Routeplanners: SatNav & GPS News

Looking for cheaper car insurance? You could log on to internet sites that save money by having very few real-life staff to pay, or you could listen to that soothing sat-nav voice and make the saving yourself.

The RAC has begun offering premium discounts for motorists who use satellite navigation equipment because it believes they are safer drivers.

According to the breakdown recovery service, using sat-navs makes drivers less likely to crash.

“It means you don’t have to constantly look at road names, warning signs and so on and it makes you a lower risk,” an RAC spokesperson said.

Mark Peacey, spokesperson for sat-nav company Garmin, said it was great to hear that sat-nav technology is also making the road a safer place.

“Using sat-navs is considered a great way to make driving less stressful and more enjoyable,” he said.

“With innovations like pre-loaded speed camera information, drivers are alerted to known black-spots, and provided an ongoing reminder to be aware of conditions and their speed.”

Finnish cell phone maker, Nokia, announced this week that it is launching a free mobile mapping service for users in over 150 countries worldwide.

The Smart2go service will be launched around the globe on February 10, allowing mobile phone users to access local search and route-finding features at no charge. It also comes with the optional add-on of car navigation software, at a significantly lower price than dedicated GPS devices.

Standalone GPS device makers like TomTom, however, do not see mobile phones as a direct threat to their core business model, believing instead that they widen the overall market for route-finding software.

The Taiwan handheld maker has just announced that its upcoming ROM update for its HSDPA-enabled D810 PDA-phone will add GPS (Global Positioning System) as well as BlackBerry Connect functionalities to the device.

According to Dopod’s product manager, the D810 was already shipping with an onboard GPS receiver during its launch in November last year. However, due to software complications, the GPS application was not ready for commercial use then. Thus the company decided to go ahead with the product launch without announcing the GPS functionality.

The D810 joins the 838 Pro and C720W as the third cellular handheld to offer the popular push-email client, in addition to the Microsoft Direct Push solution. Current owners of the D810 can download the new firmware from February 10, while new users can expect March shipments of the handheld to come with the updated GPS ROM. The ROM update will, however, only activate the GPS receiver. Users will have to purchase the GPS software and map content separately in order to utilize the GPS features.

You can now take Google Maps with you wherever you and your Windows Mobile phone go. Mobile Google Maps have been released on Windows Mobile 5.0. You’ll be able to take advantage of GPS capabilities (assuming that you also have a GPS). If you have a previous version, you’ll still get varied functionality, just not the full suite.

Your current location is always at the center of the viewscreen, and you can easily plot your trip to your destination from there. You can also use those GPS satellites to look at snapshots that they took and at interactive maps. In case you’re wondering, the Mobile Google Maps software is device-independent. As long your device runs the Windows Mobile 5.0 OS, you can run this latest incarnation of Google Maps. It works with BlackBerry, Palm, and most JSME handhelds.

Check the read link below for a download.

See more at http://www.google.com/gmm/index.html

Have you ever walked by a restaurant or a cool store, only to forget where it was, never to be found again? Recently in Taipei, I discovered the Dopod P800w, a GPS/ PDA, which has a feature that lets you take a picture with its 2 megapixel camera and then associates it to a location via GPS. That way, you can take a picture of something and then save its location.

On the PDA side of things, it has a Quad Band GSM phone, built in WiFi and FM Radio, and Bluetooth. Price is in the region of £ 300

Source: Popgadget

With Latest Maps of Middle Eastern Countries including Saudi Arabia and
Egypt, Tele Atlas Expands Digital Map Coverage to 64 Countries. The total
amount of road coverage in the company’s database now stands at 21.3 million
kilometres or 13.2 million miles, the same number of miles as 528 trips
around the earth’s circumference at the equator.

Tele Atlas digital maps feature detailed street-level and complete
interconnecting road networks to allow application developers and device
manufacturers in the personal navigation, automotive, Internet and wireless
markets to guide users seamlessly across country borders. The announcement
follows Tele Atlas’ recent move to deliver digital maps covering Central and
Eastern Europe and South Africa, and is in response to increased demand from
global customers for highly detailed and accurate maps of all major
countries around the world.

Source: Tele Atlas

British residents may find that the theft of their satellite navigation systems may have implications for their home insurance premiums as thieves are targeting owners’ houses in burglaries, it has emerged.

Personal details stored on the motoring systems are being used by criminals to burgle people’s homes, Hampshire Police have warned.

Insurance expert Peter Gerrard, from comparison site moneysupermarket.com, is now warning that the practice could affect home insurance premiums, potentially causing them to rise after a burglary, Computeractive reports.

On the back of the findings, a representative from satellite navigation manufacturer TomTom is urging Britons to protect their home insurance premiums by ensuring they remove the systems from their cars and remember to take out the suction mount when they lock up their vehicle.

“When you’ve finished your journey, take all elements out of the car and pack them away in the packaging and protective case provided,” the representative told the website.

However, West Yorkshire Police recently advised Britons to mark their systems with their house number and postcode so that they could be identified in the event of theft.

Source: Kwik-Fit Insurance

In Spain, the director of the General Traffic Department (DGT), Pere
Navarro, announced today that a panel of experts has been put together to
review a number of issues, one of which is the use of SatNav.

They will assess the use of in-car SatNav systems, although “for the time
being” the department is recommending that they only be used when the
vehicle is parked. Notwithstanding, should it emerge that drivers are
ignoring this advice, their use may be prohibited on the same grounds that
mobile phones are banned.

In-car technology, or telematics, is a thriving business in the United States. At the recent CES technology show in Vegas they showed-off dashboard
TV screens to watch whilst you waited for a parking space.

But other technology aims to make sure that you don’t even have to wait.

Big city car parks are often full, so one US satellite radio station is
aiming to stream information about space availability directly into the
cockpit.

“There are hundreds of different parking garages spread across the United
States where the garage owner has computer technology to tell them which
spaces are empty or full,” said David Butler of XM Satellite Radio.

“We are tapping into that information and sending it to your navigation
system. The map will tell you where the parking garages are located, and how
many empty spaces they have.”

Source: BBC Website

Nissan is to introduce a new in-car GPS service to promote fuel-economical
driving habits amongst Japanese motorists, as part of its efforts to reduce
CO2 emissions under the Nissan Green Program 2010. CARWINGS, carrying the
service, is Nissan’s original GPS & Telematics service currently available
only in Japan.

The new service will provide CARWINGS-equipped Nissan drivers with average
fuel-consumption data according to their day-to-day driving habits, and
allow them driver to track and monitor improvements to their eco-driving
skills over a period of time via a personalized web page available with the
CARWINGS service.

Source: Auto Industry News (UK)