It's turn by turn. Why carry a sat nav unit when you can use your phone?

Anyway, it was £54.99 at first, looks like they've hiked the price. The UK only version is cheaper.

The built in maps aren't built in, they're streamed from the internet. Therefore you need a decent signal. If you lose internet or only have GPRS then the maps won't display.

The design of the HTC Hero should be enough to make you get an iPhone.

HTC make ugly tacky designs. The Hero has an ugly curved bottom section and naff looking buttons.

It has a custom GUI too, so i'm not sure how it will behave with other Android apps?

Gilesuk,
I don't think that what you state is correct......as unlike googlemaps I believe the maps are resident on the phone (hence the 1.6Gbyrte download).

I may stand to be corrected but could you clarify are you speculating or speaking from experience of your usege with the app?

Regards

jawdrops

Gilesuk,
According to the Navigon site no internet connection is needed....

http://www.navigon.com/site/uk/en/products/navigatio...

Regards

jawdrops

In reply to a post by krazykizza:

Phones are intended for postable use, spashing £80 on something for a static purpose seems useless.

Well for me portable includes in-car and as for £80 it's good value compared to a dedicated sat-nav and more convenient (1 device etc)

In reply to a post by krazykizza:

Google Maps is suficient for 99.999999% of users.

But only in the country of your contract otherwise I believe data charges start racking up (see my no internet needed post below) also turn by turn voice instruction for car driving is very superior to google maps.

So at the end of the day it's all about priorities.

Regards
jawdrops

In reply to a post by AlanH:

Post code truncation is not a big deal. A few taps get you to a full address entry, as it finds town and street names on the fly. A couple of letters of each will usually get you to a list that you can tap. I figure that's no more taps than a full post code. Even a full postcode would still only get you to a section of a road, and you still require the house number for a complete location.

I have to disagree with you there, I have owned 3 SatNavs over the last few years and the first one was running Navigon software with the 5 digit post code search and it was the most frustrating thing ever. For example try entering a Pub that has no building number but is on a 5 mile stretch of an A road. With a full post code search the navigator gets you close enough that you can see to place. With the stupid 5 digit post code you have to drive up and down 5 miles of road to find the place you are looking for. Not only that sometimes the road names in the database do not match with the postcode. So for example the address might be 50 old high street but the navigator has no old high street for the first 5 digits of the postcode but instead lists another dozen or so road names that you have no idea if one of them is an alternative name. Totally frustrating and utterly useless at times.

The second Navigator I bought just recently was a Navigon branded navigator, full post code search was a real improvement but the software was just a real pain, it felt really clunky and the routing was worse than the old one, especially annoying was that it would tell me to turn left in the middle of a main road where there was no turning but there was a slight left hand curve in the road where as it would fail to tell me to turn where there was a real turning so I'd have to look at the map. I literally dumped that one after 8 weeks it was so bad.

Having tried two Navigon based navigators that were bought because they were cheaper than Garmin and Tom Tom I decided to splash out and buy a Tom Tom and it is miles ahead of the Navigon, everything works smoothly, well thought out interface, brilliant post code lookup and points of interest. No stupid error messages when trying to save locations, a real dream in comparison, really worlds apart. I recently bought a navigator on behalf of my father-in-law and as there was an offer on a Garmin I went for that. Not quite as nice as the TomTom software but again still a lot better than Navigon.

I must admit that the idea of having SatNav on my iPhone is appealing but after being so disappointed with Navigon before I decided I wouldn't waste my money even at the introductory price of £37. I decided it was a waste of money because there is no gaurantee that they will update it for proper post code search and the reviews on the app store say that the map data is old and generally the app is not that good.

My advice, don't bother, wait for Tom Tom even if it is significantly more than the Navigon software it will be well worth the extra.

In reply to a post by AlanH:

the reviews on the app store say that the map data is old and generally the app is not that good.

My advice, don't bother, wait for Tom Tom even if it is significantly more than the Navigon software it will be well worth the extra.

Not sure what other reviewers are comparing with. Comparing the maps to my existing tomtom 700 I've found them to be up to date. Overall I've been impressed with the Navigon for its primary purpose (ie navigating from A-B) , the POIs are much more complete (which partially address the 'pub' issue above) but full post code search would be a benefit (do hope navigon respond - the iPhone app store has a different dynamic than updates for fixed devices). It will be interesting to see tomtom pricing but so far, for a relatively modest price the idea of always having the Navigon satnav with me is worth the price!

I was on about the Google maps application.

Indeed, the maps of Navigon are in memory. In fact I downloaded the EU version and altered the ipa file to remove the maps I didnt need as 1.6GB is a lot of space in an 8GB iPhone.

Yes. I was making the point that Google Maps application is not up to the job of navigation as it requires a net connection.