Filed under: iPhone, App Review
G-Map back in action with new nav app
XRoad gave us one of the first Nav apps for the iPhone. It's still for sale under the name G-Map West or East, and gives users either a Western or Eastern U.S. version. It was pretty basic when it first came out, but there have been many improvements. Now the folks at XRoad have a new app that covers the whole of the U.S., Puerto Rico, and Canada, and it's on sale for US$39.99.
The new version of the app brings text to speech to the party, free traffic service for one year, and a claimed update to the Navteq data. Like many of the competitors out there, G-Map offers address book integration, 3D views of the road, detailed renderings of thousands of intersections, trip planning, and it allows the editing of POI information by adding notes or phone numbers.
So how does it work in the world of cars, traffic, and road closures? OK, but it's not wonderful. First, the app is pretty slow. It acquires a GPS signal right away, but then G-Map takes it's own sweet time orienting the maps. For a few seconds, your direction of travel is not at the top. After a bit, G-Map figures it out, but I think if you were launching the app when you were already underway, you'd get some pretty confusing visual cues.
When you get a call, the app stops, and after the call you can go back in. When I did go back into the app, I had to once again acknowledge the legal mumbo-jumbo by tapping on the screen.
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