Posted 10/28/09 at 07:44:31 PM by Ryan Whitwam

Microsoft is always trying to work its way into new businesses. With that sort of approach, there are times that even Microsoft must admit defeat. One of those times is now. Microsoft has announced that the MSN Direct GPS service will be discontinued as of January 1st 2012.

MSN Direct is a service integrated into some GPS devices that uses FM signals to deliver traffic data, weather, stocks, movie times, and various other bits of info. The service was initially offered in 2004 when there may actually have been a need. Now, with the proliferation of cellular data connections and other digital networks, the MSN Direct service makes less sense.

The ample warning will give users just over 2 years of service to work out a substitute. Users with MSN Direct devices can still enroll in the service right up to the end date. Any subscribers wanting to cancel their accounts will be issued a prorated refund. Be honest, had you even heard of this service before now?

Read More

Posted 09/29/09 at 08:07:07 PM by Ryan Whitwam

AT&T announced today that the long awaited Garmin Nüvifone G60 would be coming to the carrier on October 4th. The touchscreen phone will be equipped with a full-fledged Garmin GPS interface and receiver. The handset will come preloaded with maps and points of interest for North America.

It’s not all good news, though. AT&T is asking $299 after a $100 mail in rebate, and 2 year service agreement. Optional Nüvifone Premium service will show the user traffic updates, white pages, weather, movies, local events, and fuel prices. However, it will run you an extra $5.99 per month after an initial 30 day trial.

The G60 is basically a high end Garmin GPS, with phone functionality thrown in. It is said to have a full HTML browser with data access through both HSDPA and WiFi. A 3.5 inch touchscreen and 3 megapixel autofocus camera round out the specs. Just for fun, all pics taken with the camera will automatically be geotagged. Given the price, are you considering dropping some cash on one?

Read More

Posted 08/30/09 at 09:21:16 PM by Justin Kerr

 Any old GPS will save you time, but if you’re like me and are still clinging to an older model that doesn’t have real-time traffic data, you could be missing out. According to a new study conducted by NuStats, drivers who use real-time traffic enabled GPS’s save approximately four days per year in travel time vs. those who use nothing at all. The savings work out to an average of 18 percent per trip, and also yielded a CO2 savings of nearly 21 percent.

Participants in the study were broken down into three categories, drivers with no electronic navigation assistance, drivers with a GPS, and drivers who were using real-time traffic enabled devices. The survey participants made more than 2,100 individual trips, across approximately 20,000 kilometers of road.

These results sound great on paper, but it’s worth noting that even though the study itself was conducted by NuStats, the project was funded by NAVTEQ, a leading provider of real-time traffic data for GPS manufacturers such as Garmin. Does this shoot holes in the credibility of the study? Let us know what you think.

Read More

Posted 08/26/09 at 10:21:54 AM by Paul Lilly

Nothing blows more than sitting in a traffic jam for two hours as you inch your way to your destination 25 miles down the road. Should you get off at the next exit and try your luck on the surface roads instead?

Looking to take the guesswork out of those kinds of scenarios, Google announced that its Google Maps will now show you live traffic conditions on arterial roads in selected cities. All you have to do is select the city you're stuck in and click the "Traffic" button in the upper-right corner of the map.

"As you zoom in closer to an area of interest, we'll color the arterial roads, in addition to the highways, to show current traffic conditions," Google wrote in a blog entry. "Just as with the highways, the colors correspond to the speed of traffic (relative to the speed limit of the road): green is free sailing, yellow is medium congestion, red is heavy congestion, and red/black is stop-and-go traffic."

And it works for Google Maps for Mobile, too.

Read More

Posted 08/17/09 at 07:54:28 PM by Paul Lilly

Apple iPhone users living in the U.S. and Canada now have another navigation application to choose from. The app was first demonstrated at WWDC in June and is now available for download.

The $100 app uses iPhone's built-in GPS chip to give users turn-by-turn directions and is compatible with both the iPhone 3G and 3GS running the iPhone 3.0 OS or later.

"With Tom Tom for iPhone, millions of iPhone users can now benefit from the same easy-to-use and intuitive interface, turn-by-turn spoken navigation, and unique routing technology that our 30 million portable navigation devices users rely on every day," said Corinee Vigreux, Managing Director of Tom Tom.

Other features include IQ Routes, which the company claims helps drivers reach their destinations up to 35 percent faster, landscape and portrait navigation views, night and day color mode, multitouch gestures, and navigation to contacts in your address book.

A version compatible with the iPod and other iPhone models is said to also be in the works.

Read More

Posted 06/17/09 at 04:05:30 PM by Pulkit Chandna

Scandinavian developer SPRX mobile has developed Layar, an augmented reality browser for 3G phones, which it claims is unprecedented. Despite the company’s we-have-the-first-AR-browser rant, Layar is in fact the world’s second AR browser. The first being Wikitude AR, which provides users with location-based Wikipedia and Qype content using the phone’s GPS, camera and compass. But Wikitude AR is certainly short on features when compared with Layar. 

Layar lets users browse their milieu using their 3G handset’s GPS, compass and camera. It furnishes realtime information about the user’s surrounding, which is presented as screen overlays and can be used to find hotels, bars, ATMs, properties for sale, jobs and a lot more. The idea is that all that meets your phone’s camera has a story of its own. It is only available for Android devices in the Netherlands.

Read More

Posted 05/20/09 at 05:38:04 PM by Andy Salisbury

Thanks to a recent report, a new worst-case scenario has been proposed that details the downfall of the modern GPS system, as we know it.

The report, distributed by the Government Accounting Office, states that our nation’s GPS could begin to fail sometime next year. Our GPS system has supposedly been extremely mismanaged, and when the aging equipment used to keep it all running begins to fail there will be no new satellites to take their place.

“If the Air Force does not meet its scheduled goals for development of GPS IIIA satellites, there will be an increased likelihood that… the overall GPS constellation will fall below the number of satellites required to provide the level of GPS service that the U.S. government commits to,” says the report.

It also notes that the Air Force has failed to build successful GPS satellites within the cost and schedule constraints provided to it.

Read More

Posted 03/26/09 at 05:23:01 PM by Andy Salisbury

That’s right, another life. It would seem that a driver over in the UK has decided to follow the instructions of their in-car GPS instead of the instructions of their eyes.

A man making his way to Todmorden over in England was allegedly told by his GPS to drive directly into a fence (whoa.) just before the road fell off of a cliff. Still, he managed to make it out of the situation alive, and with a lesson that he won’t soon forget. That is, unless he wants to be in the news again.

Read More