My POSITIVE experience with Gen 4 Navigation

Where did you get the Gen 4, v9 DVD from and how much was it?

 

Glad you had a good experience with it, and it is better than no GPS. But to me it is sort of like watching tv with rabbit ears or a VHS versus a 720p signal through satellite or 1080p through bluray. Yeah they both give you the same thing, but one is obviously much better and doesnt require constant rewrapping of tinfoil to get the signal through.

If you have never really used or needed GPS, then Toyota nav is ok. But having used many GPS units I can say Toyota's OEM is severely lacking. This includes OEM such as Honda/Acura, BMW, and Toyota/Lexus along with PNDs (personal navigation devices) like a TomTom, Garmin Nuvi's, Magellen's and some no-name chinese brand (that was surprisingly good), AND PC based solutions like Microsoft Streets & Trips, iGuidance 3 and 4, GarminPC, and Destinator, and then mobile versions like Google Maps/Earth on my Windows Mobile Phone with built in GPS as well as iGuidance mobile.

The "polish" is what I find lacking the most. I would prefer to have a solid "home" button like on many systems. I know you can program 1/2/3/etc hotkeys, but a #1 or a picture of a bell doesnt really say home like a big 'ol button. Also in the Toyota/Lexus nav I have used, 2008 being the most recent, the GPS announced turn direction and distance ahead but not street names. Believe me it is really nice to hear "in 123 feet turn left onto XYZ street". You dont really think it is a big thing, but when navigating a busy foreign city it is an asset. There could be 4 streets between the warning and the turn and you are constantly checking distnace versus the map to guess which street it is since you cant really read the screen in rush hour traffic. TTS (Text to Speech) is very important. Some other not-so important but cool things I miss would be the 3D view offered by iGuidance which lets you choose 2D top down, or 3 different 3D views to give you more of the view you would get if you were in the 3rd person camera in a racing game. Following from behind you looking forwards and slightly above. Other things that were really nice in some of the microsoft offerings and of course in Google's would be satellite images streamed live via the internet. My Civic has this and it is awesome when you pull up to a plaza and you can see the satellite image of the plaza and exactly where the store is in the complex instead of driving around with a generic dot on the road.

There are lots more, but I wont bore you too much. Glad you are happy, but there are much better options out there if you ever want to venture out.

 

can someone post the part numbers for a version 9.1 disc for gen 4 nav??
please post both lines of part numbers, for example the v7.1 part numbers are 867271-33047 and 464210-0960

My 2005 is still running v4.2, I was just about to buy a used v7.1 on ebay for $130 including shipping, but If DENSO has created a newer version I'd rather go to the toyota dealership and dish out $200 for a brand new v9.1, hopefully I can find a coupon lying around to use at the parts desk.

Does anyone know if only the maps get upgraded when you get a newer disc, or does the nav speed up, sometimes I click on a section of the map and it takes a couple of seconds to re-center the screen.

 

I bought 8.1 for $50 from someone on Craig's list. It is a copy but it works great. There is no way that the updates are worth over $200.

It was really nice to get 8.1 as I was running 4.2 since 2005. Though not much has changed where I live, the new POIs were nice to have.

 

okay i found 2 dvd discs on ebay that both claim to be for gen 4 v9.1:

86271-33048 "U24"
and
86271-33049 "U23"

does anyone know why there are two version 9.1 part #'s for the gen 4 nav system?? is only one the correct one??