Behavior with both Smartphone Link and HD Traffic

 

I have a unit with the HD traffic feature. If I also purchase the Live Traffic subscription, how does the unit deal with the two sources? Does it combine them? Does it give priority to one over the other? Do I have to turn one off and select the other?
From reading posts on the subject, it sounds like there is advantages to having both.
Thanks!
Jeff

If you purchase Live Traffic

If you purchase Live Traffic and connect your phone to your GPS via bluetooth, Live Traffic will be the ONLY source of traffic updates and it will switch to it automatically ... and that worked way much better for me than HD traffic

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NuviCam & 3597

Depends on Your GPS Unit

I’m not sure which GPSr you use but on my Garmin 3597, under settings> Traffic> Current Provider, an AUTO setting appears when data from both the HD Traffic receiver cable and Live Traffic via Smartphone Link are available. When selected, the 3597 will switch to the best source. You can also switch sources manually if you wish. Other GPSr's may function differently though.

99% of the time in the areas I travel, Smartphone Link provides the best information. I have only seen the 3597 switch to HD Traffic once when I lost cellular service but HD Traffic was available.

Good to know that 3597

Good to know that 3597 switches traffic providers automatically. As per my understanding, it was not possible. You have to manually switch between HD traffic and Smartphone Link.

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Iphone XR, Drivesmart 61,Nuvicam, Nuvi3597

You weren't alone

rookie8155 wrote:

Good to know that 3597 switches traffic providers automatically. As per my understanding, it was not possible. You have to manually switch between HD traffic and Smartphone Link.

You're not alone. I also had understood it not to be possible with my 3597.

I now can understand the challenge in learning about the auto switching. To my knowledge, there's no discussion of this auto-switching in the owners manual or other information, online or otherwise, or the ability to force either HD or Smartlink when both are present.

I did a test with my nuvi. I live in an area without HD Traffic being offered. (In fact, in all of Arizona, only the areas in Greater Phoenix and Tucson offer HD traffic.) The Current Provider (where the Auto option is offered per the earlier post—thanks, bdhsfz6) as well as the Subscriptions, are apparently only accessible when both the nuvi is connected to the GTM receiver and receiving traffic data and the Smartphone link is providing Traffic coverage. Since I live in an area without HD coverage, I cannot tap Current Provider or Subscriptions, and my Current Provider is listed as Smartphone Link, even when the link isn't active. I will have to repeat this test when I'm in Phoenix with HD Traffic to see that I'm set for auto-switching. Hopefully the default setting is for auto-switching.

A rare Occurence

CraigW wrote:
rookie8155 wrote:

Good to know that 3597 switches traffic providers automatically. As per my understanding, it was not possible. You have to manually switch between HD traffic and Smartphone Link.

You're not alone. I also had understood it not to be possible with my 3597.

I now can understand the challenge in learning about the auto switching. To my knowledge, there's no discussion of this auto-switching in the owners manual or other information, online or otherwise, or the ability to force either HD or Smartlink when both are present.

I did a test with my nuvi. I live in an area without HD Traffic being offered. (In fact, in all of Arizona, only the areas in Greater Phoenix and Tucson offer HD traffic.) The Current Provider (where the Auto option is offered per the earlier post—thanks, bdhsfz6) as well as the Subscriptions, are apparently only accessible when both the nuvi is connected to the GTM receiver and receiving traffic data and the Smartphone link is providing Traffic coverage. Since I live in an area without HD coverage, I cannot tap Current Provider or Subscriptions, and my Current Provider is listed as Smartphone Link, even when the link isn't active. I will have to repeat this test when I'm in Phoenix with HD Traffic to see that I'm set for auto-switching. Hopefully the default setting is for auto-switching.

I discovered this quite by accident. I don’t know if “Auto” is the default setting or not since it only appears when both Live Traffic and HD traffic are available at the same time. Like CraigW, HD Traffic is practically nonexistent where I live so it is difficult to test. Most of the time, Smartphone Link is listed as the current provider and is not changeable.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, the “auto” function has only appeared once in the 2 years I’ve been using the 3597. It suspect it’s a rare occasion when Live Traffic isn’t available (no cellular service) but HD traffic signals are present.

The only mention I can find for the “Auto” traffic function is on the 3597 under Settings> Traffic>. If you touch the question mark in the upper right above the traffic enabled check box, a brief but not very helpful explanation is offered.

..

Guys, thanks for the heads up.

I have both HD and Samart phonelink traffic. I was never sure which traffic I have been getting.

I have steady HD traffic reception here in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Just did a test on my 3597 (firmware 5.10, map 2016.1) here is what I found:

1. Auto is indeed the default traffic selection mode.

2. Smartphone link traffic has priority. when both the Smart link and HD signals are present. The current provider selection tab is grayed out thus you cannot change the provider manually.

3. The Auto/manual selection is available only when the Smart link is not present. You can then let the 3597 select the traffic provider or manually set it among Here HD/RDS and other traffic providers that you also have.

4. If the Smart phone link is disconnected while it is on, it takes ~5 minutes for the 3597 to switch over to the HD.

5. On the other hand, if the Smart phone link is turned on while the HD link is established, the 3597 switched over to the Smart phone link instantaneously and the provider selection is grayed out.

Thanks

Thanks. Now that's a definitive answer. exclaim

Pillowcase wrote:

2. Smartphone link traffic has priority. when both the Smart link and HD signals are present. The current provider selection tab is grayed out thus you cannot change the provider manually.

3. The Auto/manual selection is available only when the Smart link is not present. You can then let the 3597 select the traffic provider or manually set it among Here HD/RDS and other traffic providers that you also have.

Just curious, given #2 and 3: If you want HD traffic only but still want the Smartphone link for other features, can you fire up the nuvi without the Smartphone Link on, Select HD as traffic provider (switching from auto), then fire up the Smartphone Link, and as a result, keep the HD traffic?

I'm not sure why you'd want this unless there are times when HD Traffic offers more than Smartphone Link Traffic. Or am I reading this wrong and the Smartphone Link Traffic will always take priority when it's available?

Being in an area with constant HD traffic, do you find Smartphone Link traffic to be better than the HD?

Thanks again for your experimenting.

Experiment #2

CraigW wrote:

Just curious, given #2 and 3: If you want HD traffic only but still want the Smartphone link for other features, can you fire up the nuvi without the Smartphone Link on, Select HD as traffic provider (switching from auto), then fire up the Smartphone Link, and as a result, keep the HD traffic?

I'm not sure why you'd want this unless there are times when HD Traffic offers more than Smartphone Link Traffic. Or am I reading this wrong and the Smartphone Link Traffic will always take priority when it's available?

That's an intriguing thought. Just went out to the car and did the experiment as you suggested. The Smartlink traffic takes over once I fired it up, even though I manually selected HD beforehand. Looks like the only way to keep both other features of Smartlink and HD is not to subscribe the Smartlink traffic. sad

CraigW wrote:

Being in an area with constant HD traffic, do you find Smartphone Link traffic to be better than the HD?

My subjective impression is that they are about equal as far as traffic conditions are concerned. But I have not done any systematic experiments, just based on casual observations with and without my phone turned on. Traffic information, especially on the freeway, has been spot-right-on excellent. Local traffic is hit and miss. The coverage area of Smartphone link traffic dose appear to be much bigger based on my small samples of observation when I venture out of the SF Bay area.

Smartphone traffic more up to date

I used HD traffic for a long time then broke down and ordered the Smartphone Link traffic service. Smartphone is hands down better. It is putting Google traffic trouble spots overlaid on your Garmin map so it is very up to date.

I just spent two weeks using it in LA. The upside is that is showed practically every slow area in real time. On my last trip there with HD Traffic I was usually in the trouble spot before it showed up. The downside in a place like LA is that route calculation was incredibly slower than in Philadelphia where I usually use it. I think it is because there are so many trouble spots at any given time it took much more time to calculate the fastest route. Generally, it worked pretty well and I got all around the city without issues.

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Brent - DriveLuxe 51 LMT-S

In the Baltomore-DC area

Essentially subscription has much better signal coverage than HD Traffic. Unless you have an in-dash unit, the signal coverage (for portables) is denoted as dark green in the coverage maps. In the Balto-Wash area portable HD coverage is essentially only within the two beltways (http://www.navteq.com/hdtraffic/). Virtually no coverage along I95 between Baltimore and Washington, which gets backed up fairly frequently! Live Traffic gives me complete coverage, everywhere. Live Traffic connects within seconds, as long as there is cell coverage.
Live Traffic appears to have traffic coverage on more local roads than HD Traffic.
Live Traffic is significantly better than HD traffic.
Mark

that is consistent with my nuvi 2598

I find in the SF Bay Area that smartphone link has much more comprehensive traffic than HD Traffic although I almost always have both available.

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Nuvi 3597 LMT

Data Consumption

Was wondering if the smartphone link uses a lot of data while acquiring traffic? I've got a decent data plan, but was just wondering how much the app uses on regular commutes.

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-Mark Nuvi 3597, Nuvi 755T, GPSMAP 60CSx, Street Pilot C580

not much

SDF33 wrote:

Was wondering if the smartphone link uses a lot of data while acquiring traffic? I've got a decent data plan, but was just wondering how much the app uses on regular commutes.

On an all day drive covering several hundred miles you will use just a few hundred kilobytes. I would take a couple days to get to even a full MB.

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Illiterate? Write for free help.

Very Little

Box Car wrote:
SDF33 wrote:

Was wondering if the smartphone link uses a lot of data while acquiring traffic? I've got a decent data plan, but was just wondering how much the app uses on regular commutes.

On an all day drive covering several hundred miles you will use just a few hundred kilobytes. I would take a couple days to get to even a full MB.

Like Box Car reported, on a 16 hour trip down I-81 and back, I use less than 1MB.

Data usage

There's a bit of discussion and link to additional info from others on data usage here:

http://www.poi-factory.com/node/45017

Closest Thing I've Found: Online Reference Re: Auto-Switching

. . .Might be this footnote:

1 - The Live Traffic service will override the FM or HD Traffic if both services are available.

located on this Garmin Support FAQ page:
https://support.garmin.com/support/searchSupport/case.faces?caseId={2f9d2360-38bc-11e1-613e-000000000000}