I'd like to know if the speed of navigation is faster with the HDD units(such as Z2) or the DVD based units(such as D3)? Also, do both units have the same amount of Points of Interest? Are updates easily obtainable for both style navi units? What if I replace the HDD in the Z2 with a 5400RPM drive? Will it now be as fast/faster than a DVD based unit?

I'd like to know if the speed of navigation is faster with the HDD units(such as Z2) or the DVD based units(such as D3)? Also, do both units have the same amount of Points of Interest? Are updates easily obtainable for both style navi units? What if I replace the HDD in the Z2 with a 5400RPM drive? Will it now be as fast/faster than a DVD based unit?

Aww, when you posted thisin the Welcome forum, you said money is no object for you. What happened in the 73 minutes it took you to repost this?

Anyway, HDD units are much faster at routing and rerouting in my experience.

Yes, updates are easily, legally obtainable for both units. If you want to pirate, DVD systems are easier and doesn't require shelling out $$ for unlocking your HDD.

Points of interest: Z2 (HDD), D3 (DVD), and N4 (DVD) all have 12million POI's.

Replacing the Z2's Automotive-grade HDD with a standard 5400 RPM drive will make it marginally faster, but may make it less stable depending on how well it handles road vibration, heat, or power draw. There's an entire thread dedicated to HDD research in the hacks/mods sub-forum.

Good luck on your decision!

Aww, when you posted thisin the Welcome forum, you said money is no object for you. What happened in the 73 minutes it took you to repost this?

But money is still not an issue. If the HDD units are faster, have the same # of POIs AND give me 10G on onboard music storage....it's a no brainer. Thank you for your help. You seemed to have hit on everything i needed to know.

can't hurt to get a second opinion.

Anyone?

HDD definitely route faster, POI are the same. Updates are available for both.

The only thing I don't like about the Pioneer HDD decks is that the ETA to your destination is always funky, where as it works perfectly on the DVD based systems. Probably just a programming glitch

HDD units are quite a bit faster then the DVD nav units and that's just with the standard 4200 rpm drives, also with DVD based nav units you can't use the DVD slot while navigating(except a few models that I think have 2 slots for this reason...) Plus as stated you can upgrade the hdd in the Z2 to another Toshiba brand (other brands do not seem to work well and reset constantly, have a look at the HDD thread in the mods section for more info.) So along with the 5400 speed increase you can also increase the music partition to 20GB which will now fit the whole 400 Artists or Albums limit and double your music space (anything larger is a waste due to this imposed limit). And if money is no issue do yourself a favour and go for the gold.

Hope this helps.

Cheers