RTI MMM2 satnav (MY8-11) not being updated
 

Hi, anyone noticed, or at all concerned, that the RTI MMM2 satnav maps (DVD discs) for the system installed in cars up to MY11 are no longer being updated?

Have tried contacting MapCare and Volvo, but no answers, and to no avail.

Seems rather arbitrary and unfair that they've rendered (near) redundant a feature that cost a lot of money just 4 years ago in my MY11 V70.

All the official Volvo accessories sites indicate that the last update (which I have) was from 2013:

"The map data are from model year 2014 (2013w20). No new updates are planned."

http://accessories.volvocars.com/en-...CC-473154/2011

Hi,

Can't say I have noticed. But then I have turned off the SatNav to keep the screen down. There are more up-to-date and free SatNav programs on smart phones these days and screen sizes are quite acceptable on them!
It almost makes the built-in system redundant...

Des. . . ;)

I quite agree Des, I don't have a built-in SatNav in my car but I do have "Map" on my iPhone which IMO is just as good as any of the other SatNavs devices/programmes available and the screen size is also reasonable. Of course it doesn't have vehicle speed restriction warnings etc but that is why you have a speedometer in your car. I did download an App with a head-up display but that was useless at night. I also have a Garmin SatNav and an old TomTom One but I find the iPhone the better option, it is always in my pocket, is as easy to set up as any other SatNav device and sits nicely on the ridge of the centre console.

Fair comments about satnav systems in general, although, having learned the RTI system quite thoroughly, I do believe it has particular benefits of its own. But horses for courses.

So perhaps I am indeed the only person who minds that they've stopped updating these maps then! Later models MY12-> are getting updates. I suppose, like yourselves, everyone else has just shrugged and put a TomTom/Garmin etc. on their dashboard instead. Hmm...

Hi,

It would be worth asking a dealer or if you are on the "MyVolvo" you could put the question there.
If RTI updates were part of the package then they should be honouring that agreement or providing a substitute.

This would require, I assume, an active car data connection. Would that be through the built-in Volvo system? Is there a fault in that?

Des. . . ;)

Hi, the MMM2 system isn't the same as the hard disk drive system or the newer sensus systems. The satnav reads from 1 of 4 DVD disks spinning in a player in the boot of the car. The only way to update it is to buy a new set of disks. The package is that with the system you were entitled to 2 free sets of update disks. The last set of these issued was for 2013:

http://www.navigation.com/is-bin/INT...mpTo=OfferList

I don't think a dealer could help, as all they'd do is check the availability of these as a "part", and find the same thing as myself, i.e. that no newer part exists. I suppose I could try my local authorised service centre on the offchance they know something, but this is a little complicated by the fact that I live abroad and the car was bought and registered here.

The simple fact is that after introducing the sensus system in 2012, Volvo issued one more set of MMM2 disks (for 2013, completing the 2 free updates for MY11 cars), then stopped issuing any more, effectively leaving the MMM2 system marooned, or, shall we say, stuck in the past.

However, it does seem I'm the only person bothered by this. So perhaps I shall just have to join in with the collective shrug, stick a new TomTom in my cigar lighter, and consider this a lesson in Volvo customer care :)

We're in the same position - we have an MY 11, one of the last MMM2 cars.

Although google nav etc are very good, I find it is much better using a system that's really properly designed for in-car use. The steering wheel controls and behaviours of the MMM2 system are much better suited to a situation where your attention can not be concentrated solely on the sat nav.

Ultimately I accept (as an electronic engineer) that this is the course of progress. The MMM2 system was already dated by MY09 and these things will never be supported forever. The only hope I'd have is that navteq/volvo decide to open the platform to third party developers and that someone produces a system based on OpenStreetMap data or similar.

+1 I absolutely agree, and must say I feel a little "conned" at how this expensive extra has been condemned to obsolescence, without warning, in a relatively new car. In addition to the ergonomic aspects you mention, I have a long list of stored locations which I can use to quickly pre-plan very precise routes, visiting clients in various cities. I am rather fond of the junction information that comes up as I approach a guidance point, and, as you say, the controls are at your fingertips if a change is needed en route. No battery limits, no cords and clutter. Someone might say that the graphics are a bit clunky and out-of-date, but frankly I find them "Zen" and undistracting.


Of course, things move on, but this as though, say, Microsoft were to have suddenly cut off support for XP after launching Vista in 2007. You don't do that to your customers, and so they kept the older system alive for another decade or so, despite continually coming to the market with newer products.

The bad news at the moment, I'm afraid, is that no-one wants to even discuss it, which implies to me that they hope it will just be forgotten, with, as noted above, a shrug and a sigh. I've already written to Volvo Mapcare, and they say it's Volvo's problem:

from eu-webstore-english(at)here.com

I then contacted Volvo UK with this information, also to no avail. After a brief exhange, the pleasant but firm Ms Rachel Rhodes of their customer services department finally admitted she had no answer and couldn't help me anyway as my car is not UK-registered:

from rachel.rhodes(at)volvocars.com

Of course, no-one has "reached out" to me after that :)

And so, in my experience, when a company doesn't even want to talk to you about selling a product to you...there isn't going to be any such product, in any shape or form. As they've left it 2 years already, and they still use the HERE map data in their newer sensus systems, I find it unlikely they will offer an opportunity for other vendors to take over. It looks very much like a 2013 lock-in for MMM2 system users.

Hi,

I know where you are coming from bolgia10 having been let down on smartphones by sony twice!
Can't trust the buggers!

But you'd thing that with such a major investment, on both sides, they would stick to their guns...
Obviously not.

My screen remains down until I can work out a way to show something useful on it!

Des. . . ;)

Hi you are not alone, I also have the mmm2 system in a2008 xc70. Previously I had a 2003 xc70 which has the p2001 mmm which predates the mmm2. Volvo stopped updating that map variant around the time the hard drive version came out. I managed to speak to someone in Sweden who confirmed that they did not intend to up date those maps anymore. I was a bit miffed at the time, time to change my car so I deliberately made sure that the car I chose was after the p2001 maps ie mmm2, only to find as you have that the 2014 update did not appear, however a 2014 update did appear for the p2001! Which Volvo had said was redundant. So at the moment I am giving them the benefit of the doubt and waiting to see if as part of a money saving effort they are waiting two years between updates and will update mmm2 with the 2015 updates. That appears to be what they did with the DVDs of the p2001 system. As you said getting any answer, let alone a truthful one, out of Volvo appears to be less than blood out of a stone