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ALK CoPilot Live 7 for Windows Mobile Review
| Author | Sandra Vogel |
| Published | 1st Nov 2007 |
| Manufacturer | ALK |
| Supplier | Clove |
| Price | £69.57 (Exc VAT) |
| as reviewed | £80.00 (Inc VAT) |
| Latest Price | Click here |
| Features |  |
| Usability | |
| Value | |
| Overall | |
2 comments
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TrustedReviews NewslettersThere are various map styles, and a setting for Themes. At some point ALK intends to enable users to design themes styles which will be downloadable via CoPilot Central.
It is easy to minimise the software so you can pop off and do something else. An icon sits on the Windows Mobile Today screen. Tap it and CoPilot Live 7 comes to the fore once more.
None of this good stuff matters much if it is difficult to enter addresses in the first places. This is the point at which so many navigation applications, both PND and add-on, let you down. ALK has worked on this and allows things like user choice of keyboard style - A-Z, qwerty or azerty (used in France and other European countries) to help with data input.
Full seven digit postcodes are used in the UK, and as you start to type the software narrows down its options so that you are presented with a picklist. If I have to grumble about something it is that the picklist only shows two options at a time. Now, clearly ALK needs to provide a large tappable keyboard and can't compromise this for the picklist. But I wonder if there might be a way of offering longer picklists even if it's just by making the font used smaller.
In use I found instructions to be loud, clear and precise. It is great that there is a settings area for turn warnings. You can choose any - or all - options to get instructions at two miles, one mile, 500 yards and at turns as well as what the software calls ‘near turn' for local roads. You can even set the distance from turn warning between three and eight seconds from the point at which you turn, which seems a bit like overkill on the customisation front to me.
If you buy the TMC add-on (at £35) and delivered over the air, then you can choose for automatic routing around incidents.
Verdict
Before I saw CoPilot Live 7 I was sceptical that the improvements could really make much of a difference to what was already good software. But I was wrong. In my mind this sets the standard for Smartphone navigation that others have to challenge.
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earthgate said on 1st August 2008
Ponto said on 15th January 2009
Great GPS program, It's just a real shame that the maps are so out of date. There are estates which have been built locally for 2 years, yet thy are not on the maps. I have to... more
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I have been running this on my N95 along with my tomtom rider v2. On the hole not bad piece on software, but has a few let downs
Bad points
1) safety camera database... more