Has this error ever happened to you? You enter in an address and it says it cannot calculate a route to the destination. Not that the address isn't in the database (you get that error in a different place). You select a marked point and it cannot determine how to get there.

I'll explain how this happened. I was driving from LA to the San Jose area. I decided to calculate an alternate route, just in case. It said the alternate route was much shorter (like 160 miles as opposed to 200 miles). But the current route was only 140 miles. It appears that, when calculating the alternate routes, it calculates the actual miles for the two alternate routes, but uses the miles originally calculated for the current route. That is obviously a bug.

Anyway, I deleted the destination and re-entered it It is my home, a destination I've entered many times just to see how long it will be until I get home. But it could not calculate how to get there. It could take me to my friend's house, about 5 miles away, but not to my house. I tried 3 or 4 times and always got the same error. Finally, about 30 minutes later, I tried again and it was able to calculate the destination.

 

Maybe it's a dirty disc or a spot on the disc that's hard for the reader to grab data.

I had something similar happen when I take turn on to a bumpy road that the navi wasn't expecting. The system hung on the recalculating menu and would not come back even when I was stopped at a light for about a minute. It did eventually comeback, figured out where it was and was able to calculate the destination.

 

That was my first thought also. But I've never taken the disc out of the player. So I don't know how it could have gotten damaged.

 

It is not a disc proble, but rather the firmware/software. It could very well be a bug. Report it to Navteq and see what they say about it.

 

I had this problem happen this last summer while visiting Indiana... it was acting very screwy my whole trip there... had me on the wrong roads, going the wrong direction, and wasn't able to get me all the way to my destination (although it was only off my a mile or two when it stopped the navigation). On the way home everything was fine and haven't had a problem since. I was thinking the gov't was toying with the satellites that afternoon...?

 

If you live near a military installation, then it is quite possible as theatre jamming by the military is being used around sensitive areas. We have known anomolies around the Puget Sound military fascilities, especially the nuclear submarine base.

 

I also had one other NAV problem on my trip. I know the cause of the problem (the maps are out of date), but it was funny.

For those of you in California, if you want to go from the I-5 south to I-10 East, it will direct you to 210 to avoid the central LA traffic. Problem is that it thinks that 210 ends at route 57 while in reality it continues. It was telling me to go right to stay on 210, but all the signs said stay left to stay on 210. So I followed the signs. The NAV thought I was driving through neighborhood streets instead of a highway. It was funny until the 210 started going north and I realized that I was genuinely lost. Luckily, once I exited, NAV was able to find my real location and direct me to the I-10.

A similar thing happens in Chandler (just east of Phoenix, AZ). The Loop 202 is brand new and doesn't show up in the NAV system, so it thought I was driving in the middle of the desert.

 

just don't turn into this guy:

http://www.themercury.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,11553673^401,00.html

 

clickable link here

 

ive got similar problems and my thoughts are:

this happens when the route it plans to use is obstrcuted... example:
my house is on a drive thats like a big 5 mile circle... however there is a dam at one part of it, so the road doesnt loop around from the main road, instead there is a west and an east part. . you cant get to the east side form the west by travelling in a simple circle, you have to exit the west, drive over to the east entrance off the bigger main road, and the follow the east drive until you reach your house. even if you are technically 1 mile from your destination, the dam makes you travel a full 4.5 miles by exiting and re-entering. the nav doesnt want to do this, it jsut wants to go straight thru, and since the road dead ends on the nav map it cant relaize it has to backtrack a lot and says it cant guide you to your destination.

similar situtaions have yielded the same results... the nav seems to want to take the closest road, but when that road doesnt connect with the next road, the nav goes stupid and doesnt even try to get a different way of getting there.

 

woops thanks for fixing it