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Updated November 20th, 2009 Garmin have just released the fourth quarterly map update under the nuMaps Lifetime program and it's called "CityNavigator NT 2010.30". These new maps are only available for North America for the time being and could either be based on the Navteq Q2/2009 or the Q3/2009 release.
Updated October 21st, 2009 - Good things come to those who wait...so at this point European nuMaps Lifetime subscribers or recent buyers entitled to the nuMaps Guarantee will likely just be happy to download the City Navigator NT 2010.20 maps, albeit three months after the North American users...
Updated November 18th, 2009 Well GPS on the iPhone is clearly in the news these days, so let's go with it! TomTom have just made a new update for TomTom for iPhone available for free via iTunes. The v1.2 version adds several new features : TTS (Text to Speech to pronounce actual street names) , ALG (static 3D view of roadsigns for complex intersections), iPod Touch compatibility (useful when the iPod kit becomes available...) and new maps, the v835 (TeleAtlas 2009.06) like on the AIOs.
Unfortunately there is still no traffic information option, or any other TomTom LIVE service, which is odd considering how "connected" the iPhone is, or an option to add your own POIs. More screenshots and comments in the TomTom for iPhone - Testing - v1.2 topic of the www.smartphoneGPS.com forums to discuss.
Updated October 16th, 2009 - Thanks to the FCC there wasn't much left to the imagination when the TomTom Car Kit became available on the Apple Store for pre-order at the end of September...except that for a few hours they did sell it with the Tom Tom Application but my order was amended. It came in today as expected and I've been putting it through its paces. Let me first say that I hadn't seen such a comprehensive car holder since the end of...
Posted November 16th, 2009 Well it seems we're not quite done with iPhone news after all and it is now Magellan's turn to announce the availability of an iPhone GPS application : Magellan Roadmate 2010, for North America only at this time. They have also pre-announced a Car Kit with GPS like TomTom's but that adds compatibility with the iPod Touch.
Things are certainly picking up for Magellan since they were bought by MiTac last year with successful new PNDs (the Maestro 4700 or the Roadmate 1470) and now an iPhone application and a Car kit with GPS. Back to the glorious Palm days when they had a similar combo ! Unfortunately, like the GPS apps launched earlier, the iPhone app fails to leverage the iPhone's connectivity and there is a disclaimer not to use the 2D mode on the 3G...You can use the Magellan Roadmate for iPhone + Car Kit topic of the www.smartphoneGPS.com forums to discuss.
Updated November 2nd, 2007 - After a long wait map upgrades are now available for most of the Magellan Roadmate line-up, i.e. the 800, 860, 3000, 3050T and 6000T, or should we say "almost" since the Software Upgrade Version 2 pages have been temporarily taken off-line, apparently because of Vista misbehaving...
Rounding up an "iPhone News Week", here is NDrive, another "turn by turn" navigation system for the Apple iPhone but with a "twist"...
The newly launched NDrive USA version is similar to the other apps out there in the sense that is uses Navteq road maps (in Europe NDrive use TeleAtlas maps). More unexpected is the London version with its "oblique" views (provided by Norwegian company Blom), first seen on the Microsoft Live website a few years ago. Unlike satellite pictures they can be used for road guidance on the fly. They are planning to roll out more towns in the future.
In the meantime you can use the NDrive for iPhone: First looks to read kyteflyer's opinion of the software after some testing in Autralia. We're also planning some testing of the USA and European versions so stay tuned for more.
Updated November 11th, 2009 Ever since the first on-board "turn by turn" navigation software became available for the iPhone, we've been perplexed over their lack of "connected" features - the iPhone being "THE" connected device - and mostly traffic data.
Well this is now fixed since Navigon, who were also the first out of the gate with a GPS app in June, are now offering traffic data as an option. It's reasonable priced at $25 for life and even $20 for the next four weeks. It's also impressive on paper with the usual TMC "incidents" being complemented by FCD (Floating Car Data). Unfortunately the first test runs in Europe are disappointing with toll gate slowdowns being converted into traffic jams...You can use the Navigon for iPhone - Testing - v1.3 of the iPhone forums to discuss.
Updated October 7th, 2009 - "MotionX-GPS Drive is the only GPS navigation solution designed and optimized exclusively for your iPhone. With MotionX you instantly find what you're looking for, then you get a list of door-to-door directions and a highlighted route. The maps are live, all you need to do is to follow the blue line!" - They've got a point, this is the first "native" turn-by-turn application for the iphone compared to the other current solutions which were developped on other platforms. Doesn't make it necessarily better, but interesting nonetheless and the GUI does seem to have been optimized for the iPhone. MotionX are well know among...