I’ve posted this before, and actually, in regards to Smart2Go (now called Nokia Maps), actually. But I have to say again, Bravo, Nokia, Bravo. Why do I say this? Well, for a couple reasons. The first, as I mentioned here, is because they’ve added A-GPS to the N95 (via firmware update, which means it could easily be added to other devices). A-GPS stands for Assisted Global Satellite Positioning, and is freakin incredible. It uses your device’s data connection to talk with a server (Nokia’s, in this case) to find out what towers it’s connected to, and where those are, to get a location. The best part is, the more you use it, the more towers are added to the database, and the faster and more accurate it gets!
I was able to get a lock on with A-GPS a full 17 seconds quicker than I was without it, and that’s with very little initial use. However, the other awesome part is that it works indoors, since it’s using a data connection. VERY cool. I was able to get a lock while standing in the middle of my house, and it tracked me walking around. I’m a HUGE fan of that.
The other big thing with Smart2Go/Nokia Maps lately is a new Maploader. When they said that it was 30x faster, I scoffed. I recall when it was first released, it took me over 8 hrs to download the Texas maps (104mb). Then, when they "updated" it, it was down to a few hours. With this new version 1.1, I seriously just downloaded the exact same Texas maps (104mb) in 10 minutes. Yes, you read that correctly. TEN MINUTES!! That’s stinking AWESOME.
So it appears as though once again Nokia has listened to user complaints and actually done something about it. Phenomenal. Bravo, Nokia, Bravo.
