I let someone borrow the Lexus for the night, which has GPS navigation… but I got a phone call that I had to come out to then to somewhere I’ve never been, and the location’s hard to find… and it’s at night. Normally I’d be like “Na, I won’t be able to find it without GPS…” but I decided to say yes and try to see if Google Maps and the Neocell’s non-GPS location could help me. Maybe using GPS turn-by-turn navigation isn’t needed.

Man was I wrong… I mean, the cell tower only location features (2G iPhones don’t have GPS) did ok for long distances… I can tell it would work perfectly fine for driving long distances from city to city or state to state. But for finding complex things in a city or town, it’s little more than you following Mapquest “paper” directions and seeing your location based on a mile or so.

That was my real experience using Google Maps as a GPS subsitute. I’ll take it over static, text and image only directions… but it’s so not the same as GPS navigation. But at least if I’m ever without GPS navigation, I can wing it with Google Maps, even if I may make a few wrong turns.

Peace, J