TomTom iPhone Car Kit returns to UK Apple Store, awaits drama
By Thomas Ricker 
posted Oct 9th 2009 5:40AM
posted Oct 9th 2009 5:40AM
It's back. After making a horrendous false start with the early promise of iPod touch support and the inclusion of the iPhone App in its £100 price tag, the TomTom Car Kit has returned to the Apple Store. In a big fat disclaimer, TomTom writes: The TomTom app for iPhone is not included with this TomTom Car Kit. The Car Kit dock is compatible with all iPhone models, but the TomTom app only works with iPhone 3GS and iPhone 3G.We only see it in the UK store at the moment but it's likely to pop on your local store anytime now. Ships in 1-2 weeks.
[Thanks, Joe W.]
How would it have worked out with an iPod Touch? Presumably you would need a standalone GPS to make it work which makes it pointless.
Anyhow, that'a a nice piece of kit and not bad if you're going to use it a lot.
The TomTom kit includes GPS -- Thomas
Fair enough. Now it's just the lack of an app that makes it pointless.
I heard if you tell TomTom in UK to find a local dentists, it says, "drive 10 hours to France".
What's that all about?
@Sea Urchin: Zing!
£100 for a phone dock? They're out of their tiny little minds.
*sigh* This is just want i needed/wanted but at that price...i mean really...COMON...theres just no other word to describe it.
I took my iPhone out for a drive through Sydney the other day and while GPS reception was ok it wasnt great, not to mention my battery died before i got to my destination and i had to ask some random indian taxi driver how to get there lol. If it was half that price id jump on it but i guess ill have to settle with second best.
Not supporting iPod touch is a mistake. I have one and was hoping to get one of these once the price came down a bit, but looks like that won't happen now. There really is no reason to not support it, other than the call functions in the POI menu.
will we b getting any navigation software here in india?
The app looks great and will no doubt actually work now with the receiver, but CoPilot Live works great after the update with solid GPS performance and only costs £25. No brainer really.
This is ridiculous, I ordered it from the danish Apple store as soon
as it came online, the a week later i receive this mail from apple:
Dear Customer,
Reference is made to your Order number W91xxxxxx placed at the Apple
Online Store.
We regret to inform you that at the moment we are not in a position
to accept your order and therefore you will not receive an Order
Confirmation and your order will not be processed.
We apologise for any inconvenience caused.
Kind regards,
Apple Online Store Support
I believe that that should sell it to me including the app for the
original price.. what do you think!!!
To spend both on the APP and the DOC, your better off buying a stand alone unit. TomTom needs to come off their high horse and relize that they are going to make this an epic failure with charging for both the APP and UNIT. I live in the US and the pricing we are seeing that TomTom is charging is $99 for the APP and $119 for the DOC. So, $218 for everything. You can get a deticated TomTom for that amount. TomTom...if your listen, and you are probably not, your going to lose on this one.
How many mentalists will actually spend £100, or even $120 on THIS? No app included?!?!
This is just a glorified handsfree kit as my iPhone already has GPS, unless I've been completely misled by using Google Maps all this time!
what? so how does this work with iPhone 2G if the app only supports 3G/3GS?
There is no such thing as an iPhone 2G. There's an iPhone, iPhone 3G, and iPhone 3GS.
There's a second generation iPhone, but that is called the iPhone 3G.
@Mikee
The GSM network is often referred to as the 2G network. And since the first iPhone couldnt use 3G and only the GSM network, its not that far off to call it the iPhone 2G :-)
2G - WAP
2.5G - GPRS
3.75G - Edge
3G - 3G
3.5G - HSPA (HSDPA/HSUPA)
4G - LTE
*2.75G - Edge
They're dropping the external GPS chip support for non-GPS devices? Fail. What, is Apple afraid that the extra GPS chip might confuse people into thinking that external hardware can add extra capabilities to their hardware?
"I heard if you tell TomTom in UK to find a local dentists, it says, "drive 10 hours to France".
What's that all about?"
Tedious racist stereotyping, that's just completely wrong. As well as private, we also have NHS dentists for the poor. Unlike the US, where being poor means ripping their own rotting teeth out with a pair of pliers. The standard of oral hygine and teeth is pretty good in the UK. Find something else now please.
I'm pretty sure the people living the the UK are not a "race", so the comment cannot be a "racist" by definition...
This almost had to be on purpose to fuck up a release this bad. Who in the hell is going to pay $100 for what amounts to a windshield mount for their phone. They would have sold a shit load of these if they worked with 1st gen and touch. I've got navigon for $80 and it works perfect after I figured out how to get my iphone balanced on its side on my dash.
Either someone misinterpreted the announcement, the announcement was miscommunicated or Tom Tom has shaken the foundation of business trust. Either ways, I agree on the fact of the rediculous priced iPhone stand for Tom Tom, excluding the app. I have a Tom Tom and even the yearly map updates are priced quite high. It seems that Tom Tom is willing to dare a high price limit. If Navigon keeps improving their software as they do now, I'm sure all this will surely put increadible pressure on Tom Tom to reconsider their pricing. I think we all know that Tom Tom has good products, but I believe that an iPhone owner who comits to a Tom Tom iPhone stand for the iPhone the sould at least consider a friendly or significant discount pricing of the Tom Tom iPhone app.
now that it will not support the ipod touch I see no reason for it to be sold. I am sure the gps in the 3gs or 3g is good enough. It makes tons of sense if it was for the ipod touch.
Buyer Beware!
TomTom's tech support is horrendous and they screw up their maps and s/w on the PND's on a regular basis. On a closed h/w environment, their track record is just abysmal - this could well be a disaster!
Presently anyone trying to use their Plus Services in the US (ie traffic and traffic avoidance) is out of luck - it's been down since late August and it took them several weeks to acknowledge the issue and there is still no signs of a fix.
I had TomTom 6 and had similar issues before where things would suddenly stop working and it would take weeks before you got answers and/or it was fixed. TomTom 7 came out but not in the US beyond sample city maps.
Billing problems, map update problems, broken TomTom Home s/w - they just don't have what looks to be any s/w QA
I hate to think what is going to happen once they have an influx of iPhone users. I am wondering if the delay in their app is due to some of the underlying issues with the rest of their platforms.
The way I see it is that the TomTom dock with the improved NAV chipset, bluetooth speakerphone, and charging station is a great addition or we would not all be so upset at the price. Clearly, if the price were reasonable we'd all probably jump on board and get one. That said, I am using the Navigon app as it is a much better navigation tool than the TomTom app, and I tried both before I purchased. I'm going to try and be a little patient here as I'm guessing Navigon will out do them on the cradle too in very short order. I live in LA and I have to say I've absolutely no issues moving all around the city and that includes up and down all the canyon roads.
Does the UK Price of the Car Kit include the VAT? maybe (hopefully,) the US version will be cheaper by about 20%?
you can buy standalone tom tom gos for not much more than the stand. certainly for less than the stand plus the price of the app. And they have bluetooth so you can still use your phone hands-free
It make no sense whatsoever.
Did anyone else get a survey from TT last week asking what pricing would be reasonable for the app and cradle? I get the impression they're urgently reviewing costs in light of all the negative feedback so far.