Google Maps Navigation (Beta)

Jan 21, 2010 by Justin McCall

Posted under: Gadgets, Reviews

Google has just recently launched their Navigation software in BETA form for all Android users. Now this upsets me greatly. I have an iPhone, I love my iPhone (sometimes, when it doesn’t completely crash or when Apple dictates to me what I can and can’t have on my iPhone). I have used Google Maps on the iPhone and love it, I have also been fortunate enough to use TomTom maps on my iPhone as well. TomTom is great, but got me horribly lost in Sandton two weeks ago. Although, they had rerouted an entire road near Rosebank which obviously had not been updated on the TomTom software, so I will give them the benefit of the doubt. However, at some point, the TomTom navigation would be a good 150m-200m behind my actual location, which made turning into the correct road a nightmare. So TomTom was abondoned.

Google Maps Navigation (Beta) just simply looks fantastic, seems to operate fantastically and has awesome features like voice recognition when locating a target, or searching for a Thai restaurant in a particular area. You can simply say “Find a thai restaurant in sandton area” and Google will search and locate the nearest restaurants who serve thai food. Marvelous I tell you.

Have a look at this video which describes it in detail. Try and ignore the Product Managers complete lack of excitement for one of the greatest products that Google has launched yet, and do not stare at his notrils…