Nokia GPS & Maps : A Complete Review
August 18, 2008 – 10:22 am | by Ani
I know a lot of us do have the high end Nokia phones that come with an inbuilt GPS and the Nokia Maps Software but we have hardly explored it. The same was with me until lately when I accidently opened the application and gave it a shot. So after using it for about a month today I finally sat down to write about it in detail. Now it was an intentional accident and I’m glad it happened as I was on vacation being unfamiliar with the neighbourhood made me feel a little insecure. Simply, you feel more in place when you know your way around and professionally it saves you a lot of time. So here is a Real Time Experience of Nokia Maps & GPS bundled together to see if the Navigation is worth or just another money minting technique by Nokia.
The events hereafter are based on my experiences with S60 based Nokia N95 8GB with the inbuilt GPS and Nokia Maps application.
1. LOADING
So it was time to get myself familiar with the neighbourhood and plan for a few outdoor events too. I clicked on the icon of the Nokia Maps, which displayed the following screen showing the Maps to be loading. It took exactly 6 seconds to load 100%, which is not bad at all.
2. ACQUIRING LOCATION
As soon as the home screen loads, three yellow dots start to flash one at a time going from left to right indicating that the GPS is trying to access the satellite in order to display your current position. Once the GPS acquires your current position, it registers it by displaying all three dots as Green and you can locate yourself by just pressing the 0 (Zero) button which will take you to your current location which is displayed on the map in a + sign. Now it was a pretty dicey for me as sometimes the GPS worked really quick and sometimes it took a little while, but on whole it gave me a satisfactory experience in terms of showing you your current position, after all you can’t compare a Cell Phone to offer you the likes of a GARMIN or TomTom. But once it acquired your location, it then functioned pretty smooth.
3. THE OFFSIDE RULE
Before we go any further i would like to add (a little offside) that even if your phone does not have an inbuilt GPS, you can still carry around Nokia Maps application on your s60 or s40 enabled cell phone and download Maps for free an view them using the Nokia Maps Loader. So in this way you will have all the Maps you need with you that you can view offline, a pretty amazing feature (but you need a huge memory card or the 8GB memory to preload all the maps.) Only thing you would miss out on is Navigation. Now coming back to the main part, the reason why I started this post was to tell you about Naivigation and a real time experience with the GPS.
Some N95 8GB versions in some countries come with a free trial of Nokia Maps with Voice Guided Navigation for a limited period of time and as for me I didn’t get one, even though my box said that I had a free trial, so the first Negative score and that too a big one as I so wanted to have a go at it. If you too are in my shoes, then don’t worry as you can always pay some money to get a Liscence Or keep Reading this to know how you can get a demo of the Voice guidance. To know more about costs and pricing click here. You can also buy City Guides, which will tell you about various locations of a city viz. Food, Theater, Malls, Banks, Clubs, Hotels etc.
4. FEATURES & SHORTCUTS
Navigation with voice guidance is by far a hit and a miss feature but pretty good considering that it is an early effort by Nokia. Ability to have your personal Landmarks on Maps is also pretty cool and time efficient feature. You can also save Map as an image. Alternative Route Selection, Choice between fastest/shortest routes, Nearby search, etc are a few more to mention.
Following are a few shortcuts with screenshots i have found while using Nokia Maps and they have been really useful.
0 (Zero) = GPS Position
* = Zoom In
# = Zoom Out
1 = Switch Between 2D/3D Modes while in Navigation
2 = Change background Between Light/Dark while in Navigation
3 = Send Map via test, bluetooth, e-mail or multimedia message
6 = Recieving Satellite Status
7 = Increase/Decrease Volume of Voice Guided Navigation
Also you can search a keyword by pressing any numeric key (apart 0) in the default home screen.
5. THE NAVIGATION
From the Screenshots above it would be pretty cleat that how efficient the navigation system is, telling you exactly what route to take. To use the navigation all you have to do is to select Options>Use this place>Route from and then just punch in the place you want to go and select Search Route. The application according to your settings will give you the fastest/shortest route between the two places with a set of complete instructions. Once the route is displayed, you can select Options>Start Navigation. The navigation screen will appear which on top bar will display the nest street to turn on. On top left it will display the direction of the turn you need to take with the distance to go. The bottom part will display the current street you are on below which your will be your car speed total distance to go and time passed. The ‘N’ with the white arrow is the compass pointing towards the north direction and the three green dots is the GPS. The voice only tells you to make a turn and after what distance, but it does not speak the street names. You can also use the Simulation mode to have an experiience of the real time voice enabled demo of the navigation system. During my use the Navigation was Spot on most of the time. The GPS followed us through, only missing out in tunnels and sometimes in downtown and when the phone’s lights went off.
The battery consumption was nominal as it is expected to be but surprisingly gave more backup from the regular GARMIN nuvi 660 after one complete charge to total die out. The overall performance was a bit slow. The routes were accurate almost every time.
6. THE ADVANTAGES
- Portable
- Offline Maps Available
- Good Batter Life
- Accurate Coverage
- Pedestrian Mode
- Live Traffic Feeds (Limited)
- Nearby Places
- Can be used any car
- Additional Features - Phone, Text Message, Camera, Video, Songs(MP3), Internet, Games etc.
7. THE DISADVANTAGES
- A Little SLOW
- Expensive
- Complicated GUI (Graphic User Interface)
- Small Screen
- No Street Names in Voice Guided Navigation
- Not Global
- Only Few Handsets are Compatible
8. FINAL VERDICT
You can’t beat the fact that it is not only a GPS device but a phone as well, despite a few drawbacks, i would rate it a “BIG Thumbs Up” to Nokia for providing a complete package with a rating of 8.0/10 overall. So the money minting text i wrote in the opening paragraph has been drained down as the device comes with descent quality of service on which I’m satisfied. On a final note, i personally love this application and recommend it to all. To really know what it is like you guys should give it a try and I’m sure it will totally take you in the drivers seat for a long drive to explore new boundaries. 
For More Info On Nokia Maps Click Here>>
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Apparently it seems that Nokia Maps has been updated and is completely in a new look. Thanks to Chanse for providing me with that info. I will shortly download the latest version and review it too, so keep checking back.
Thanks for the review, very useful information…