Ovi Maps with free navigation now available for N97
by Volker Weber
Look what showed up in my Update application on the N97 today? It's Ovi Maps 3.3 with free navigation. Make sure you have enough space to install the update. This is what you get:
Ovi Maps has a huge benefit, apart from that is is free. You can preload all maps to your device so you are not incurring outrageous roaming charges when abroad. Nokia has maps for more than 70 countries and now gives away navigation including turn-by-turn instructions with text-to-speech for street names. Very, very cool. The N97 just became a lot more useful.
When the free navigation was initially announced, the N97 was not among the supported devices. Unfortunately Nokia has no plans to port this software from Symbian to Maemo. Here is how you download the maps to your device without using Nokia Map Loader.
Comments
"Unfortunately Nokia has no plans to port this software from Symbian to Maemo." Oh yes, they have, but it will be "fixed in Harmattan" (aka Maemo6) and not the current Maemo5 on the N900. :-(
Well, there is a good chance that Maemo 6 runs on N900.
It seems that the Nokia Map Update doesn't work when behind a proxy (at least not under Win 7). I can't find a setting in the software itself, browser settings use the proxy (IE and FF), but Nokia Map Updater says it can't connect to the server. Outside the office (i.e. without a proxy) - no problem... Not exactly 2010-style software, I'd say!
There is a reason I linked to the page which explains how to download maps without the Loader.
Any idea for Nokia E71 support. It was not there in the initial announcement but i thought they will be adding E71 as i believe it's quite popular.
