XL340M Trip Rout Options

[William Young]

I will be taking my wife to a hospital for cataract eye surgery tomorrow morning.
I know where it is but wanted to check out the new GPS on my first trip out of town (about 140 km)

I have the address saved and when I do a trip preview in fast forward it wants to take me on some back roads that I never use for that trip and especially don't want to with all the snow packed mountain roads around here right now. .
That route might be very slightly shorter as far as km's go but the back roads are hilly and winding and I don't want to be late for her appointment.

I know there are options for the types of routes . I have seen it before but I'll be darned if I can find it now.

Could someone please walk me through finding that option right from when I bring up the address I want to go to.. ?

When I find that option, is one of them primarilly for staying on the main highways . ? That is what I would like have it set as..

It's no big deal if I can't find an all highway and city route because I know where I am going anyway. It is just a test so I will know what I am doing later when planning a trip to a location I have never been to before.

Quite a little learning curve for a first time GPS user.

 

[dhn]

Once the route is established, click on 'change route', avoid part of route, and you see a text listing of the various roads it has selected. Tap the road you wish to avoid. Then 'done'

 

[William Young]

Once the route is established, click on 'change route', avoid part of route, and you see a text listing of the various roads it has selected. Tap the road you wish to avoid. Then 'done'

Sorry but I am not finding "change route" .
I see change prefernces but nothing in there about changing a route.
I saw "Find Alternative" and clicked on that but now I cannot find where I can show the route in fast forward like I did with the route where it wanted me to take back roads.

Sorry to be a nuisance but I am having a hard time figuring this thing out with so many different options.

 

[dhn]

When your route is created, do you not then get sent to a screen showing the mapping of the route selected with a 'change route' button on the bottom?

 

[William Young]

When your route is created, do you not then get sent to a screen showing the mapping of the route selected with a 'change route' button on the bottom?

No it does not give me a change route button anywhere that I can find .

I am wondering if I should format the whole thing and start over but that could be way too time consuming to have it programmed for tomorrows trip.

It is saying "fastest route " at the bottom where it shows the whole route and that is probably why it wants to take me to the backroads.

 

[dhn]

Formatting will accomplish nothing.

 

[William Young]

Formatting will accomplish nothing.

Thanks for that .
If I don't find how to make an alternate route before tomorrow morning when I leave at 7.30 AM I will just leave the unit home because I don't want to take backroads with the snow storms we have had in the past week.

 

[pat3500]

William, what model do you have?

I think I remember that you have a XXL540, right?

Once you have setup your route, tap on the screen, you will get the main menu. There, click on "Find alternative". It is the second option, the white arrow on orange background.

From there, you can either select "Calculate alternative" (First option on the left, white arrow on green background), which will give you a totally different route, or "Avoid part of route" (second option of the lower row). If you select avoid part of route, you will get a list of the different steps of your route. Just select whichever back road you want to avoid, and it will recalculate your route without taking the problematic road.

Hope this helps!

 

[William Young]

It is a new XL340M .

I have spent a lot of hours trying to follow instruction here but no matter what I do it always comes back to "fastest route" which includes the back roads. Either it just is not capable of programing a main highway route which everyone around here takes every time we go to that city or it is beyond my capabilities to program it .

I think I could find a route to any destination in North America with a paper map faster than I can with this unit .

I know you are all trying to help and it is much appreciated but I have a feeling this is going to be an expensive toy to stick in a drawer of give to one of my sons in other provinces when they come to visit.

Thanks again for your attempts to help me.

 

[Rick F.]

Hi William,

Not sure if you've checked this yet or not, but your planning preferences may not be set up right. Tap the screen, then tap change preferences

• right arrow till you see
• Planning preferences
• Then choose what type route you want. If the highway will provide the fastest route, tick that. Make sure 'avoid freeways' is NOT ticked.
• tap 'done' and make other choices as you want them.

Hope this helps. It takes a little getting used to a GPS at first, but once you've become familiar they can be really handy. Good luck.

 

[William Young]

I spent a coupl more hours with it

Just one more inquiry.
I have tried everything imaginable to get this thing out of the fastest and most undesirable route and back to regular highway route . It is a main highway #3 in BC and goes all the way to the destination except it would go off the highway just a little when reaching the address in the city..
It is a main highway to the coast and is from east to west across the entire province.
When I do the "change route" thing it sometimes does but takes me in a totally different direction from where I want to go. Last time it was taking me down a highway to the south in USA and I am programmed for Canada .
The direction I was trying to program is North East in BC Canada on highway 3 .

What I would like to know is how do I go about deleteing the few addresse I have in "Navigate To" and "favorites" and my Home address as well . When I press "Clear Route" on any of the address it does not clear them .
I would rather not have to format it before I give it away but I would like those address's out of there so the new owner can have a fresh start.
There are only half a dozen address's in it and some of them were just mistakes in typing them which I thought I had backspaced out but they went in anyway.

 

[William Young]

Hi William,

Not sure if you've checked this yet or not, but your planning preferences may not be set up right. Tap the screen, then tap change preferences

• right arrow till you see
• Planning preferences
• Then choose what type route you want. If the highway will provide the fastest route, tick that. Make sure 'avoid freeways' is NOT ticked.
• tap 'done' and make other choices as you want them.

Hope this helps. It takes a little getting used to a GPS at first, but once you've become familiar they can be really handy. Good luck.

.

Hi Rick.
Apparently we were both typing at the same time and your new approach is something that has not been suggested yet (unless I missed it).
I will certainly give it a try.
I really don't want to part with it if I can make it program a direct route to a destination.

 

[William Young]

OK Rick, I found Planning Preferences and the only one that is ticked is the Fastest Route one . I have never changed anything in there so apparently that was what it was set at when I received it. Should I try another setting in there. ?

I am beginning to think that fastest route would be the shortcut through the mountains that it wants me to take and that the all highway route I want would be a little longer in KM's and I don't really care about it being longer or taking a little more time. The backroads around here are treacherous right now but the highways athough wall to wall ice and snow packed are quite driveable with my AWD Honda CR-V .
I am afraid of going from bad to worse with not knowing what I am doing.

I sure do appreciate you patience with me in this matter.

Would it help to clear every address out (if I only knew how) and start fresh with settings changed to something else in "planning preferences" ?

I am pretty sure I won't have this set up for the trip tomorrow but if I can just get it set up somehow to work on the all highway 3 route I might not have to give it away.

 

[Rick F.]

Usually the 'shortest route' and 'fastest route' are not the same. Shortest suggests to me more back roads but not as fast. Where as highway and freeway travel would maybe be longer but much faster. I've always had 'fastest route' ticked and it's worked for me.

If you're traveling tomorrow I would still use your TomTom, but go the way you want to go using the freeway or major highway. The TomTom should automatically 'recalculate' to include the highway or freeway. I can understand you're wanting to use major highways/freeways with winter road conditions getting cranked up.

I don't think erasing any addresses will help.

After TomTom has planned my route and I don't like it, I tap in the middle of the screen... then tap 'find alternative', then 'travel via' (to specify certain road), tap 'right arrow', then 'point on map'. Then I zoom in with the bar on the right-hand side of the TomTom until I see the road I want TomTom to use. Make sure you zoom in enough to get the right road. The road label should pop up on the map to verify the road you're trying to have TomTom use. Then tap 'done'.

Hope this works for you.

 

[William Young]

Hi Rick and Danvo and others,
Just a note to let you know I was in the city 120 km away yesterday and have to return today for followup on wifes eye surgery (lens replacement) .
On top of that I got a virus in my computer day before yestsrday which crashed the internet explorer part of it and have now got that resolved.

Just didn't want you to think I was ignoring your TT advice.
Hopefully I can get a reply back to you later today after reveiewing and practicing what you have supplied.
Best regards

 

[William Young]

I'm Baaaaack . .lol

I have those two trips under my belt and was quite impressed with the amount of info showing across the bottom .

As mentioned before the route it planned on fastest setting wanted to take me on about 40 km of back roads in between the main highways . When it told me to turn to take that I ignored it and went straight ahead on the highway and it immediatley planned a new route for the same trip via highway that I am most accustomed to. I was wondering if it would save the all highway trip after doing that both going to the destinatin and coming home the first day but on the second day I had to ignore back roads and let it re-plan itself again.
Keep in mind that this was a trial trip which I have been over many tmes without a GPS and I knew the roads and my destination.
I am wondering how many back roads it would have taken me on if it was a trip about ten times as long in an area I have never travelled.
I don't know if the route it wanted me to take would have been the shortest or fastest and also wonder if I should try changing it to "shortest" route and see what happens.

I don't have a signal here with a steel roof overhead and its too cold to go outside tonight but the idea of moving the route by scrolling on the right side to bring the roads I 'want' to take sounds like a cool idea . When I find the all highway route like that how do I move it away from the backroad and back onto the highway. Will it drag it around by sliding a finger on top of the screen?
Even then this would only work if I Know the route as I do in this case. If it was an unknown route that would probably not help at all unless I was to compare the route with a paper map .

 

[Rick F.]

William wrote: "I was wondering if it would save the all highway trip after doing that both going to the destinatin and coming home the first day but on the second day I had to ignore back roads and let it re-plan itself again."

No, unfortunately, these GPS units don't learn from we humans, . Glad you got there and back safely. There must be something set in your TT that has it ignoring the major highways / freeways. Not sure though what that is.

"I am wondering how many back roads it would have taken me on if it was a trip about ten times as long in an area I have never travelled.
I don't know if the route it wanted me to take would have been the shortest or fastest and also wonder if I should try changing it to "shortest" route and see what happens."

I would go ahead and try selecting 'shortest route' (under planning preferences) to see if the TT comes up using the main highways. If not, it's always easy to change that setting back.

"When I find the all highway route like that how do I move it away from the backroad and back onto the highway. Will it drag it around by sliding a finger on top of the screen?"

Yes, the map will drag around easily – but not quickly with your finger. I have a ball-point-pen with a stylus as a second cartridge that I keep overhead in the visor of my car for this sort of thing. Not necessary, but works better than the finger. If I don't have that, I find that using the back of a fingernail works pretty well.

Good luck with your TT.

 

[fk91km]

Hi,

I was reading this thread. I have just bought a TomTom 340TM. I am wondering if there is a planning preference like this:

"Always prefer Highways"

Or

"Avoid local streets"


The reason is, I am someone who always prefer driving on highway instead of along local streets--even if taking the highway route might be a bit longer (say within 20% longer).

I don't want to do the 'alternative' route every single time. This is way too time-consuming for me.

I believe this one of the most common driving preferences many people want to select.

It's hard to believe, but I just don't see this commonly needed option at all. Is there a way I can have my TomTom do this?


Thanks.

 

[dhn]

There is 'avoid unpaved roads' but not 'local streets'.

With IQ routing, which your model has, if you select 'fastest', IQ routing (if not disabled) kicks in and selects what it thinks should be the fastest route.

You may try Itinerary Planning and select the points you wish to travel through as waypoints but it is still not 100% that the tomtom will select the roads you want to get there. You can have 48 waypoints per itinerary and the more points you have, the more likely the route will go the way you want.

 

[William Young]

Hi,

I was reading this thread. I have just bought a TomTom 340TM. I am wondering if there is a planning preference like this:

"Always prefer Highways"

Or

"Avoid local streets"


The reason is, I am someone who always prefer driving on highway instead of along local streets--even if taking the highway route might be a bit longer (say within 20% longer).

I don't want to do the 'alternative' route every single time. This is way too time-consuming for me.

I believe this one of the most common driving preferences many people want to select.

It's hard to believe, but I just don't see this commonly needed option at all. Is there a way I can have my TomTom do this?


Thanks.

Welcome to the nightmare
I still can't make head nor tail of the settings . No matter what I do so far it still wants to take me across partly backroards rather than the all highway highway routes I am familiar with .
Emphasis on "familiar with" because I just keep going straight ahead on the highway when it wants me to turn onto the backroads.. I have still only used it for routes I am familiar with and travel on all the time.

I would never trust it to an unfamiliar route withoutout taking a paper map so I would know which out of the way routes to avoid every time it wants me to go there.

If you get it all figured out I would sure like to hear about it.

For now I have given up on mine and might have more time to play with it in the new year and after I have read more responses here and am able to get it working satisfactorily.