11. Conclusion

TomTom’s 910 is nicely designed hardware that has the potential to be an excellent GPS. Unfortunately, several serious issues detract from an otherwise good unit. Most serious is the poor mounting hardware that ships with the GO 910, followed closely by TomTom's decision to use Tele Atlas' mapping data. There's little that's more important on the GPS than the maps, and Tele Atlas' maps are simply not as complete or accurate as NAVTEQ's maps.

In my testing, I found many instances where the GO 910 was unable to route me to a destination because the address was not on the map. When I tried to go to the same address using a GPS that has NAVTEQ maps (Garmin, Magellan, Pioneer, Alpine, etc.), I was able to find the address without issue. I'm sure there are many instances where Tele Atlas is better than NAVTEQ, but in my own testing here in North America, NAVTEQ was clearly the better choice.

The GO 910 also suffers from TomTom's own inadequacies. TomTom's customer support needs improvement, and many of the GO 910's advertised features are still not available, even 12 months after the product's initial release. Moreover, TomTom needs to improve its Quality Assurance program. In my testing, buddy firmware code frequently interfered with normal GPS operation. For example, the unit was unable to keep accurate time, and the Bluetooth was unreliable.

Given the TomTom GO 910's price of around $500, I feel you're better off buying a Garmin nuvi or Magellan RoadMate 2200T. There's a lot to like about the GO 910, and I'm eager to see what the Dutch-based TomTom releases next. However, in it's current state, I must recommend against the GO 910.

12. Suggestions to TomTom for Improvement

• Mute button: it would be nice if there was a simple, easy way to mute audio prompts with a single touch to the unit.
  
  
• Improved Favorites UI: when saving an address in the Favorites menu, there’s no way to move the cursor so you can change the name you want to save an address as. You can only backspace. So, for example, if you entered the address 1 Easy Street, Burbank, CA and wanted to save it as “Home – 1 Easy Street, Burbank, CA”, you have to delete the entire thing 1 space at a time, and then re-type it out. You should be able to place the cursor at the beginning and just add “Home – “ to the string.
  
  
• Customized menus – With so many options available, it would be nice if you could create your own customized theme, or menu options. For example, you may only want 3-4 menu buttons that you use regularly, but they are space out across 5 different pages. If you could assemble only the buttons you want and save it as a custom profile, using the unit would be much more enjoyable.
  
  
• Improved mount: it goes without saying that the windshield mount needs to be improved ASAP. The current shipping mount is absolute crap, and according to TomTom support, a known issue. They really have no excuse for selling this unit until a suitable mount is developed (especially since support told me this is a "known issue" and "the reason TomTom isn't selling the unit directly yet". Bad TomTom - for Shame!
  
  
• Broader TomTom Plus Phone Support: 2 out of 3 phones we tested we not compatible with TomTom’s Plus feature, which allows the 910 to retrieve real-time traffic, weather, and other data. TomTom should broaden support to include many newer cell phones, and Blackberry in particular.