Hasta La Gadget!

TeleNav has already launched its subscription turn-by-turn navigation service for the G1, so it stands to reason that official myTouch 3G support would be close behind — and sure enough, the company has announced that its GPS Navigator app will be available for download to T-Mobile’s second Android device starting tomorrow, August 5. The app features all of the goodies that TeleNav users have come to know and love, including traffic and incident monitoring with automatic rerouting, gas prices, business information, and a choice between 2D and 3D maps; additionally, you’ve got automatic day / night coloration, carpool lane and tollroad avoidance, and speech recognition for destination input — a big plus when you’re on the road and you need to keep distractions to a minimum.

We’ve been playing with a cut of GPS Navigator on our myTouch recently, and it delivers a totally usable car navigation experience — a perfect complement to the comprehensive pedestrian capabilities of Google Maps. Most of the warnings from our G1-based review of the application carry over here — you need true GPS reception, not merely cellular triangulation, so your phone will need a view of the sky to have a shot at picking up satellites (this also means that getting a location lock is a more time-consuming process, though it typically didn’t take longer than a few seconds to do its thing). We’re not digging how the colored lines that convey traffic information on highways flash; we’d rather they just stayed a solid color, the way most GPS systems handle it. We also found that the menus are a little wonky — bringing your finger in contact with a menu item and swiping up or down to scroll would occasionally trigger the first item you touched, which ends up being a fairly annoying bug in practice. All told, though, if you can justify the expense, your $10 a month is going to net you a genuinely reasonable way to consolidate all of your help-me-I’m-lost needs — whether by foot or by car — into a single device.

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds, Transportation

TeleNav GPS Navigator comes to T-Mobile’s myTouch 3G originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 04 Aug 2009 00:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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M&Soft’s Mappy navigation software seems well established in Korea, and now the company has decided to offer its own hardware for it in the shape of a 7-inch SiRF-based touchscreen device. Of course, it wouldn’t be a South Korean PND if it didn’t include a DMB digital TV tuner, video and audio playback, and a photo / text viewer, but the company’s gone one better by offering the elaborate, gimmicky GUI you see above. Pricing is pretty decent too, set at 349,000 KRW ($283) with a 4GB SDHC card, or 399,000 KRW ($323) for an 8GB unit. The AP in the model name stands for “Absolute Pride” — sure, make your jokes, but maybe it’s that wise-guy sense of humor keeping this sort of tech away from Western shores.

[Via Slashgear]

Filed under: GPS, Handhelds

M&Soft launches 7-inch Mappy AP1 PND in South Korea originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 31 Jul 2009 10:22:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Globalstar’s SPOT personal GPS tracker made waves amongst outdoorsmen and argonauts the world over when it was introduced back in 2007, and now the outfit is finally gearing up to ship the second iteration. The newly revamped SPOT is some 30 percent smaller than the previous model, and it also boasts an enhanced antenna for picking up signal whilst deep in the brush, a GPS acquisition light, “Message Sending” indicator light, illuminated buttons and a dedicated pre-programmable Custom Message button. There’s also a protective cover over the all-important S.O.S. button to prevent inadvertent message transmissions (wouldn’t want that, now would we?), and in a move to give fashionistas a choice, this one will be available in both silver and orange. It’s expected to be available in select retailers this fall, but you’ll have to wait until then to get a handle on pricing.

Filed under: GPS, Handhelds

SPOT intros refreshed, smaller Satellite GPS Messenger originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 22 Jul 2009 12:49:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It’s been a few months since Navigon ceased doing business Stateside, and already the company’s back on our radar with a device that made us wish they’d stuck around these parts a while longer. The Navigon 8410 features a 5-inch touchscreen, a polished steel frame, and a righteous assortment of features, including: DVB-T digital television tuner, City3D’s photo-realistic 3D mapping software (only for select cities on the continent), and a media player for all your fave tunes, flicks, and pics. Available only in Europe, we don’t have a ship date for you yet, but we do know it’ll cost €449 ($630). Now, if you excuse us, we were due in Bonn hours ago.

[Via Engadget Spanish]

Filed under: GPS

Navigon 8410 GPS debuts, packed full of features for the trendy Euro jet-set originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Jul 2009 10:24:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It’s been a while since we’ve seen any major updates for Ricoh’s 500SE camera, but if you’re in the mood, here’s a heads up: the company has just announced its new SE-2 GPS module. Designed by EKA Technologies, Inc., this bad boy sports a new helix antenna, which should provide better reception and accuracy, and smaller fix times. Available in two flavors, the SE-2g (GPS only) has an MSRP of $169, while the SE-2c offers GPS and a 3-axis compass for direction information for an MSRP of $399. And if that weren’t enough, the company has just announced new firmware for the camera that enhances its ability to store field data and embed it into images for GIS mapping applications. The new firmware also allows up to three attributes as well as GPS position, azimuth, and UTC (satellite time) to be imprinted directly onto images as they are captured. Pretty awesome, right? Full PR available after the break.

Continue reading Ricoh announces new GPS unit, new firmware for 500SE camera

Filed under: Digital Cameras

Ricoh announces new GPS unit, new firmware for 500SE camera originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 15 Jul 2009 14:11:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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