Home > Consumer Reviews > TomTom Rider v2 Satellite Navigation System - Great Britain

After a while of checking out the different GPS I bought this product for touring on my bike,and recently used it while in the Lake District.It dose what it says on the box,a good piece of kit-very reliable.
Things they should fix for the next version of Rider are.. The On/Off Button..A verbal warning telling you the battery is getting low.. And some sort of light on the GPS or charger showing the system is on charge or is fully charged. If your doing a lot of touring i would advise using the cable provided to connect it to your bike battery.

I was disapointed with the TomTom Rider V2. Yes it navigates well and the scala rider earpiece works well, i like being able to receive mobile calls.

I have used a TomTom one V3 in a car. The tomtom one is half the price and much quicker at picking up satellites and calculating routes.I was very impressed with the "Safety" camera alerts on the One. This was the main reason I bought the rider.

I was dismayed to discover that I can't change the proximity (for safety cameras) alerts on the rider. Neither can I change or select the audible warnings. I prefer different sounds for traffic light cameras and speed cameras.
The unit itself seems excessively bulky, this isn't a problem on the bike but when you park and put the unit in a jacket pocket it can be.
The on/off switch is a nightmare, there is no positive click and it can take some time to operate.
The rider feels like old technology compared to the one, it is sometimes a bit slow with its directions in central London.

I know the scala rider and Ram kit inflate the cost and the alternatives for a bike are more expensive but it seems pricey compared to the car versions.
Value for money? does what it says, would be great if tomtom could sort out proximity alerts

This is an excellent product, and makes my life a lot easier. I have been up and down the country with the help of my TomTom. The earpiece can be heard loud and clear, even at moderate speed and with earplugs in (of course, most of the time, instructions are being read when you're slow or slowing).

I keep my TomTom with me even when I know the general direction where I'm headed, because it gives an excellent overview of the road ahead, which helps in planning overtaking; of course, knowing where speed cameras are lurking is nice too.

My only complaint is that the maps are occasionally out a bit, if the roads have changed recently. This can be annoying if not dangerous. Normally, common sense steps in and you can navigate around the problem, following which the TomTom will re-calculate the route for you; but there are times when you're simply "stuck". Roadworks and new roundabouts are my favourites.

The Rider has various options for routes: walking mode (took me a while to discover this, but it is very much appreciated), avoid motorways, and "shortest route" (as opposed to "fastest") -- the latter is particularly good for finding nice little backroads.

This arrived today and after thinking spending almost £300 for a satnav was a hell of a lot, but i think its worth it. It links to my LG U990 (viewty) well allowing me to send and receive calls etc. When i was out testing it and trying to make it confused it always recalculated routes within seconds and has a sexy voice ;) The only thing i'm not to keen on is that the mounting kit. It makes my bike look a bit dodgy but fortunatly with the ram kit you can take most of it off with little fuss.


I found it difficult to get used to and set up at first. (especially as it wouldn't find signal when i was trying to do it indoors) but once it finally found signal it picks it up within seconds now.

I would recomend to anyone who is after one for their bike.

Tip Notch product. Just dont come off when your phone rings.

Hi all,
my six pennyworth...
I love the tomtom itself. It is a well built pleasant gadget to use. Fairly intuitive, and full of things I never thought I would need. However, there are some issues:
Customer service at Tomtom sucks. They make it deliberately difficult to use the poxy website so that you don't hassle them, instead wanting you to rely on their "FAQ's", have those things ever been any use to anyone? Not me. When you do finally find a phone number, the auto answer woman on the other end tells you (without fail no matter what time of day) that they are far to busy to speak to you.
I did eventually (by putting the phone on loudspeaker and listening to crappy music for 47 minutes) get to speak to a very pleasant young lady, but it was quite apparent that she was just reading the answers off the FAQ page which I could have done!
Turns out that my Samsung U900 (supposedly state of the art) phone will not support the wireless data transmission required for the traffic and speed camera updates supplied by tom tom. Therefore I now have a tomtom with reduced functionality. How annoying is that!
Short of replacing a three month old phone, I am stuck...
The on off button is utterly useless. I have to carry a pen top around with me, because that is the only way to apply enough pressure over a large enough area to operate it. They also don't make it clear that you cannot turn the thing off when it is plugged in. Pressing the button then, just causes a sore finger. Why oh why doesn't the thing take power from the mini USB socket? Everything else with a mini USB socket does, my blackberry, my treo WM device. Surely it would save them the cost and valuable space of the jack socket they have fitted!

Don't download the Sylvia voice from the website. She sounds great on your pc speaker, but she might as well have her head in a bucket 50 feet away through your helmet speakers. I use Tim. He is very clear.

The kit that comes with the device is excellent. I had to buy a different RAM mount as my FJR 1300 has odd handlebars that the kit doesn't cover, but it all went together beautifully. No need for instructions if you have any mechanical ability whatsoever. Ditto for the battery wiring lead. I would however have liked some ring terminals fitted, and also the connection to the plug that goes into the mount isn't finished very well. I had to put some silicon around the base to keep water out, and protect the small gauge wiring from stress.

Hope this helps.

Nick