I can't tell you whether it's a setting hidden somewhere to enable it or what but on numerous occasions the TomTom has informed me that the trip will take X min longer and asked if I wanted to take a different route. I presume it's the RDS-TMC receiver doing its job.

Wow, that's not bad - I just need to buy that cable to get the RDS-TMC to work. ^

I have to say that we not always had luck with the TMC recommendations. Often times when we exited the highway to drive around the traffic jam, the recommended route turned out to be also congested and when we got back on, we saw some trucks we had passed a long time ago. We usually now just stay on the highway.

I recommend looking at the ADAC traffic predictions for a holiday weekend and also like the suggestion to use Google maps to get an idea for the general traffic situation.

I normally ignore what it's telling me anyway because if I wanted to take the back roads, I would have indicated so when I planned my trip.

I paid 30 Euros for the pleasure. Money very well spent.
My car has built in RDS-TMC (Lexus RX) and I speak some German (having been born in Hannover), however, we've had such bad experiences on German roads that we were glad for alternative...especially while travelling with a 9 month old.

A couple of years ago, the traffic was so bad on the A8 near Augsburg that we ended up in a camp at the side of the road. By camp, I mean people were pitching tents! The problem was due to a truck fire in a roadworks section which essentially closed off the whole road.

I'm very used to the Eastern European traffic. I encounter a large amount of it on my daily commute up the M20>M26>M25>M40. The only accidents that my wife and I have ever had have been with Eastern European Trucks on British roads.

I think our Tomtom Start 20 has it and sometimes it reports that it will be a couple of minutes delay - but not the huge delay I encounter on A1.

Thanks for the ADAC tip! I saw it and it looks pathetic.

Found AB flight down to DUS from CPH - return for EUR 100. So we are really flying this time :) Not just flying on the motorway.

I suspect that the motorway queue is weather dependent. During thw whole time in our driving trip during Easter, there was no queue. I was able to get from HD all the way to Denmark in 7 hours. Fortunately we didn't go that far due to the serious road work on A5.

Stau happens because of dense traffic, because of accidents, because of construction sites, and sometimes "just because" without any apparent reasons. But it can happen almost any time. When planning your travels, it is wise to add an hour to any estimated travel time (viamichelin etc.) on the Autobahn.

There are two TomTom products.
One is the free TMC receiver. Not very reliable, and not exclusive to TomTom either.
The other one is called "Live-Services. It uses date from mobile phone signals and other TomTom users, and can tell you pretty much exactly where traffic jams are, even if they are not broadcast on TMC. It also costs EUR 49 per year.

You can try the live traffic updates with the free Tomtom internet based route planner on their website. Try a routing going from Hamburg to Bonn, or from EC2Y 8HR (Barbican Center) to TW6 1QG (Heathrow Terminal 3), or from Beauvais to Marche de Rungis (ie from north to south of Paris) at various times of the day. The routing changes with traffic conditions, sometimes several times within minutes.

Just back from Germany - driving mostly Frankfurt / Heidelberg / karlsruhe.

Two things: there were floods all over the area closing down the A5 and A6 exits and entrances. And the cute BMW 1 Series I was driving had a GPS that seemed to be omniscient. It showed every upcoming traffic delay from flooding to construction to car breakdown. Nothing in the states has done as good a job.