I just received an email from Nokia UK "showcasing" 4 of their current top devices.

The first in the list is the N900, with the features listed as:

Full internet browsing with Maemo browser powered by Mozilla
• Touch screen + 48GB memory
• GPS and FREE navigation with Ovi Maps replace your Sat-Nav
• 5MP camera + video

That gps bullet suggests (in terms of replacing sat nav) that this is fully ovi maps enabled. The current version doesn't really cut it

So is this
* over-optimistic marketing
* A hint of ovi maps improving soon

I hope for the 2nd but suspect the first

i wud say full ovi maps coming with next major update (which should be very soon)
just a guess like.

joe

Yeah right, I have been waiting for ovi map to have Japan map with a little more detail.

I think so.

And that's not the very first case from Nokia.

Have you tried to run OVI ARCHIVES on N900?

Nokia engineers anyway in last interviews said that all next Ovi Maps versions will be the same on Symbian and Maemo/MeeGo thanks to Qt.

No, it doesn't... For me, this is the most disappointing "feature" of the N900. I don't really have a need for GPS in my daily commute. However in the past month, there have been multiple occassions where I could have used one. Instead, I was left feeling very frustrated with the N900's inability to get me from point A to B. We can only hope Nokia understands the need for work in this area and we will see something soon.

Was in the Nokia shop in banbury the other day, guy there said free navigation would be in "the next few days"

he may know, or he may have been talking BS, i dunno... maybe true tho...

There's some hopeful messages here. PR 1.2 should be out before too long - wasnt it by around end/Feb.

Just waiting for that update notification! (on global fw) to see...

The current Ovi Maps is embarrassingly bad and is rocks and stones primitive compared to the user experience of a dedicated device like a Tom Tom / Garmin. High quality free mapping across a broad range of devices & countries seems to be a big part of Nokia's strategy and with their purchase of Navteq they are uniquely positioned in terms of having access to some of the best maps globally. Unfortunately, about all their software has going for it is that it is free. I really hope that Nokia sicks some high quality UI & developer talent into creating an navigation app that truly fills people's needs and isn't just a marketing bullet point.

Does that mean they started from scratch again, throwing away maemo ovi maps and symbian ovi maps to create an ovi maps on qt that works the same on symbian and maemo? ;-)