Why read a flat map, when you can luxuriate in a 3D GPS-style rendering of exactly where you are on the highway – for FREE! Israeli company 3DVU (I interviewed the CEO, Isaac Levanon, a couple of years ago) has a new product called Way2Go,

“the first and only personalized Web-to-Mobile route planner giving real-time turn-by-turn, GPS tracking, voice and text guidance navigation for PC and mobile phones with full 3D aerial photography and real terrain elevation of entire countries.  Way2Go is based on patented technology, enabling users to plan, review, share and navigate their routes in a full 3D virtual world with smooth zooming and perspective angle maneuverability. Way2Go one-ups mapping solutions like MapQuest, Google Map and Yahoo Maps.”

Don’t take their word for it – download a free route map when you sign up. The Way2Go service, which provides you with up to 15 route maps a month, usually costs $4.99 a month, but they are giving away a sample route for FREE! You register, download the appropriate viewer – Windows, Symbian, Blackberry, or Windows Mobile – and build yourself a route map for any to-from route in the US, UK, Germany, and some other European countries.

If you don’t want to subscribe to a GPS service, Way2Go is a great alternative, because there are no online charges – you download the route directly to your device, in advance of your trip – and the Way2Go maps are way better than anything Google or Yahoo has. 3DVU has its own rendering engine (used in its other products as well). If nothing else, a 3D map will keep you more alert on the road, making it safer for you to drive. I downloaded a map with a route from my parents’ house on the Jersey Shore to NYC – the Garden State Parkway never looked so good!

This entry was posted on Monday, April 20th, 2009 at 10:51 am and is filed under cellphones, hi-tech, israel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.