Product Description

Go!Explore is the 3D sat-nav for the PSP that uses a GPS receiver. A collaboration with market leaders TeleAtlas and NavNGo, Go!Explore is a fully functional, state of the art satellite navigation tool for PSP, incorporating both vehicle and pedestrian functionality, the very latest in three dimensional mapping technology and over 100 different categories of overlays for such things as speed cameras, petrol stations and restaurants. The Go! Explore package comes with the GPS system and a UMD featuring all UK and Ireland maps. You can choose from 12 languages and more voices will become available to download via the PSP Store.

• Points of Interest - Over 100 categories and sub-categories with thousands of locations
• Superior Graphics - 2D and 3D city maps with 3D landmarks
• Twelve Different Languages - Including 22 unique audio voices
• Find and Go - Easy search features and smart keyboard
• Smart Zoom - Automatic zooming and map tilting
• Explore Map - Search and explore the surrounding area
• My Data - Manage favourite trips, saved places and routes
• Route Settings - Fastest/shortest routes and safety/night modes
• Itinerary Mode - Step-by-step journey schedules
• Car Cradle - Turn your PSP into a in-car sat-nav with the car cradle

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #6389 in Computer & Video Games
• Brand: Sony
• Released on: 2008-07-18
• Platform: Sony PSP

Manufacturer's Description
PSP (PlayStationPortable) owners need never get lost again, because Go!Explore turns PSP into a state-of-the-art Global Positioning System, putting digital maps in the palm of your hand and making PSP the perfect travelling companion. Whether travelling abroad or tracking down a much talked about pub in your home town – plug Go!Explore into your PSP to open up the world around you.

Customer Reviews

A Great Add on for your PSP - It really is a SatNav!
I bought this one in a major UK high street store two weeks ago and have been very impressed with the results. After a bit of getting used to it works as well as any other Sat Nav I have used. The device to attach it to your windscreen is sturdy and fully adjustable; it picks the signal up very quickly and has a variety of routes to choose from (economical, fastest etc). Navigation of the software using the PSP controls is easy, typing addresses using the on screen keyboard is a joy; the predictive software is logical and fast. Personally I have never liked the touch screen sat navs so the use of the D-Pad and other PSP buttons is a functional plus point for me. Once your route is selected there are a host of bonuses - seek out nearest petrol stations, shops, bars, places of interest - its like a mini tourist focused yellow pages coming along for the trip!

Drawbacks? Well yes - the built in speaker is pretty quite in my car so I have to use the headphone socket to feed the sound to my Cars stereo system - not ideal but it works very well.

I have not tested it on foot - the 3D maps look great but I don't fancy wandering the streets with mp PSP and Sat Nav gizmo on full display!

Conclusion - for the £100 or so outlay you are getting the functionality of a £200 plus Sat Nav with some small drawbacks (Sound, Size when on Foot). These drawbacks aside I am delighted with the purchase.

By no means a bad GPS, but Sony. what's with the price???
I bought this add on for the PSP so that I could watch films during my frequent trips to Spain and have a ready-to-go Sat Nav when I got there.

The Sat Nav function performs perfectly fine despite a slight delay initially whilst the Go Explore software works out your curent location and which satellites to use. Some reviews have criticised the amount of time this process takes however, I have found very few other Sat Nav devices which operate any faster. Locating destinations is very straightforward and the route planner works everything out for you seemlessly.

Map detail is pretty much spot on - very easy to follow. One way streets and speed limits are clearly indicated, and all driving actions are called out well in advance of any manoeuvres.

The only gripe I have with this product is the price. A top of the line, dedicated Sat Nav may cost you around £150. I imagine the bulk of that price might go to the actual hardware. In the case of Go Explore you already have the hardware, so why the price tag of £100???

In conclusion, this is a perfectly fine Sat Nav with some interesting features. Whether you think your money is better spent on a dedicated machine - I'll leave that up to you. Personally, having one device that plays music, and films on the flight, and gets me to my hotel in my hire car when I get there makes this the right device for me.

Disappointed
I bought Go Explore expecting a less than perfect implementation of a Sat Nav but hoping to have some fun with it.

Despite the low expectations I have been severely disappointed with this bit of kit.

Whilst the build quality is as you would expect from Sony there isn't much else positive I can say about this device.

Prior to acquiring this device I had used Nokia's incarnation of sat nav for it's own N770 internet tablet. The problem with Nokia's implementation was that the N770 is a little short on memory and therefore once the latest update of the software is applied it makes it things grind a little when accessing menus and even starting it up could prove hitty missy sometimes causing the device to crash but once it was up and running and in use it was pretty immaculate. It even managed to take me from Gateshead in the north east of England to the centre of France with minimal effort.

So anything more than this would be a bonus and if nothing else it would provide a talking point for me and my IT colleagues.

Upon opening the packaging I noticed a note stating that heat reflective glass may cause problems for the gps reception.

Not deterred I continued to install software from UMD disk and as recommended allowed everything to be installed onto memory stick. This process was painless and in keeping with Sony products.

As the PSP does not have a touch screen text entry is via an on screen keyboard but using the buttons on the left to navigate around it, this is made very easy because as you type in an address the letters available to select reduces based on the possibility of towns or streets which can be used given the letters already entered. Sometime a street is highlighted after only entering two characters.

The PSPs screen lends itself well to the application providing a bright and detailed screen which scrolls around effortlessly.

Some of the funtionality is also quite inventive and would indeed offset any other small gripes.

The problems really are around the gps reception. The intructions state that for the first time in a day that you use it you should allow up to 10 mins for it to acquire the satellites. That seemed a little long compared to my previous device but again as I had bought this for occasional use I wasn't too concerned. Unfortunately the receiver just isn't good enough to use reliably certainly not in a Peugeot 307 SW which does have a heat reflective windscreen however it does also have a glass roof which provides a clear view of the sky.

Tonight I have driven 6 miles to the local Asda and by the time I got there it still hadn't found any satellite despite changing the angle of the receiver several times. After completing my shopping I came out rebooted the device, still no joy, I then pulled out and receiver and connected it again and hey presto it started to detect satellites immediately. I thought ok I have a work around. So I set off on another 10 mile journey first thing I noticed is that although I had set the measurement units to imperial i.e. miles rather than kilometres the voice gives instructions in metres yet the display shows miles and yards. I have yet to find a way of changing this and suspect you cant.

Never mind I thought as this was just meant to be a play thing. However, even when driving along A1 in the middle of no where it would lose the signal from satellites, ok when on a straight road but very confusing when at the point of changing directions particularly when it then gets it bearings for a split second before losing them again but it still chirps out an instruction which may be for a road a few hundred metres.

I shall try to end on a positive note. Unlike my previous device which would alert you to known sites for speed cameras, this device warns you when you exceed the speed limit for the road you are on. Though even this failed on a 70 mph road when it was alerting me to the fact I was exceeding 30mph this is obviously a mapping error rather than the device.

I will continue to use this device for a little longer and if I find any improvement in it's working I shall write a follow up review.

David