The slow death of Zumo...

[Wallace Shackleton]

I hope this does not come over as a moan/rant, hopefully an observation.

I got caught in the failure of Garmin Drive to deliver a MRA route to my Zumo XT at a very inconvenient time this week. In short Garmin badly let me down, it could have ruined my carefully planned trip.

Looking at things objectively, the Zumo hardly figures in Garmins product range any more, everything is now directed towards smart watches. They don't sell enough of them or they wouldn't cost so much, which is a vicious circle.

We (I) can not even tell Garmin that there is an issue with Drive so some connectivity can be reestablished with my XT, so ultimately there is no hope of a future for the Zumo devices.

This has drawn me to the conclusion that Zumo is dying a slow death and that it is time to abandon a dedicated motorbike GPS and buy a tablet device instead. Playing straight into the hands of a competitor.

The Chinese tablet devices seem to be a lot more innovative than the Zumo, with the drawback that kept me clinging on the Garmin, such as true GPS rather than being reliant on phone service but now what choice do I have?

BANG!
That was Garmin shooting themselves in the foot... it just took a long time for the sound to reach me.

At least it would give me the chance to try the MRA Android Apps.

[Peter Zehentreiter]

@Wallace-Shackleton If you're leaning toward getting a tablet, please do yourself a favor and think carefully about whether a Chinese tablet is the right choice.

I also spent a lot of money upfront on an alternative device.

In the end, I've now switched to a professional solution.

https://www.thorkracing.com/produto/dmd-norte-nav-tab-7/

I should have done that much sooner.....

[Marinus van Deudekom]

@Peter-Zehentreiter I fully agree. Yes dmd are expensive but the quality they deliver is huge

[Mzokk]

@Peter-Zehentreiter Thork racing/Dmd tablets are made in China. Garmin Zumo's are made in Taiwan

[John S Parry]

@Wallace-Shackleton said:

We (I) can not even tell Garmin that there is an issue with Drive so some connectivity can be reestablished with my XT, so ultimately there is no hope of a future for the Zumo devices.

There is a lot of truth in your overall post. With the emergence of smart phones, navigation apps, and now CP/AA, dedicated GPS devices like Garmin are a dying breed. People use their phones for everything, and it's a natural evolution to extend their use to routing/navigation. However, I don't think Garmin will abandon the dedicated GPS market. Niche or not, they own it, and it gives them an overall market exposure they find valuable.

It doesn't help that the Garmin Drive/Tread apps have issues. This isn't the first time Garmin broke Drive with an update. And Tread is not always friendly wirelessly transferring routes, due to the Explore architecture they're pushing on their ecosystem of products.

The only thing I'd argue here is that Drive/Tread issues are well known. Or should be known to anyone doing their research. You don't have to use either app at all to effectively use the XT/XT2/XT3 devices for core navigation. Wired route transfer is effective 100% of the time. It never falters. In the years I used my XT, I didn't use Drive after I understood the risks of encountering a bad app update. On my XT3, I only use the Tread app for Traffic, Phone, Music and Weather. However, on Tread, I did not enable external storage (Explore), which is the component that allows for app transfer. Explore is the source of 99% of problems on XT2/XT3 devices. So, by understanding Drive/Tread behavior and only using the components that are stable and always work, I've never had export/import or route calculation problems with my XT/XT3 devices.

If you insist on using apps for transferring your routes, then Garmin is not your long term solution. In my case the XT3 has navigation functionality that doesn't exist in any phone app, so I live with the inconvenience of wired transfer. But honestly. it's not that big of a deal.