Reviews
App Review: CoPilot Live takes Android voice navigation in the right direction
July 15, 2009 | by Andrew Kameka
Android App Reviews, Featured post, Reviews, Travel
Put on your seatbelt, check your mirrors, and launch CoPilot Live for Android? That’s not the traditional pre-driving routine, but it’s what I did when testing CoPilot Live, a new GPS application that offers turn-by-turn voice navigation for Android. The ALK-produced service creates Android GPS navigation systems on the fly thanks to massive map libraries available for every inhabited region of the planet.
CoPilot also offers enough features to make me wonder if it would sink or swim during a marathon road-trip through Florida. Here are a few impressions of my Weekend With CoPilot.
DESTINATIONS
CoPilot Live has a standard entry method for destination searches. Users can enter the address, cross streets, points of interest, points on a map, recent GPS coordinates, or GPS information stored in photos on an SD card. The app predicts city and street names as text is entered, then automatically calculates a route from your current GPS position.
My nephew and I set-out from Miami to attend a concert in Orlando, visit friends in Kissimmee and Lakeland, and watch a NASA shuttle launch from a friend’s house in Cocoa Beach. The shuttle launch would eventually be scrapped before we returned home, but would CoPilot prove to be equally as disappointing?
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VOICE GUIDANCE
How does turn-by-turn voice navigation work in CoPilot Live? Very well. CoPilot offers clearly understandable voices in 28 languages, including English (Australian, US, and UK), French, German, Spanish and more. The American-accented Jill was a pleasure to listen to as I traveled more than 700 miles this weekend, a big improvement from the choppy voice libraries I’ve experienced in the past.
Instructions are clearly stated and turn notifications are available at 2 miles, 1 mile, and 3/10th mile before the next turn. The volume level was strong on my T-Mobile G1 even when music played in the background at a reasonable level. However, if you listen to music as unnecessarily loud as I do, you’ll need to lower the volume when the 2-mile warnings start. I missed a notification at one point and kept right rather than left, thus getting on the wrong road. Thankfully, CoPilot recognized this and gave me instructions to exit and return to the right course.
MAP MODES
CoPilot offers display options for 2D, 3D, itinerary, 2D next turn, and a glance-friendly Driver Safety mode. Each option has its own usefulness and method for displaying progress or miles until the next movement. I used the 3D and “Planning A Trip” modes because I had several stops to make in different towns, so I wanted something incredibly easy to read. After all, my actual copilot controlling the phone for the first leg of the trip was my eight-year-old nephew, so CoPilot needed to be an easy visualization of the route. Both of us were able to sneak quick glances at the device and quickly know how to travel the highway networks of Central Florida.
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POINTS OF INTEREST
Every GPS device must be able to find places to eat, get gas, rest, or repair a vehicle. Thankfully, I only needed to worry about the first two, but the POI database proved effective as I drove north. CoPilot charted a route that took me to a familiar rest stop in Fort Pierce, but I didn’t want to get anything to eat there. It was much more appealing to drive to a nearby restaurant en route to our exit from the Turnpike towards Interstate-95. CoPilot offers a view of several nearby restaurants – ranging from big chains to locally-owned establishments – and shows distance, contacts, and routes for making stops. Gas stations were also displayed, which came in handy when I was running almost on ‘E’ on the I-4.
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ACCURACY/RELIABILITY
The true test of a GPS app is its accuracy and reliability. CoPilot performed well in one aspect and good in another. As I expected, the app could not get me to a friend’s house because she lived in a relatively new subdivision (neither could Google Maps or MapQuest, so I can’t really fault them there). I was able to get there thanks to a cross street search and all other searches were spot-on accurate in getting me to my destination. The routes were accurate and reflected the shortest time getting to the destination.
Reliability twice proved to be a concern. On the drive north, a massive thunderstorm created traffic problems and made it difficult to establish a data connection with my network. I tried to connect to the Live Traffic/Weather service to confirm that it reflected the slow-down, but no service was available. Obviously, T-Mobile is at fault for that, not CoPilot, but it reflects a potential problem of using a mobile phone-based GPS program.
On another leg of the trip, traveling on the I-4 to Lakeland, CoPilot inexplicably froze on me and stopped providing instructions. I’m not sure what caused it because maps are stored on the SD card rather than pulled from the Internet, so the connection shouldn’t have been an issue.
Overall, I must say that CoPilot was very solid and reliable given the circumstances. After all interruptions, including incoming calls, CoPilot promptly re-launched and resumed navigation.
SPECIAL FEATURES
CoPilot offers three special features that may interest Android users: Live, My Places, and PhotoNav
- Live Service – Live Traffic updates users to reported traffic incidents nearby, en route, or in a destination city (important for considering detours); Live Weather warns of impending weather conditions at the destination; Live Link reveals user positions and allows subscribers to message or track other CoPilot users. I found no use for Live Link, but it’s an optional feature that others may enjoy.
- My Places – Stores shortcuts to stored destinations like Home, Work, Recent, and Favorites. Each provides easy access to navigation to common addresses or recent locations. Users can quickly add to their favorites by pressing “Save Current Location” when they travel somewhere. If you enjoy a new establishment or attraction, save the coordinates for safe keeping and quick re-visiting at a later date.
- PhotoNav – CoPilot can browse a photo gallery and search for coordinates stored within an image. Imagine stumbling upon a great beach and deciding to take photos with family or friends. If your device has enabled storing GPS coordinates within the photo’s details, PhotoNav will be able to browse the gallery and provide turn-by-turn navigation to return to the spot that photo was taken. The feature allows users to return to exact locations just as easily as photos allow them to return to those memories.
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CONCLUSIONS
Despite the storm, I made it to my friend’s home in Cocoa Beach. Over the next three days, CoPilot then easily led me to a pleasant trip to Kissimmee, a nice lunch on the way to Lakeland, and a fast route to the event in Orlando that I thoroughly enjoyed.
I have never attempted to visit as many places or people in such a short amount of time, and I’m thankful to have had CoPilot guiding me most of the way. I could have printed directions for each stop, but that would have been wasteful and not as efficient as having my phone tell me the quickest way to get to each destination.
In four days, I traveled nearly 700 miles to five towns and countless stops over a dozen roadways. CoPilot Live was a top-notch guide throughout the long-winded weekend. As long as I have an Android device, I’ll more than likely continue using this application.
- CoPilot Live is available in the Android Market for $34.99 USD (one-time fee)
- Premium services for Live Traffic and Fuel price listings are also available in certain regions
- Requires an SD card that is at least 2GB or more of memory
- Maps are licensed and downloaded by continent or region (North America, Europe, Oceania, etc.)
App: CoPilot Live
Price: $34.99 USD
Website: http://www.alk.com/copilot/android
it's terrible, it tells you to turn after the turning, it stops the phone from doing anything else (like text or phone calls), it takes forever to re-calculate and when it does it just tries to make you go back on yourself
DON'T WASTE YOUR MONEY PEOPLE!
It works just great! I am using the EU version here in Germany and it gives indications of a turn well in advance.. so much so that my father-in-law hates it for it's accuracy… ha ha ha. It reroutes you very quickly and makes you double back if that is the only way to reach your destination. It's true that once in GPS mode you cannot multitask with calls, text messages & video games unless they are incoming… not outgoing (I like the idea of doing all those while driving). When I am driving through small European side streets I want to know my destination… not a random text about the weather in Cali.
Hello Gregory,
How long have you be working for CoPilot ? Did they give you promotion yet ? You are certainly kissing all the right places to get it.
CoPilot is totally unreliable with dreadful support. An early beta product that never seems to get any better. It loses its configuration every week, you have to do a fresh install again and again, it can’t download its maps properly. Running CoPilot is not an aid, it’s a (very boring) full time job.
Dreadful product. Don’t believe this guy.
When I bought my G1, I thought it would solve my need for a GPS. I was so wrong. Driving while looking at the Google maps thing is going to get me killed. There is a definite need for this application. I probably still won't buy it. $35 + 2GB card is not a cheap solution. Plus the standard G1 GPS appliation goes bonkers all the time when I use it. It continuously says I am miles off from my real location and sometimes can't find the GPS satellites at the worst times. I am worried that the G1 hardware just isn't good for serious GPS. I love my G1 but I think I am going to just buy a stand alone GPS.
Check out TeleNav GPS for Android Phone. I have been using it for over 6 months and I am very happy with it and I have stop using stand alone GPS device I own. The TeleNav Andoid GPS has more futures than the top of the line stand alone GPS device that I own.
I got a review copy I'm about to test out. I've only used TeleNav on my G1 and it got uninstalled as I returned to my TomTom.
Right now, I'm liking Waze the best on Android. It still needs a ton of work, but it is getting better.
I think AndNav2 is the way to go, just needs some support and perhaps a little bit of time to make it more polished, but its starting to look really good.
I thoroughly agree with Maff’s problems with late voice instructions. Unlike some Android nav sofwtare it understands the concept of a roundabout in the UK but it’s a little late to tell me which exit to take when I’m half way across it. It also completely missed instructions for taking a slip road to leave a major road. The only reliable way to use it is to have a passenger looking at the screen and giving you the instructions themself.
I am keeping it though as I’m travelling over the pond soon, can’t use nav software that needs data due to high roaming charges and the cost of CoPilot with UK and USA maps is approximately one tenth of the cost of a TomTom with the same.
Wow, I like the special features. Like the photo nav, and my places. It's pretty pricey though for just an app!
The late turn instruction issue is fixed in the latest update to copilot on the android site. So there.
To be fair, GPS signals can only bu guaranteed to give you a position within 50 feet or so of your actual position (although they can often be more accurate than that) so it's difficult to imagine any satnavs giving you an accurate indication of when exactly to make your turn.
I didn't experience any problems with the late announcements. If you go to settings, you can add more announcements for 2 miles or quicker directions to put you on alert for the turn. Whether local road or highway, I was able to easily spot my turn based on instructions.
@Tim
It's correct that a common 'civi' GPS reciever will determine the position with about 5-15 metres (15 metres = 50 feet), though the signal is often SA-scrambled making it even more inaccurate.
@Guest
SA was turned off in 2000. There’s still an anti-spoof capability in Navstar, but the 15 metres of error includes this.
I've been using this app for a couple weeks now, and it's worked really well for me. It got confused about just where an exit was once, but it's not like I expect to be able to completely turn my brain off while driving anyway.
The big problem is their support. Or, more precisely, a total lack of support. I've never been able to get set up so that I can download maps using their PC client – it doesn't know that I have an account even though I went through the registration process, and it wants to charge me for map downloads. So, I have to download all of the maps on my phone, which is far slower. I've sent many e-mails, and I've only ever gotten one form-letter response that didn't address my problem.
ALK is a joke when it comes to technical support. The Co-Pilot app installed without a problem on my G1, but it kept failing to download the maps over a WiFi connection. I installed Co-Pilot Central on my PC, but that also failed to download maps for North America. My email to tech support has gone unanswered. I'll stick with my Garmin.
I had a problem with map downloading. and I sent them an email and they did not reply to me. I hate it so much. I recommend not to buy it.
Update on the support issue I mentioned above – two months later, and they still never helped me. Their answer to my problem with the PC client was to send me a link to download the maps directly on my phone. I replied back with yet another plea to assist me with the PC software itself, but they never replied.
I'm still using the software, and I like it. Even when Google Nav comes online, it will still not be a complete solution for me because I do a lot of traveling in the boonies where a data connection isn't available. Still…how this company expects to succeed when they seem to have no ability or even desire to help their customers is beyond me.
I asked ALK how often the CoPilot failed (information that any user would want in order to know whether it is safe to rely upon the product or not). As a safety advisory to other CoPilot users, I posted ALK's response on Facebook that the failure rate of CoPilot ''is not available to customers''.
I promptly received this… message from ALK: ''…having reviewed your comments on Facebook
and with our own internal team, we believe the best course of action would be
to provide you with a full refund on your purchase…''.
Since I haven't asked for a refund, ALK's message feels to me remarkably like being shown to the nearest exit for asking about CoPilot's safety record.
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bought for maps without internet signal. It is unusable. The maps work, but a week or two it will deactivate itself. Unload, reload, get customer support to re-activate, it stops working again a week later. over and over. My account is still there, wont reactivate. A product requiring internet service to recheck its activation is useless without service anyway. Save your money.
Having got a new smartphone, I thought it would be easier and cheaper to get a sat nav software rather than a dedicated sat nav device. How wrong I was! CoPilot does not have the features that TomTom or Garmin has, such as being able to plot the fastest route whilst avoiding motorways (if motorways are avoided, CoPilot chooses the shortest route which goes through busy urban centres and such). If you choose to have street names spoken, it sounds like a poorly impersonated Stephen Hawking, and difficult to understand!
The main problem is the difficulty in getting a GPS fix, which could take several minutes to never getting a fix. There are loads of people saying the same thing on ALK blogs, and it all comes down to the type of GPS in most smartphones. Dedicated sat navs have full GPS which connect to satellites to get a fix. However, most smartphones have Assisted-GPS which needs an internet connection initially in order for CoPilot to get an approximate location fix, and then it will connect to the satellites.
Assisted-GPS is designed to find your location faster, but in my experience, it slows CoPilot down. Now if you don't want additional internet charges on your phone, then you may have your wi-fi or mobile data network turned off, and as a result, CoPilot cannot connect to the internet, and hence cannot get a GPS fix. And if you're a PAYG user like me, connecting to the mobile data network means incurring charges from the mobile company.
Despite complaining to ALK, they are not interested which means I've wasted paying for CoPilot. I've also read many people saying how the ALK customer and technical support is very poor.
I would recommend getting a dedicated sat nav rather than a smartphone sat nav, or to get something other than the useless CoPilot.