a new unit ?

Thanks for any help / advice offered.

[stevejm]

You should be able to get help here, http://www.pocketgpsworld.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewforum&f=93

[SPB]

That sounds unreasonable to me. I can understand the SD card itself not being covered, but to not provide the maps for re-install is pretty poor form.

Did your cousin get a map "activation code" in the box, or don't they do it like this anymore? I'd have thought that you could (legally) re-download the same version maps into tom tom home and reapply to the until (onto a new SD card). Not sure where to source the maps if Tom Tom won't help, I guess we can't talk about that here anyway even though we are not talking about piracy in this case.

When I have had to deal with Tom Tom support they have always been woefully inadequate, particularly as this is a market leading company.

Sorry no to be of any help.

[Sam]

It maybe worth running a recovery programme to see if you can get anything off the card. I've never used it but PhotoRec (http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec) is supposed to be quite good.

[threadkiller]

Although not sounding reasonable it does make some sort of sense. It works out of the Box, they give you instructions to back it up so you can restore it if something goes wrong.

Its a bit like a PC in some ways, when I manufactured & sold PC's the biggest problem was end users, in that they'd call you out when the PC was "faulty" under warranty, only to find it was some latest game or other that had screwed up the drivers, and you had to say, sorry but that's not covered, as its something you've done / added / changed. So you put it back to default, or restore the PC & explain its only original config & hardware that's covered.

The TomTom is like that in some respect in that you can add maps & POI's etc and there is the possibility of it going wrong. Though I think the £50 for the default maps is a little steep.

As suggested go to pocketgpsworld, I've always found them very helpful in the past with mine.

[Dodgy]

But to be able to back it up there is an assumption you have a PC to do so, unbelievably, not everyone has a computer and TomTom units are sold on the basis that they are standalone devices. If there's a requirement to back them up, it shouldn't rely on the purchase or ownership of other potentially expensive equipment to do so.

Dave.

[Kryten]

Moving

[asadmm]

You should be able to get help here, http://www.pocketgpsworld.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewforum&f=93

Thanks will have a look over there, perhaps other people have had a similar problem.

It maybe worth running a recovery programme to see if you can get anything off the card. I've never used it but PhotoRec (http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec) is supposed to be quite good.

Cheers downloaded this. I copied the corrupt directory to my hard drive (as I didn't want to mess up the SD card anymore just yet). I ran the PhotoRec program and it started scanning my whold hard drive, it did start coming up with a few files from the hard drive but these were ones I had deleted in the past. I ended up stopping it but the quick look I had I couldn't see an option for checking just a particular directory with Photo Rec. But will go back to it when I have more time.

SPB I think he has got an activation code on a card somewhere.

I spoke to Tomtom again today and argued that the software and maps were integral to a sat nav system which would be useless without them so should be covered by the warranty. Even though she sort of agreed with this she insisted they're not covered. Only options as before buy new maps or send it back for repair. But today she didnt quote a price for reinstalling the maps she said I should send back the unit and SD card they would check it and let me know the cost of repair. At that stage I could go ahead or ask for them to return it unrepaired if it was too much. Aparently they will send a package in which I have to send off the unit so at least shouldnt have to pay for postage. I will probably end up sending it for "repair". I did ask could they just send me a new working SD card but aparently no.

[Butch Coolidge]

I spoke to Tomtom again today and argued that the software and maps were integral to a sat nav system which would be useless without them so should be covered by the warranty. Even though she sort of agreed with this she insisted they're not covered. Only options as before buy new maps or send it back for repair. But today she didnt quote a price for reinstalling the maps she said I should send back the unit and SD card they would check it and let me know the cost of repair. At that stage I could go ahead or ask for them to return it unrepaired if it was too much. Aparently they will send a package in which I have to send off the unit so at least shouldnt have to pay for postage. I will probably end up sending it for "repair". I did ask could they just send me a new working SD card but aparently no.

Had a similar problem with mine (One XL Europe). Device took what it looked like a core dump on Linux and corrupted the map files on the flash memory internal disk. Synchronization software was useless for the restore (what a joke anyway this GUI). I simply deleted the content of the memory and copied back the files from the backup directory on my PC and it worked fine again.

TomTom should be able to send you a zip file containing the original content of the memory.

You need to backup (copy/paste is enough) your device (on several hardware even). Especially before any upgrade of the application. SD 1GB card cost nothing now so you can keep a copy with the GPS.

[Butch Coolidge]

That sounds unreasonable to me. I can understand the SD card itself not being covered, but to not provide the maps for re-install is pretty poor form.

Make me think that the original content of the memory (incl. maps) should be provided on a CD in the box when you purchase the device. This is not the case unfortunatly.

Every laptop comes with a recovery CD. Why not GPS ?