Mobile phone as sat nav- recommendations?

[biosurf]

I know there have been a few discussions around GPS etc. recently but can’t find one specific to mobiles recently enough to make it meaningful.

I’m coming to the end of my contract and looking for a mobile to use as sat nav. Mem map as well as the standard uses.

Main criteria are:
Large screen without being PDA size
Not a flip phone
Reasonable battery life
Able to use sat/nav GPS including memory map (basically I want to be able to use this as sat nav on road to find my way around but also to use it offroad when greenlaning with memory map and GPS
Able to use long and lat coordinates as well as postcodes
Have a camera but doesn’t need to be all singing all dancing huge megapixel
Decent for internet usage with fast enough firmware to make it livable with
A contract that includes data for a decent monthly price (not, for instance 02 who seem to charge a fortune)
Touch screen only if it is very usable and sensitive
Not fussed about amazing music abilities – basic MP3 is fine
Radio nice but not essential



Any suggestions on either phone and/or contract gratefully received

Does Sat Nav use data (i.e. web link) or jut standalone GPS? (I presume the latter)

I know I seem to be asking the world but really want to use my next phone as sat nav both in my car and when on foot in London

Thanks

[TOC]

I have a blackberry 8310 and it has GPS sat nav but i also installed googlemaps which is awesome as you can in addresses and get directions from the phone in a step by step manner.

It has camera too.. i think there is a new one which is called "Blackberry Bold"

Also has excellent email feature which is probably the best, but you dont have to subscribe to that if you dont want it.

[dirtydog]

i know you said you dont like o2 but I have an XDA Orbit II and I love it! I used an orange SPV M600 before and this is miles better.

[nero279]

i've been using an SPV M700 for about 18 months now, and it's been good, relatively small for a PDA/smartphone, and more reliable than my previous xda exec, or xda IIi, (though my sister has an orbit which seems equally better than the exec). i wouldn't want a screen any smaller for memory map, the m700 is just about usable on mm with os maps loaded.

[kiowa]

nokia n95 8gb

[an1mal_69]

Ive just got a Samsung Omnia..Is essentially a PDA, yet its smaller than an iPhone. Runs on windows mobile 6.1 so you have choice of multiple SatNav programs inc TomTom. Phone is available free on 18mnth contracts (mine is £35/mnth with 200 mins, 1000txts and unlimited data).

Alternatively, hang onto the end of the month for the new Nokia N96

[da SLUG man]

the IPhone GPS uses Google maps... satellite mapping, and normal maps on there...

with the O2 contract you get unlimited 3G data and free wifi on "BTopenzone" or "the cloud"
(Park outside any McDonalds or a hotel and you'll get access!!)

have a look on iTunes "Appstore" and you can see the ammount of applications you can download for it!... some quite good apps using the GPS combined with he accellerometer

[an1mal_69]

iphone has had its day..

windows mobile is the way to go..check XDA developers sites for apps galore..!!

the iphone is a great bit of kit (got an itouch myself), the user interface is 2nd to none, but will it run tomtom, memory maps..?? They dont even do MMS msgs without hacking them

[da SLUG man]

i was a bit gutted about the MMS.... it's something you just expect a phone to have!!...

was over a week before i realised that i couldn't send a pic!...

it doesn't have video calling either.


saying that... i use it more than any other phone i've had before!... mainly down to the screen size and free data/wifi



(oh, and my previous was a Nokia N95... the satnav is crap!!... dunno if it's any better on the 8gb, as it's a different phone)

[chaiwalla]

I'm using Nokia N95 8gb with TomTom mobile. You still need an external bluetooth GPS unit as TomTom won't work with the internal GPS. The internal GPS works with Nokia maps and google maps but i prefer TomTom for road navigation. Haven't tried running memory map on it yet.
The phone's great though, big screen, loads of memory, good camera and mp3 player can, connects to data using 3.5g so really quick data transfer ( i get 460kbps when using the phone as a modem for my laptop), can even connect to wifi networks where available so no mobile data usage.