Do you mean which side of the road by voice or do you mean when it shows the final destination on the inset, you can tell the target is on the right/left side of the arrow?

 

hadn't noticed it but you are right. The other thing I don't see is the different icons for gas stations, restaurants etc... I only see these red icons (red square with triangle "flag" on top).

I like my new disc but the jury is still out on if it is worth $185.00.

 

yes!

 

dual layer wont matter unless it is using more than 4.7GB of total space. Did anyone check the usage on the Disc?

Sorry if I'm asking something someone already said.

 

I was referring to when it tells you where your destination is when you approach it. Old Navi tells you what side of the street it is on, New Navi only indicates that you have arrived. It might be a minor issue to some, but for the amount of money we paid, I would expect the new version to equal or surpass the original in all aspects. Otherwise, why buy it?

 

Yea, it's like 7-GIG

 

Okay, several people have already posted about the update, so I'm just going to try and post comments (and pictures!--I apologize in advance for some of the blurriness) and thoughts that haven't already been seen here. I received mine on Wednesday so play time has been limited, but so far here's some of my thoughts:

1. Everyone keeps asking about the voice. Well, daggummit, I made a voice sample for y'all to hear. The quality isn't the greatest as I grabbed it off one of those voice memo recorders, but you'll get the idea. Closest I can think of is Demi Moore after a heavy night of drinking and smoking:

New Navi Voice

(Also worthy of note to the ubergeeks with perfect pitch: The "ding" chime that preceeds a voice instruction has been lowered in pitch. I don't know if it's because they re-recorded it or because they slowed down all the waveforms during playback to give the chick a deeper voice.)

2. The database version is from 07/15/03, the most recent database available in all current Hondas and Acuras. This is the same database currently found in the MDX as well as the TSX and the Accord.



3. The only real change in operation is the fact that there are now two overlapping datasets: (a) the old, verified road database (I don't know if these roads have been updated or just copied over), and (b) the new, unverified road database. Although the supplement that comes with the DVD talks at length about unverified roads, it never actually says how they determined which is which. My guess--and this is only a guess--is unverified roads are those roads that were imported from someone else's database (another company, etc) and not physically driven (i.e. verified) to make sure they are accurate. The only problem with this is that the unverified data is pretty much everything else the last version didn't have--like they just overlayed a full road map of the entire country onto their current dataset, and anything that wasn't already covered is now considered unverified streets. As such, you can tell the navi to ignore these roads when calculating a route by choosing the option in the set-up menu:



By default, the disc starts with the option set to "off" which means the navi pretty much ignores all those new roads and only calculates routes by the old data. Kinda defeats the purpose of having the new disc if you ask me. With it off, the navi draws a dotted-blue vector line from your starting point to your ending point (in addition to drawing the solid blue route line showing your intended route) to give you an idea of where you need to go. If you can see roads on the navi that you want to take you can drive down them, but the navi will try and get you back onto the verified roads as quicky as possible.

4. To me, this next thing is the worst part of this new disc: the unverified roads (light tan) are displayed in a different color than the verifield roads (black/red). This wouldn't be so bad except light tan is the absolute worst contrasting color against the light grey background:



This picture makes it look *better* than it actually is because this was shot at night (with navi set on "Day" mode) in a dark car with the brightness on *max*. They are so faint they are next to impossible to see during the day when the sun is shining in the car, and forget it if you are wearing sunglasses. Why the heck they chose that color is beyond me, but it is horrendous. This is what the same shot looks like with navi set to "Night" mode (such as when your lights are on):



Notice the big contrast in how easy it is to see the black streets but not the tan ones. Also, remember, this is with the brightness on the display turned up to max. Here's what day and night look like with the brightness set to just below half (my normal setting):




Even if it doesn't look it, take my word for it--the new streets are very hard to see in at night and even worse during the day.

5. If you set the Unverified Routing option to "on" in the setup (and I highly recommend you do otherwise you won't use the new roads), whenever you calculate a new route that uses even one unverified road, you get this warning on the screen *and* the voice reads it to you verbatim:



This happens *every* time and you cannot bypass it--you can touch the "OK" and make the box disappear but the voice still has to finish reading it to you. And there's no way to not have this show up. In addition, when you go from a verified to an unverified road, you get a large yellow bar across the top that says "Entering Unverified Area" and the voice also says that. As directions come up, the voice ends every instruction with the words "if possible." So on a verified road, it would say "In a half mile, make a left turn." On an unverified road it would say "In a half mile, make a left turn if possible." Something tells me that's going to get real annoying real fast.

Also, with the old database, the full screen driving instructions (the big arrows overlayed on sections of road) showed light blue roads with big yellow arrows on them and the name of the road you were about to turn on to appeared in a light blue box at the top of the screen. It still does all that with the verified roads, but with the unverified roads it makes the arrows pink and the street name is in a dark blue box across the top. I think Acura's lawyers got too involved in making this DVD--there are way too many reminders and differences between verified and unverified roads, probably to avoid liability if you end up in a bad part of town on the wrong road and get jacked up.

6. If you use the full map view when following a route (as opposed to the screen by screen instructions, there is also a change. Instead of a blue line with arrows every so often showing you your route, it is now blue over verified roads and dotted blue-and-pink over unverified roads:



As for the speed, my own observations tell me the system is either the same or slightly slower in making calculations. After a few days with this I don't think anyone would notice. However, what I *did* notice was a much more pronounced lag in the touch-screen response to my input. I press a letter and it takes longer for it to acknowledge it, probably because it has a bigger database to sort through so it knows which letters to "grey out" because they can't be used next. That may take some getting used to.

I haven't really had much time to play with the POIs yet (hopefully this weekend), but I will make two comments: (a) there are definitely a lot more in there (they say double and based on my area I believe it) and (b) it looks like they didn't just add them, but also updated old ones. There's a restuarant in my neighborhood that got bought out and renamed but they kept the same phone number (and obviously location as well). The name change is on the new disc with the old (but correct) phone number and location. So that's a good thing.

Naming final destinations seem to be a mixed bag: sometimes it will tell me which side of the street ("In a half mile, destination ahead on the left") and other times it won't ("In a half mile, destination ahead"). I've seen it do both on unverified and verified roads so I'm not sure what the deal is (yet). I'll keep an eye on it and see if I can detect a pattern.

This probably seems like a lot more bitching than good stuff, but I want to make sure everyone understands there are a few downsides to this new disc. Personally, I like it (except for the damn color of the roads). The new POIs are nice, but it's the road coverage I like the best. I live in a very rural area and all the roads are in there. Every public road in my town is listed--even some that are just dirt farm roads only passible on tractor or four-wheel drive.

I'll be happy to answer any other questions or look up streets/addresses for anyone if you are trying to decide whether or not to buy this disc. And on that note, my version 2.04 disc is officially for sale. I'll be posting it (as others will as well, I'm sure) in the For Sale forum very soon.

 

Awesome review
Thanks!

 

Why there is no coverage for Vermont state? The whole state is not covered. Burligton, VT is freakin huge city.

Also, why they dropped Canada cover if it is available on the MDX and new TL Nav DVD!!!

Nashua.

 

Philips (amongst others) are getting ready to sell dual layer DVD+R burners so making backups is only a few weeks away .I am buying one as soon as it is available along with software to make it all work .

Jens

 

Your "the response time is slower" comment has me VERY concerned... The system was slow enough before, now if it's even slower because of the larger database, that's going to suck...

 

I'm sure the larger database has something to do with it. But it is also just generally slower. For example, when I press on the map to get the long/lat., elevation, etc. it used to come up immedately and populate the screen immedately. Now when the screen comes up it takes a good 2-3 seconds before it's populated with that data. It's kind of annoying, but still worth having all the newest information.

 

Don't go by the link on the Acura or Alpine site--those don't seem to be accurate. VT *is* covered, quite extensively. However, just about all of the roads are of the unverified nature. So as long as you set the Unverified Routing option to "on" you will be able to go to most any address in VT.

 

I cannot confirm for a fact that it is, in fact, slower, but it is defintiely not faster. If it is slower, it is just by a little bit (for routing). Touch response defintely seems slower--but again, not by much.

 

I haven’t really noticed any slowdown yet.

Wednesday night I was mapping an alternate route to my one friend’s house because there were several accidents on the main roads that I knew.
Of course the system kept trying to put me on the highways and I kept ignoring the commands and following the route on the back roads.
It kept saying “recalculating route” whenever I missed a planned turn and it seemed to quickly re-route me to the road I wanted.

Shawn S

 

Also, one other comment I forgot on my review--the unverified roads only show up at the two most zoomed-in views (1/20th and 1/8th mile). Once you go to 1/4 mile or further out, only the verified roads show up. To me this isn't a big deal since the unit defaults to displaying at 1/8 mile and I hardly ever change the zoom under normal use.

 

Speaking of checking the lattitude and longitude, altitude information is also displayed-and mine is way off. See if yours is that way too if you will. I drove right by an airport hanger here where posted on the hanger is "Palwaukee Airport. Elevation: 647 ft. I pressed the upper left hand corner and the navi sai something like 518 feet. That is a lot of error.

Tip: subtract posted airport altitude by 10'. Back when the FAA posted rules about this, the most used important airplane around was the DC-3, where the pilots eyes were about 10 feet above the ground. His altimeter would read 647 feet, but the ground would be 637 feet in reality.

 

GPS and altitude has more information in this thread.

 

Awesome review on the new Navi.

I got it on Monday and since then its been working great. I like the new voice and the fact that it shows schools now. (red box with flag on top)

 

EDIT… Shawn S

NO TALK OF COPYING DVD’S PLEASE

By the way… This thread is ANCIENT