Navigation Experience on 2.1

[lessit]

I had the opportunity to drive about 700 miles this past weekend using both my Garmin (205) and Google nav devices. I've had various Garmin's for about 5 years so I have a good base of comparison. The net is that the Google device compares very favorably to the Gramin and even exceeds it in some important ways.

The google maps are great. They are more detailed than the garmin. Side by side the garmin's almost look cartoonish. The google maps look like real maps. The one thing they could use is a better color for side roads in daytime mode. They are very light grey against an off white background. They should be darker grey. Some of the fonts could be bigger too. Nighttime mode was very good.

Voice sound was not quite as good as garmin, but good enough. I liked the text to speech vs. the garmins lack of it.

Route and reroute calc was about the same.

Loved the ability to do email, phone, apps while navigating.

Voice Search (and search in general) was awesome. This is one area where google won running away. With garmin there is a bunch of text entry and you're not really sure how to enter it. Google leverages their search technology here. All you have to do is say something like "Navigate to hotels near the Mall of America" and it presents you with a list to select from.

Nice integration from email/web with navigation. Just click on an address and you have the option to navigate there.

Google maps were more up to date. My garmin maps were about a year old and there were two times where google routed me correctly due to obvious recent changes in road construction. I ended up trusting the google nav more.

There was some variation in routes but they both got you there. It would be nice for google to have more options such as shortest route, fastest route, avoid this or that.

Traffic updates worked well as far as I can tell. Somewhat useful in metro areas.

Google did a poor job of extimating arrival time. That's one thing the garmin units do a great job at. For any 3hr segment I'd say the google unit overestimated by at least 1/2 hr. It got more accurate as the trip progressed but the garmin is spot on here.

While google search is terrific the "search along route" needs some work. The search results seemed to be returned randomly. I'd like to see a list of MacDonalds sorted on nearest to My Location.

Google should make more use of the Layers. It would be nice to move waterways and green spaces to their own layer so you could just have a navigation layer with roads only. The Gas, restuarant, etc. layers were OK but needed to be relative to My Location (see above).

Would like to be able to Save any My Location as a Favorite or click on the "car" (triangle) and have it tell me details about where I am - like the garmin.

The display had better contrast than the garmin and sharper resolution.

I started out using it in landscape mode but ended up liking portrait better. In portrait you can seen farther in front of you. I'm not that interested in what's to the side of me.

It would ne nice to have driving orientation and speed on the main screen.

One problem was that google tends to be a little schitzo when the car is stopped. It tends to bounce the car indicator around as it calculates current location. I suspect this is because of the inherent innacrucies of gps positioning. This was a minor annoyance if you were near an intersection of close streets. Sometimes the car would bounce around between the direction you were headed and the side street. Than it would respoition the map and recalc the route. The garmin just showed the stopped car. Google just needs to relax and not try to react to everything so quickly.

That's it for now.

 

[Bishop]

Cool, good read!
With my Navigon (I LOVE that thing) acting funky lately, I need this 2.1 to happen real soon! At least before Spring Break.

 

[BoulderAndroidFan]

Thanks for the great review! It's been working well except when I got a call and was talking to the caller fine when the navi voice alerted to an upcoming turn super loudly on the ear piece. Navi had to be restarted after the call.

Anyone else dealing with calls during navigation? Is there any way to mute the navi voice during a call quickly without muting the caller?

 

[goofdad]

Anyone else dealing with calls during navigation? Is there any way to mute the navi voice during a call quickly without muting the caller?

I had a similar issue, only it went over my car speakers because I'm hardwired into a handsfree. The person on the other end heard the nav system interrupting them.

I didn't, however, have to reset the navi ...

 

[Pitamakan]

Interesting stuff!

I've always been pretty impressed with Google's maps and directions ... although at least for me, their time estimates have always been ridiculously conservative. I assume that's partly because they don't take into account the lack of traffic in my part of the world, or the fact that most Montanans are genetically programmed to drive ridiculously fast.

The thing I like best about using my Eris for this is the ease with which I can switch from view to view -- the satellite views are great, and the accessibility of street view is fun, too.

 

[lessit]

Anyone else dealing with calls during navigation? Is there any way to mute the navi voice during a call quickly without muting the caller?

Yes, I got some calls during navigation and yes, while I was on the call the vocal nav instructions came into my ear at the same time the caller was speaking. If I was on speakerphone the caller could hear the instructions.
Kind of a difficult resolution as the phone interface is on at the time of the call so you can't see where you are going. If they muted the nav instructions you wouldn't have any nav. You'd need a way to flip back and forth between the phone and nav interface as well as muting the nav.
And no, my phone didn't lock when doing calls in nav. I had to be a little patient while it flipped from phone back to nav though - it took a couple of seconds.

 

[dirtmouth]

i really like the goognav . been taking longer than usual lately lock in a signal . sometimes 3-5 mins with coulds .....

 

[Richman]

The Google Navigation is Beta!
But as reported works very well, and is probably more acurate in maps then most Navigation devices. I went to Google's website to figure out how to best use the App. While there I went to the forum to request the speed readout and one other thing be added to the App. Someone had already suggested it, I just added my agreement, the more votes they see for a specific request the more likely they are to add that feature.

So if you want additional features added please go to their website and make your voice heard!
This program was the main reason I got the Eris!
The Verizon employee had one and said they would get an update soon, so I didn't have to buy the Moto Droid, that was December!

 

[Droidcula]

Is there a way to make it avoid toll roads? Here in TX every route I enter uses a toll road in GoogleNav. I just usually ignore the toll road then it recalculates and gives me a new direction. But it keeps telling me to u-turn before it finally realizes I am not going to u-turn.

 

[Crunchbot]

I noticed that when in the Navigation, on the Eris, if you change the volume then it says "Navigation Volume". That might make it lower for calls, but then it might be hard to change while driving, and I don't know if you can turn it down without going back to home and back to navigation while in the call, which is a lot while driving. I actually liked that it would still do the navigation while I was listening to music, so that I wouldn't miss a turn but still had everything functioning.

 

[ksigh]

... I actually liked that it would still do the navigation while I was listening to music, so that I wouldn't miss a turn but still had everything functioning.

does the music fade when the directions are given? jw

 

[jlampson]

does the music fade when the directions are given? jw

Yes, it does; it fades like if you get a call while you're listening to music.

 

[ksigh]

oh thanks, cool.

 

[Natas]

With my experience, it SUCKS compared to my old phone or a normal GPS.
My street is a one way street, and it says to go down it the opposite way, even though the map shows it as a one way. So I tested it again on another street, it doesn't seem to always recognize it's a one way, real helpful in Boston where EVERY road is one way.

 

[Podivin]

I'd give it an 8, maybe 9, on a scale of 10.

My wife and I took a ~700 mile road trip over the weekend and used the navigation all along the way.
Leaving home when it came to get on the ramp to the interstate it was announcing that my turn was coming up when in fact I was already half way up the ramp. If I hadn't known where I was I would have missed that turn.

All the other turns along the way were announced in plenty of time to get into the correct lane. Street names (pronounced phonetically and therefore sounded a bit strange) were always correct.

When we were getting to our destination it was showing that'd we'd need to do a U-turn to get into the driveway. We're wondering about the U-turn because there was no island in the street. RIGHT before we got to where we needed to turn an island began - sure enough we had to make a U-turn to get there. So it nailed that part.

Most of the time I had my phone plugged in so I could see the display. But when I unplugged and put it to sleep the navigation still called out direction. That's both good and bad. It's good when you're driving and want to save battery. It's bad when you're in the restroom somewhere with the phone in your pocket telling you to drive 1000 feet and turn left. I learned to turn down the navigation volume when we stopped.

Navigation remembers the addresses you've requested it to route to. So it's easy to completely exit navigation and then later restart to the same address, with no need to reenter the address.

Speaking the address, rather than typing it, worked well. It would bring up a map, long press on the map icon and you get an option to navigate to it.

I received several phone calls, none of which caused any problems with the navigation app. You do have to be patient to give it time to change to and from the phone screen though.

 

[lessit]

With my experience, it SUCKS compared to my old phone or a normal GPS.
My street is a one way street, and it says to go down it the opposite way, even though the map shows it as a one way. So I tested it again on another street, it doesn't seem to always recognize it's a one way, real helpful in Boston where EVERY road is one way.

So your testing involved finding two streets where it indicated traffic flow incorrectly therefor it "SUCKS"? There's lots of anomolies in every gps system. I think most people would agree that googles is very good even given its beta status. BTW, did you submit your findings to google for correction? I did that with a few streets and they corrected their maps in 24-48 hours.

 

[TheSultan]

I drive MAYBE 15 miles a day, so I rarely have a reason to use this. But tonight I'm going to dinner an hour away, and I'm looking forward to giving this a try! What I can't seem to find yet, is how to put it in "Street Mode". Has anyone got this going yet?

 

[Natas]

So your testing involved finding two streets where it indicated traffic flow incorrectly therefor it "SUCKS"? There's lots of anomolies in every gps system. I think most people would agree that googles is very good even given its beta status. BTW, did you submit your findings to google for correction? I did that with a few streets and they corrected their maps in 24-48 hours.

Yes, after that small test, it "SUCKS" The bug would be in the navigation application, not Google maps. The map within the program shows the streets as one ways.

I'm on the phone with Mr Google right now telling him software "SUCKS"

 

[Podivin]

On the map screen, long press. A popup will show you the address you pressed, long press the popup and one of your options will be street view.
Also, while driving you can put on the satellite layer to show the birds-eye view.
If there is a street view while driving I've not run across it.

 

[Slugdoc]

Obviously, google has access to the real-time traffic data, and you can show it using menu->layers.

BUT -- Does it take traffic into account by default when planning a route? Or telling you the ETA?

I can't tell.
I drove in to work this morning at 6:30 AM, little traffic.
I am driving in tomorrow at 7:30, much more trafffic - I will see if it offers a different route or ETA..



((Hey! With Google Nav, my Eris with 2.1 has route!

 

[bezerk19]

I have a troubling question; do you need to have a 3G connection in order to use navigation?

I'm assuming if you are using the navigation (in the middle of nowhere), would navigation still work even if you didn't have 3G coverage? Maybe not even phone service? I haven't tried this outside my living area, so there isn't a place i would have coverage. What i have tried is turning of mobile network and navigation seems very slow to load (don't think it works).

Maybe someone who has actually tried outside a "network" coverage area might know??

Thanks

 

[jmastron]

I have a troubling question; do you need to have a 3G connection in order to use navigation?

I'm assuming if you are using the navigation (in the middle of nowhere), would navigation still work even if you didn't have 3G coverage? Maybe not even phone service? I haven't tried this outside my living area, so there isn't a place i would have coverage. What i have tried is turning of mobile network and navigation seems very slow to load (don't think it works).

Maybe someone who has actually tried outside a "network" coverage area might know??

Thanks

I played with turning off wifi and mobile networks (leaving GPS on), and I'm pretty sure it caches the main route's map info, so it'll continue to navigate to the destination, but probably won't be able to recalculate if you go off route.

We're going to Death Valley in a couple weeks, with plenty of coverage-free zones; will try it then Definitey still some use for the Garmin Nuvi, but for day to day use, it's awesome to have navigation on my phone.

 

[bezerk19]

I played with turning off wifi and mobile networks (leaving GPS on), and I'm pretty sure it caches the main route's map info, so it'll continue to navigate to the destination, but probably won't be able to recalculate if you go off route.

We're going to Death Valley in a couple weeks, with plenty of coverage-free zones; will try it then Definitey still some use for the Garmin Nuvi, but for day to day use, it's awesome to have navigation on my phone.

I'm headed to Corpus Christi in a few days, lets see how it works out.

 

[bezerk19]

I'm headed to Corpus Christi in a few days, lets see how it works out.

Otherwise, there is always good 'ol OnStar

 

[bezerk19]

Anyone know any easy way to go to street view when navigating?

It's not available on the first screen when you click on "navigate" after you enter your current location and your destination.