Just remember that the iphone is not actually a true GPS receiver, probably the reason it doesnt suffer from lack of satellites.

 

Pretty sure the 3GS iPhone is a true GPS receiver, the older ones triangulate using cell towers I believe. I use my 3GS for GPS all the time and it can be accurate within feet, at least as accurate as any other portable GPS I have owned.

As far as the RER nav radio I have never had any issues with it getting off track, never even looked at the number of sats its using. But the Pioneer 310 nav HU n my other car can end up miles off at times, have to do a hard reset to get it back on track and it shows 5-6 satellites and high signal strength al the time.

 

I'm not sure about the problems you were mentioning, but updating the map made a huge difference on accuracy problems. I never realized that the updates really had so much in them. I saw on a blog somewhere about the map company just published and update on www.updateyourmap.com. Noticed it updated the restaurants on there and the newer neighborhoods/developments too.

 

Nav is the most expensive non necessary thing and half the time it is wrong. Take you into the wrong neighbourhood in Chicago or New York and see how much you like your Nav.
Just google your trip and print out the map and directions for free before you leave, you can even do alternate routes just incase something is wrong the first way when you get going.

 

is there an official dodge site for updating our nav? or is that updateyourmap site the way to go?

 

the road highlighting is most likely the traffic info from sarius, it highlights the road in green-yellow-red based on traffic....im sure you can turn it off, its actually on of my favorite features so I havent messed with it.

 

how would google or even a map prevent you from going into the bad neighborhoods?.....

I travel a lot and the factory nav is one of the most useful options on my truck, just wish I could enter adresses and POI's while driving.....

 

That url is part of navteq's website, and it seems like all roads lead to navteq, so to speak. What I found out (asking around, price shopping) is that updates for dodge and many other car makes use navteq for the maps. My friend got something from her VW dealer and it led to navteq product. I didn't look too far for Dodge (since I already did it), but did a basic google search and didn't find anything else. Good luck!

 

I gave up on my factory nav. I now use my Droid with google maps. It's much better than the trucks. It gives better voice directions and even shows the street view when I reach my destination.
My onboard GPS did this a bunch.. I even turned the truck off.
Showed me way out in the middle of galveston bay.


I kinda wish I would have saved my money on the nav. It looks cool though! Oh and the maps are always out of date as well. And they charge you to update it! Google maps is always up to date.
--Hop

 

*edit glitched double post... delete this please mods