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So whats the latest on turn by turn GPS
- Thread starter bbplayer5
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I had it for 15 days... The lockups, slowness, and lack of apps really kills it. Not to mention typing on it is horrible. The screen isnt calibrated correctly and some of the buttons overlap each other (not visibly, but the touch response is off). Sometimes you hit space but it pushes caps instead.
And all of them pale in comparison to using your brain and a Rand McNally Atlas or Thomas Cook guide.
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http://www.engadget.com/2008/12/23/xroad-g-map-app-brings-bona-fide-navigation-to-the-iphone/
A newly released app now brings turn by turn GPS to the iPhone! Although currently it is only for the west coast, while an east coast version will follow later.
A newly released app now brings turn by turn GPS to the iPhone! Although currently it is only for the west coast, while an east coast version will follow later.
This has been discussed to death here:
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/618265/
I haven't personally used it, but by its description and other users' comments, it's pretty much just a glorified Google Maps that you don't need 3G/E to use. It doesn't come close to being a useable GPS unit like Garmin or TomTom.
The idiots may be the ones who think GPS is coming to the current iPhone.
It won't. The combo of GPS + 3G uses too much power to meet the battery life spec, so people would complain and sue Apple. The GPS antenna is covered up by the cell phone and wifi antennas, so people will occasionally get bad directions and complain. And nobody wants to pay a bunch extra for legal rights to the map data, plus extra liability insurance (for when they crash and sue Apple just because they can).
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Yep, so does Samsung, LG, BlackBerry, and lots of others. I'm guessing all those manufacturers are much better at managing their legal department, battery life (and so on). So c'mon Apple, . . . we're not gonna wait forever.
How do you know someone hasn't sued HTC? No lawyer is going to get a ton of free publicity suing HTC and the like. And Apple has way deeper pockets anyway.
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Absolutely. That's why you have an iPhone. Apple puts that money towards paying their engineers instead of their lawyers and insurance companies.
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Are you suggesting the iPhone 3G was designed poorly? How come other cell phones that have all those antennas can have voice/turn by turn nav?
I know Sprint has their own GPS app they put on their phones and other carriers probably have their own too. I think we probably would have heard if a US cellphone carrier was sued due to faulty directions. That type of crap would be on the front page (just like suing McDonalds for getting fat, suing a dry cleaner 54 million for a lost pair of pants, prisoners in jail suing over not having chunky peanut butter, etc..), the media loves that type of stuff.
All these devices are poorly designed from the point of view of an antenna designer. If you want to see a good GHz antenna, find a picture of a telecommunications satellite.
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I've used Garmin Navigator on my BlackBerry for several hours and only used half the battery. You just get the warning at the beginning not to operate it while driving. Even my full size Garmin 880 does that.
Admittedly the iPhone uses more power than the charger can provide it with when GPS is on, but you can still get a couple of hours GPS use with the iPhone which is comparable to any other GPS enabled handset. I don't see any other handset manufacturers getting sued over battery life. At the end of the day, its the user who chooses to run the software, and even a standalone GPS unit won't last much longer than a couple of hours.
The GPS antenna is not, as is popularly thought, with too small or not powerful enough to run a TBT satnav solution. This statement seems to be based on the fact that people are watching Google Maps whilst driving and seeing that the blue dot occassionaly jumps away from the road they are on, or onto another road. Google maps is purely there to pinpoint where the GPS signal says you are. Of course the thing gets screwy every now and then when the line of sight to some of the satellites gets cut off. Dedicated TBT satnav software deals with this by having some AI built in which knows that you can't magically teleport from one road to another, and so does a but of error correction. Google Maps can't do this. It doesn't mean that the chipset is any smaller/less powerful than that on any other mobile phone. I'm sure if you run Google Maps on any of them you will see a similar result. As for bad directions, every satnav has a disclaimer which you must accept to use it. This is inherrant with the technology.
The likes of TomTom/Garmin/Route 66 et al already own rights to the map data, in fact TomTom owns the map data. And someone suing Apple over them crashing whilst using a satnav system on the iPhone is rediculous. First of all Apple (I hope to god) will not be the ones who wrote the software, and secondly, at least here in the uk, crashing because you're paying more attention to your satnav than the road is going to result in you being charged with driving without due care and attention and losing your licence. If you went to court to try and sue over that I'm sure the judge would have some strong words to say to you.