Which is better FM Traffic or MSN?

As long as you drive near big cities, the FM receiver might be a big help detouring you around traffic delays. It worked for me when I went to Washington DC. I avoided a 20 minute delay, and was routed around the beltway to get to my final destination.

If you don't renew, you're wasting one of the features of the unit you bought.

Just me 2 cents worth.

I've tried both and the traffic feature seemed to be equal for both services as far as I could tell. The additional features of the MSN service make it much more valuable then just the FM traffic receiver.

To me one of the coolest MSN features is the ability to send POIs to your GPS wirelessly from maps.live.com. I think it's also a bit cheaper as well.

I have a 760 and prefer MSN. I get traffic and other information. I guess I feel I get more for my money.

I travel the USA heavily and can only comment on the FM traffic, it is a great deal for metro areas. If you travel metro areas everyone should have onefo the systems.

I switched to msn-direct last month. Has attractive menus of various info. I find things kinda slow though with the updating(I DO leave it plugged in). I have seen flash flood icons on the main screen and when pressed lots of map info, yet I have NEVER heard any traffic text or audio at the main gps screen. I also rememeber "not" seeing any traffic icons on the main screen( only the traffic screen has the info)plus have never been automatically re-routed because of traffic. I have even chosen a route that is showed "slow" traffic, yet told me my chosen route was traffic free! The unit that came with the nuvi 760, TMC, at least did speak and show things on occasion. Anyone else? :)BTW I do have traffic checked under "avoidances" on the nuvi's menu.

Hi, I'm newbie. My Nuvi 760 come with GTM20 receiver, may I use for subscribe to MSN traffic.

Thanks

I have the FM, enjoy seeing locations of traffic, but most of the time the events are over by the time I get there.

No. The GTM20 supports only TMC. There's a different receiver for MSN Direct (GDB50).

I am still on the MSN three month trial on a Nuvi 780. Last week, on the main map screen I got traffic alerts about a road closure and a flash flood alert. The road closure was a bit overstated - it was a construction zone with temporary lane by-passes but the road wasn't really closed. Still, I do see the value and I do appreciate the gas prices (which I find very accurate even tho some stations don't play). I've even used the movie times feature once. I'll pay when the time comes.

Glenn

I live in Westchester and drive into NYC quite often. So far the FM traffic on my Garmin C550 has done a great job predicting traffic and directing me around it. Approaching the BQE on Queens Blvd. it correctly warned of heavy traffic just ahead on the BQE. After going over the Triborough bridge all lanes were blocked but it correctly advised taking the Bruckner rather than the Deegan. It also steered me around traffic on the Bronx River Pkwy.
At times, a traffic alert had been posted but the actual road traffic was light. The system is a bit slow to update at times. Overall, I like it and will subscribe.

I have enjoyed my MSN.

I got a Nuvi 760 which included FM Traffic and it's pretty cool. I live in the outskirts of Chicago, so it's in one of the areas with good coverage. But I wish there was a way to try both MSN and FM before you decide to subscribe.

Asking whether FM traffic or MSN Direct is better is like asking whether soda pop or Coke is better. One's a subset of the other.

People seem to want to incorrectly call the Total Traffic Network (TTN) "FM traffic."

Both TTN and MSN use subcarriers on FM broadcast stations to deliver information. TTN uses the standardized RDS-TMC service ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Data_System ), MSN uses a proprietary Microsoft Directband ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DirectBand ).

Both can correctly be called "FM traffic."

I always like learning the underlying technology behind something, so your answer tells me that the reception distance from downtown to the far suburbs where I live should be comparable.

I see screens and hear talk of the goodies with MSN, especially the "send to GPS" option and think that is really cool. But I wouldn't want to give up traffic reporting accuracy to get the cool stuff. So my question still stands if they both give you pretty much the same reliable and sometimes not so reliable notice of traffic ahead?

On fathers day I was going home and got three alerts for slow traffic ahead, none of which appeared, the traffic was moving normally if not faster.....Then without any warning traffic slowed to a crawl and according to the ttc everything was clear...It was the first time I received warnings, or didn’t as the case may be, now I'm not sure I'll pay much attention to it, let alone renew the subscription when it expires..... This was on the I5, the 405, and the 101, in Los Angeles….

Do both ClearChannel "FM" Traffic and MSN Direct get their traffic information from the same source? For example, do they all base traffic incidents off of DOT-supplied information?

If so, that would lead me to believe the only advantage to MSN are the extra features. The reliability for traffic information would be the same.

It depends on the place... For instance, in Oregon, the DOT has an extensive network of speed sensors and cameras that it makes widely available (see http://www.tripcheck.com/). So here, most commercial traffic services are using the same DOT info. In other places where they have to use private infrastructure to measure traffic, they could have independent sources.

That being said, delivery of the info is another matter. Either provider could have various issues in transmitting warnings in sufficient time to be useful; sometimes MSN Direct shows me a wreck that's being mentioned on the radio traffic report at the same time, but other times it shows slowdowns that aren't there. At the same time, TMC receivers implicitly trust the data they receive, while MSN Direct receivers use cryptography to verify the data (interesting article here: http://securitywatch.eweek.com/phishing_and_fraud/impress_ch...).

When it comes down to it, you really just need to be able to try them side by side in the same metro area, with a variety of traffic conditions, which of course is not that easy.

I bought the 760 w/ the FM receiver two months ago for the sole purpose of helping me avoid traffic in Houston. My route takes me through the two most congested highways out here - 290 and 610. I get delay icons and dense traffic warnings almost everyday. I know it's working but I'm not 100% confident it's considering other routes.

Trick (I guess) to using it:
I let it pick the route without avoiding highways and check the time to destination. Then I tell it to avoid highways and see what the time is. Then I pick the shortest time and take that route.

I don't understand why it wouldn't automatically do that for me (it obviously doesn't when I find a route 30 mins faster using my trick) but I don't know what I would do without it now that I have it. I've found all kinds of back ways I never knew about.

Once Garmin figures this "problem" out, I hope I can get an update without having to buy a newer model.

But I still recommend the unit.

I have been using my MSN feature on my 680 for over a year. I couldn't do without it anymore. Traveling through Phoenix or Los Angeles, it has routed me around major traffic jams. It even know which freeway to pick coming home. What I mean by that is there are 3 or 4 different ways to get home via different freeways. Depending on how slow the traffic is, it will pick a different freeway to take me home. I love it. I like the other features as well, like gas prices, etc.

It's a mater of choice, I sure wouldn't buy a new gps just for MSN. FM TTS works and you have the receiver.
Plain and simple. wait till you are forced to get a new GPS.

Bob

The 760 is compatible with both the TTS and MSN receivers. Why wouldn't it be feasible to sell the TTS receiver on eBay and then just buy an MSN receiver to replace it?

As I understand it, the 760 comes with the TTN receiver cable and the MSN cable has to be purchased. I aggre that they should include both and allow you to try both. The MSN direct cable must be purchased as an accessory part.

I'm thinking of purchasing the MSN Direct cable/receiver to try it out and then eBaying the TMC cable/receiver or whichever one I decide not to keep.

I just used mine last weekend for my trip from RI to PA through NYC and George Washington Bridge.

Since I fonly owned the unit for only a few days before the trip, we decided to ignore the traffic warnings, but kept monitoring them to establish accurace (since we did hit traffic)

Our personal experience is that the traffic delay forecast on the Garmin was highly inaccurate. The forcasted delay kept changing by the minute with a big variation and here we are stuck in traffic for 20 minutes and the road is showing green on the traffic map.

If you picked "Avoid" we couldn't find a way to revert back to the original course if you didn't like the alternative. I experimented with it back in RI and the routes it plans to take you around traffic are atrocious.

The moral, if you need to drive around traffic, listen to a a good AM news station with frequent traffic updates and rely on your Garmin for navigation.

Anyone else with similar stories?

I have the 760 and sold the traffic receiver that came with it (with the 3 month trial) and bought the MSN one. I liked the additional features, primarily gas prices, that the TMC didn't come with. Being compatible with both in one receiver sure would be a novel idea, letting the customer pick the one that works best for them without having to replace parts!

i bought the Nuvi 760 with TMC and all i was getting is the traffic info.
after my 3 month was over i bought the MSN cable and now receive the same traffic info. PLUS all the other extras that they offer see here.
http://www.msndirect.com/NavigationDataAvailability.aspx

i like it so much that i just purchased a Nuvi 680 that comes with the MSN service for one year

Have you used the Send to GPS function? How long does it take from clicking Send on your computer until it shows up on the GPS?

i have a garmin 760 and i bought the msn reciever i love it it has all the gas prices weather and the traffic is better than the traffic reciever just so everybody knows if you buy the msn reciever you have free service for one year but if you buy the garmin 780 that comes with msn you get service for 3 months so the better buy is the garmin 760 and the msn reciever

I dont think they update as often as they should out here. Even though the 405 and 101 interchange is always packed so they could just leave that as a constant warning. I also used it on fathers day and it was having problems all day.