Review: TeleNav GPS Navigator 6.0

With TeleNav's recent announcement at CTIA of version 6.0 of their GPS Navigator application and it's new features, I thought the family trip to St. Augustine, FL would be the perfect time to give this program a good run through.


I don't travel too often, so I rarely have a use for a navigation app. When I do need directions, Google Maps or BlackBerry Maps always seem to work fine for me. One problem this time around though, it was going to be a long trip, with a lot of stops and sights, which means having to punch in an address each time was going to become a hassle. Not to mention the fact that there's no voice direction from these two and I'd rather watch the road then my BlackBerry screen.

Armed with only an address for the hotel we would be staying at and absolutely zero knowledge of the town, I clicked on "Drive To" to begin plotting the course. Now here is where TeleNav first began to really impress me. In the picture, you'll notice that when I went to "Address", a menu pops up that asks whether you want to type in the address or call it in. I knew I had to, so I clicked call. My BlackBerry dialed up TeleNav and an automated prompt asked me for the address I wanted, confirmed it had heard me correctly (which oddly enough it got perfect everytime), and then instructed me to hangup and refresh my "Recent Places" list. I obliged the polite computer voice and voila, the address was already there on my device. I never typed in a single zip code or street name. I was very surprised at the system's ability to recognize odd sounding street names. Especially considering I purposely spoke as normally as possible, with no extra diction, just to throw it off. Now this is how it works in the 5.0 versions. In version 6.0, this is all done seamlessly through the app itself with no updating required.

The address input, I was ready to go. TeleNav will let you choose whether you want to map your route from your current location or another address, the default being your current location. If you choose to use a pre-set address however, it won't give you the audio prompts, but will display a route map, unless you enable the GPS routing. You also have the option of selecting the type of route you want to take; Fastest, Traffic Optimized, Shortest, Prefer Streets, Prefer Highways, and Pedestrian. I stuck with the default of "Fastest".

TeleNav began downloading my route and brought up a 3D map showing my current location, first turn, distance to it, and even my ETA for my destination. You have the option of viewing the 3D map (pictured), a 2D map showing you an overall layout of your route, or simply a series of direction arrows. The 3D maps for me were perfect as once we hit the city, it shows the name of upcoming streets so I know the app was spot on.

It was easy driving from here on out as the voice prompts let me know how far to travel before my next prompt and periodically alerted me that it was checking for traffic. At one point we hit a major traffic jam due to several accidents and TeleNav told me approximately how far up ahead before it cleared up and even offered to route around it for me. In the event you do miss a turn, TeleNav automatically re-routes your course to get you back on track. Along the way however, the kids began to get hungry. Using the "Directory" (or Biz Finder) feature, I was able to search for restaurants close to us by style of cuisine (i.e. American, BBQ, Chinese, Caribbean, etc.) and have TeleNav guide us to it. With this feature, you can search for almost anything from banks, to gas stations, to movie theaters, to Wi-Fi spots, and more. TeleNav will display the search results in a list ordered by the distance to each. Selecting a business will display the address and phone number for that business and allow you to map a route or get turn by turn to it. Once we finished, TeleNav mapped our way to the hotel from the restaurant and we were back on our way.

Once at the hotel, the wife and I decided to plan our days out by picking the attractions we wanted to see the most. After we had the addresses of each of them, we logged into our TeleNav account on the laptop and entered each one as a "My Addresses" entry. Here's where that seamless integration comes in. The addresses all became available to the app on my BlackBerry and it was just a matter of selecting the one we wanted to go to. TeleNav truly made our trip both there and back easy and helped us find local points of interest and local restaurants. Hey, I can eat McDonald's at home. On a vacation I want to try the local food.

Perhaps the best feature in this app that I luckily didn't need was the out of coverage directions. This new feature actually downloads your route onto your device so that even if you're out of range of data coverage, you're never lost. With the route stored on your device, you continue to receive turn by turn directions to your pre-set destination. Even though I didn't need it, I decided to turn off data services temporarily to try it out and sure enough, TeleNav kept plugging along.

All in all, I have to give a high recommendation to TeleNav's GPS Navigator. It is an easy to use application that offers some really awesome features. The different methods for entering your destination is one of those that can simplify the trip and personally one of my favorites. The ability to search for local interests and other businesses along the way without the need for an address is another high point for this service. This new version offers even more features such as red light camera alerts, one touch speech recognition, out of coverage assistance, and more. However, Navigator 6.0 is currently only supported on the 8900 and 9000 models, but more are coming in the future.

Subscriptions to the service are $9.99 a month, $99.99 for one year, and $249.99 for four years. Well worth the price for anyone who travels to know that even if they manage to get themselves lost, TeleNav will be there to get them back on course. A 30-day trial is available at TeleNav's site.