Time to arrive question

You cannot modify the TOA. It basically calculates the time using ideal driving conditions and then recalculates TOA as you encounter "unplanned" delays - lights, traffic which is slower than speed limit, accidents etc.

Assuming the 2300 knew how many traffic lights are between here and there (that it doesn’t know) how would it determine which ones will be red and which green?

@sonealtx, welcome to the site.

Many of us would advise that you should not expect too much from your device.

Just wondering - how far off has the unit been? Is it high or low in its estimates?

My experience is, if the trip involves mostly freeway on a low traffic day, than the ETA is generally within 15 minutes. Otherwise, you can get the better ETA just by guessing it yourself.

I find that long trip estimates are subject to change. The more times I stop to eat the worse the estimate is.

You mean the PND doesn't allow for you to eat? it should take into consideration and have programmed in its calculation how many red lights, meal stops, bathroom breaks you will have per miles traveled otherwise what good is it to have one.

I find that the Navigon gps app on my iPhone is significantly more accurate than my Nuvi 3490. In fact, the Navigon app is scarily accurate in terms of updating TOA as conditions change (speed, detours, etc.). The Nuvi is not.

Don't have a fancy $50 a month phone, just my free 765 Nuvi, you know what, surprize, it dose everything I need for free. If I need to tell someone arrival time, I tell them what my Nuvi says and about what traffic looks like so far. Its always been enough for me, life is too short to see problems that don't exsist!

I have found my 2460 (Veronica) to be pretty good at estimates. When we make extra stops she adds to the time when we restart. If I push the speed a bit and traffic is light she drops a little off the time. I use it a lot when I decide to go a different way, to see how much time she thought she was going to save me, going some non obvious route. It usually only was saving me a minute or two but the fun ones are when my way actually shows up as being faster than her estimate.

Jim...

By the preponderance of the evidence associated with the prevailing conditions, i.e. wind factor, direction wind is blowing, the result of the mood of the red light to give way to the green and the allowance of the yellow not to be jealous that the green light is given president over it????????????
If only we had more important things to be concerned about!!!!!!!

Yep, and the president sets precedence...

My experience with the Nuvi 350 & 1350 is that it provides surprisingly good estimates of time of arrival. I'm sure that the algorithms used are quite simple & are based upon not only estimates of the speed allowed on roads but whether you are not keeping up with those speeds (light, traffic jams, etc). I find the info useful & surprisingly good. Obviously, the estimates get better the further along you are on your trip - quite impressive for a VERY simple device.

Fred

Like the OP I found that my previous Nuvis (350, 660, and 765) we all too optimistic. I am currently with the 3790 and it's a lot more accurate. However, I fins Google navigation on my smartphone to have the most accurate ETA.

As the trip goes on the GPS will update the time.
Every time the unit resets itself it takes new readings.

I will manually toggle "Show Traffic Map" / "Show Normal Map" every once in a while. I do this in the hope that when traffic maps are toggled back on, that will cause the unit to update traffic and ETA. I don't know if it really does anything, but I do it anyway.

I find that my 660 is real close to the ETA. I watch it change as we stop take a detour or drive a little faster.

I use the Time of Arrival as an estimate, and do not depend on it for accuracy. As pointed out earlier, it is based on "ideal" driving conditions - and I have NEVER encountered such conditions As for red lights and traffic (and munchies), the GPS just adds the time stopped to the ETA. I have noticed that when I am driving on a highway and going slower than regular highway speeds (winter driving conditions), the Time of Arrival slowly increases.

If I need to be somewhare at a specific time, I just leave earlier! And hope for "decent" driving conditions.

My 250w I would have to say is very accurate as it constantly adjusts the arrival depending on on speed and stop times the same way rally drivers do for there set stages,eg. later arrival = faster speed, earlier arrival = slower speeds.

Thanks,
It is usually accurate with highway driving... but in city driving I've seen it off as much as 10 minutes.

That is where most traffic lights are located.

I think the time to arrive assumes you will always be traveling at the speed limit and that every traffic light will be green when you reach it.

You just have to add additional time to the garmin estimate based on the lights and traffic.