Smart phone in lieu of dedicated GPS unit?

[FUEGO]

The problem I have with GPS, stand alone or phone, is it shows me where I am, and it gets me to where I want to go, but I don't know where I am.

That's how I ended up in the middle of the Adirondacks one day. Didn't realize our route on the interstate took us through the middle of nowhere and we wouldn't have cell reception. Guess where we broke down?

We're kind of spoiled that we can plan a multi-hundred mile trip with a 10 second series of screen taps on a mobile phone, click "navigate" and then follow the spoken directions and get where we're going. I know what you mean about not really knowing where you are. On road trips I have to pay attention to what city we're in and even what state we're in.

To combat that, I take a look at the big picture. Zoom out. How many more miles till the next big city? How far till we get to the state line? Do I need to stop somewhere in particular for cheap gas or a place that has a variety of restaurants? Sometimes that's aiming for a certain exit number.

 

[Sunset]

When driving we do use our super great GPS, it came with a camera that I didn't add on, but the thing speaks the directions really well, and only gets confused (wrong directions) in passing through 1 city even after updating it. I think it was Nashville TN.

When I make a wrong turn, my old one would yell out "Re-calculating" as if that was hard, but this one just carries on and adjusts the route to fix my mistake.

 

[Ronstar]

....When I make a wrong turn, my old one would yell out "Re-calculating" as if that was hard, but this one just carries on and adjusts the route to fix my mistake.

Yep, "Re-calculating" makes things interesting.

 

[braumeister]

And there is always the random brain fart, which was common with older GPS car units.

In 2005 I had a TomTom unit in the car. Went into a small town for lunch in rural Idaho and when about to get back on the highway it told me to go back the way I had come for "812 miles, then make a U-turn."

 

[sengsational]

I have a cheap phone with a non-US radio that I use for navigation, local calling, and my contact number when I'm traveling. It's a Moto-E. In Costa Rica, I bought a SIM for $2 and put 5000 Colones (about $10) on it (all done at WalMart). Also, I can switch on the wifi hotspot and use my regular phone (with a faster processor and bigger screen).

I did download the maps for where I expected to be (Google Maps), but I had cell data most places anyway. Never got close to using up my $10 worth.

So the bad news was my water shoes (with plenty of velcro) kind of self-destructed. The good news was that I had the phone where I could see it.

 

[explanade]

What is that, some kind of a vent clip mount holding up the phone?

 

[mpeirce]

OK, here what I do. It's pretty much way over the top:

Our cars have nav built into them, but when I'm traveling I often use both the car's nav system and the phone's. They have their own advantages and disadvantages.

Car system advantages:
- It's always there
- It has map data built in, so no connectivity required
- Shows upcoming exits and rest areas on highways. Even shows if the exit has fuel, restaurants, etc, even Starbucks!
Disadvantages:
- It's a pain to enter destinations, though I can send the car the destination from google maps
-

Phone system advantages:
- Voice (siri) is way better for specifying destination
- Waze (if I'm using it) shows me upcoming speed traps!
- Can choose from Apple Maps, Waze, others
Disadvantages:
- Smaller screen
- Needs cell coverage

So what I often do when traveling is use the phone for the actual navigation, but since it shows only the local area on it's small screen, I also have the nav screen up on the car showing a wider area. So I can see upcoming town and such. Helps with the situational awareness.

My favorite feature using Apple Maps is that when you are following it's directions, you can ask Siri about things ALONG THE WAY. E.g. "How far to the next Starbucks?" will just tell you about stores along your route - NOT the one closer, but you have get off the highway and drive 30 miles over city streets in the wrong direction to get there. This feature is awesome.

 

[explanade]

One thing I noticed in a Lexus SUV is that the GPS is logging where the car has been.

Wonder if you have to go to the dealer to get all that cleared up. I remember on Dexter, he snoops on the navigation system logs of a car to track down someone.