Hi NR552. Many thanks for confirming this.
Kind regards,
BringGo Support
Wanted to give feedback after exclusively using BringGo on a trip to Las Vegas and back from San Diego over the last 2 days (at least trying to).
After about 4 minutes to fire up BringGo (including bluetooth connecting the phone, starting the application from the Mylink screen), I was able to plug in my destination address. Initially it couldn't find the address, but then I discovered since I was driving to a different state (which I had already loaded the maps for, Nevada) I had to select the state from the drop down. After entering the address (there's an East and West address apparently), when calculating the route, it would hang for about 4 minutes and either report back it could not calculate a route to my destination or it would simply bounce back to the map screen with my current location.
I restarted both the Mylink and my android phone a couple times, same results. I then plugged in my work address here locally, it would route. I then attempted my Nevada address again. No joy, no route available. I chalked it up as possibly an issue with my phone not being able to built a route that far (325 miles). SO, I reverted to Google Maps on my phone (pretty much for traffic avoidance, I know how to get to Vegas!
At the mid point of the trip I once again tried my destination in Las Vegas, only ~160 miles distant, same results. SO I put in my home address, approx 175 miles behind me, and it routed within a few seconds. Hmm. Maybe an issue across statelines? More on that later. Once I was about 25 miles from my destination I tried again, and boom. It routed me. Cool. So as I got closer it was apparent that it was pointed somewhere else. The "WEST" address I suspected. I was able to get to the hotel without issue as I knew the location already. I figured I put in the incorrect "west" "east" selection. More on that later too. The following day we went to a gas station, a local restaurant for breakfast, then the Hoover Dam bridge (that runs into AZ). Everything worked, except when we went across the bridge. No fault of BringGo, I didn't load AZ into my map database on the phone, so when we
were nearly across the bridge, the screen displayed the end of the bridge! It was pretty funny. Upon return back into Nevada, the roads reappeared on the display and we were able to follow the directions around the Hoover Dam.
Remember that "west" "east" issue? Now was the time for BringGo to bring us back to the hotel. I selected the address (the correct address, and I put it in the favorites list). BringGo brought us all the way back until we reached the decision point of "west" vs "east" and unfortunately, it tried to take us the wrong way again. Later that evening we went to the Fremont Street experience, a mere 7 miles away, but when attempting to find Fremont Street without an exact street address, BringGo tried to put us about a mile east of the downtown Las Vegas landmark (I believe where they were filming COPS or something). We got headed in the right direction by dead reckoning (go to the bright lights dumbass!) and all was well. From there we headed to a Rock and Roll Heavy Metal joint somewhere in west/northwest Las Vegas by following a friend who lives in town. Afterwards we were now in an unknown environment, and intrusted BringGo to get us back to the hotel. This time, I previewed the map and it was pointed once again to the incorrect location of the hotel. I deleted the location from my favorites, went through the browse feature to find the hotel (which was listed with the same address that I put into my favorites)... and BOOM! It pointed to the correct location. So there's a glitch for that address. We got back directly to the hotel (though I believe they should add for Las Vegas (and quite possibly many cities) an option to the route "Avoid Gang/High Crime areas")
The following morning we headed to breakfast (BringGo all the way). Remember that "across state lines" issue? I attempted to navigate back to San Diego driving southbound from Las Vegas which seems about unnatural as man giving birth to a child. I plugged in my home address, and BOOM. There's the route. Maybe BringGo didn't want me to leave home? Not sure, but I did have a good time in Vegas! (What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, including my money
BringGo did well, including some new traffic notices. Got a "!" on the screen, and the description of the incident was unclear (turns out it was a police chase/lojack case of a stolen car, fwy was shut down for a bit). I wanted to avoid the unknown "!" and was told it couldn't be avoided, no route available. It was more than 90 miles distant, possibly it would be gone when we got there. As we neared other traffic issues popped up (typical Friday afternoon rush hour in the Inland Empire), and BringGo directed me to exit the fwy (*to avoid something ahead I had asked to avoid about an hour prior), I did, followed the road (in an area I have never driven surprisingly) and though it directed me around something that was no longer and issue, I discovered a great way to get around traffic (north or south) along the I-215. Back on the fwy BringGo began to really impress me. We put it head to head with my girlfriend's phone running the same route with Google Maps. BringGo routed me in a completely different direction than Google Maps. As we neared that fateful (OK, never been this way, hope this works) I was able to see the route that I would normally go, and the one that Google Maps suggested, was completely stopped. We continued on westward into new territory, which BringGo's traffic showed all green, and immediately ran into bumper to bumper, stop and go traffic for about 3-4 miles. We made it through to the carpool lane and were back to full speed. At the 91 west / I-15 south interchange it was easy to see that I-15 south was a parking lot. Maybe Google's route would have been the lessor of two evils. We exited the fwy, stretched out legs, and via google maps (not with the navigation, just the satelite maps) found an alternate way to go (surface streets) That too was a bit of a drag, but got past the mess, BringGo in the driver's seat again, and all the way home (and once again, the traffic reports on the 52 FWY are non-existant, yet it was stop n go for 8 miles).
My experiences with BringGo are both positive and negative. I had a couple "data connection lost" reported which to recover from involved rebooting my phone and the Mylink (BringGo would ask if we wanted to continue our previous route when it came back up, that's a big plus to get us back on track asap). The address issue may have been just a software glitch (both across statelines and to the hotel), but I would imagine I am not the only one that it's happened to. The traffic reports are mildly accurate, which isn't 100% BringGo's fault, you have to consider the reports to be somewhat recent, but not real time or near real time. Is it worth it? I paid $60~ for the 3 years of update maps, etc. It allows me to have GPS navigation via my android phone displayed on my Mylink display which is both easier and safer to use than a phone. Works fairly well. Is cheaper than a stand alone GPS unit (Garmin, etc), and carries the maps on your phone so you're not stuck without GPS navigation in areas with poor cell/data coverage.
I give it 3.5 out of 5 stars. It's worth the price.
NR552
