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CoPilot live is updated and continues 30 day free trial offer

A new version of CoPilot Live enhances and fixes a lot of issues in the previous versions. According to the company, the app now includes improved guidance at complex intersections, Facebook status updates, free local search, and the latest maps of North America. More than 15,000 miles of roads have been added, 73 completely updated counties and hundreds of map improvements submitted by the CoPilot Live User Community.

If you want to try a sophisticated nav app but don't want to shell out any money right away, ALK technologies is continuing to offer a free version of CoPilot Live Directions for a month. The app is full featured, and includes things like voice guidance and 3D mapping.

If you decide not to buy the app, you'll lose the voice guidance and 3D, but still will have use of turn by turn directions throughout the U.S. and Canada. If you want to upgrade after the 30 days, the app charges U.S. $2.99 a month or $19.99 a year. You can get more details on the free app deal here.
We've reviewed the app before and gave it average marks. User reviews have complained about out of date maps and frequent app crashes. Hopefully this new version fixes a lot of the issues reported.

Having this app as a subscription tends to make it pretty expensive over time, but it has a low cost of entry. After using it for a couple of years, you could have bought the higher rated TomTom or Navigon apps.

Another alternative from ALK is CoPilot Live North America. It's $29.99 at the app store, and it's a one-time purchase with turn-by-turn voice directions, 3D maps and a pretty good points of interest database. Here again, some additional features are extra like live traffic alerts and fuel prices.

I've said before, and will say again that there are just too many confusing options in buying the CoPilot family of apps. The company does keep updating the software, and improving it, so if you are totally motivated by price the apps are worth a look. I'd prefer to just buy a nav app and not have to worry about constant up-sell of features or renewing my subscription. I understand charging for traffic or fuel price info, as the all the map companies have to license some external data, but I think the ALK bewildering options and pay-as-you-go philosophy may not be worth the trouble for many.

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iPhone App Review

A new version of CoPilot Live enhances and fixes a lot of issues in the previous versions. According to the company, the app now includes...
 

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Diddle

I've been using CoPilot since last August (bought it right when TomTom and Navigon were at their peak prices, so yes, a major purchase factor for me was price).

I too have had my share of complaints about it...

- outdated map information
- wrong directions
- glitches taking me 40km in a direct line where no road existed
- sometimes the best route is not suggested
- no volume control for the voice

They offer a 45-day map guarantee; you email them with details about where it's wrong and within 45 days it will be in the update. I have yet to use it (namely because by the time I get home, I forget), but for the glitch I experienced their tech support was very good at assisting me to get it resolved (it took waiting for an updated version for it to clear up).

For the price, I'm VERY happy with it. It's fast and reasonably efficient and given the strides they've made since last August, I'm happy enough to stay with it and update for better features in the future.

March 16 2010 at 5:37 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
tivoboy@gmail.com

I've used this app for many years, in the USA and in Europe. The USA maps are the companies own, and not NAVTEQ or another standard and more frequently updated map provider. While there have been of course some notable deficiencies in the maps, I think the updates quickly make up lost ground. I REALLY wish they would move to NAVTEQ or some USA standard. They use it in Europe.

I like the new update addition of LIVE SEARCH for free. This is a great feature (one of the DASH features that most companies are now integrating) forget out of data POI's, if you have a data connection you have the latest info.

I would really like to see more options for traffic data. On the 30 day trial app, there is a click button for 4.99$ a month traffic info. I'd like to see something like 2.99$ or 3.99$ a month for those times when I am in another city, state and need immediate insight into local traffic patterns.

For the price point, one simply cannot beat Copilot

March 16 2010 at 11:49 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Tom

CoPilot is awful. Completely outdated maps - 6-8 years outdated, I mean - and a user interface that is so ugly that I don't want to use it. MotionX's Drive is much nicer for 99 cents and you get the benefit of updated maps, but I found myself sufficiently annoyed at it's lack of live traffic updates en route to a destination that I'm switching to the Tom Tom app. You get what you pay for, unfortunately, and that's no much. If you only want turn by turn directions, these cheap apps will do it for you, but if you need traffic coverage and you want a professionally laid out app, you'll have to pay for it.

March 16 2010 at 11:36 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Brian

I use CoPilot exclusively (chose it because of the price). There still may be a few bugs/limitations (that gabe listed above), but I have to say the update did fix the major lag issue. It seems to start up and find the directions in about half the time as before. Local search has also worked for me.

It did tell me to turn the wrong way on a one-way street in downtown Austin before the update. I've yet to try the same drive again to see if the new maps fixed that.

Another major drawback for me is that my FM transmitter causes interference with the GPS signal, so if i try to use it to listen to music/voice directions, the directions go wacky. I didnt realize this was an issue, but many of you are probably saying, "duh"

March 16 2010 at 9:59 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
gabe

They continue in the same tradition of overstating their updates. Almost all the new features do not work. Despite their directions to reset the license and reactivate (which only enable the button for clearturn), no clearturn and laneassist is displayed during navigation. The only new feature that works as advertisd is local live search. The music fading is touch and go. Sometimes lowers the volume of ipod at start of copilot, sometimes it works fine.
Do not get fooled by the cheap price. You get what you pay for!

March 15 2010 at 11:39 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
grant

i used it on a trip this past weekend from falmouth, mass. to d.c. and back, with a stop in NYC. it does a pretty good job and the directions are good. it didn't always give the fastest route, though. but it does the job for the price.

the worst thing about the app is its poor contacts integration. you can choose addresses from your contacts, but then you still have to go through the "choose zip", "choose street no.", choose house no." menus...the benefit of the contacts is that the street no., house no., etc. is filled in for you. i want to be able to choose a contact and then be done with it. having to go through the whole destination rigamarole is stupid and copilot needs to address this problem.

i didn't use POIs that much, but the few times i did, it found what i was looking for. i'm not sure how far the "on my route" radius is, because it took me 5 miles off the freeway to find a store when i asked for stores "on my route." oh well.

i bought this last year and am fairly happy with it. it works when i need it to and i don't use it every day. if i were going to use a GPS on a daily basis, i would still buy a dedicated one. but for occasional use, it works well.

March 15 2010 at 11:39 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
emil

I like the UI for this app better than MotionX GPS Drive, but overall it's inferior. The directions it gives are often inefficient, and several times it instructed me to make an illegal turn (or impossible turn, because of dividers). It does also crash a lot. Price is the same, get MotionX GPS Drive

March 15 2010 at 10:09 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
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