CES 2008: Sony takes the lid off a new set of sat-navs
We haven’t seen a lot in the way of Sat Navs here at CES yet, but rest assured they’re lurking out there in their thousands. Yesterday, Sony did spill the beans on a couple of new models heading to North America early this year. The NV-U73T and NV-U83T measure in at 4.3” and 4.8” respectively; however each is now just 0.75 inches thick, which is a pretty sensible acknowledgement of the fact that if you actually want to keep your sat nav in your possession for longer than twenty minutes, you’re going to have to carry it with you when you park your car.
Each model has 2GB of memory built in, but this can be supplemented with further memory using the MS Pro Duo slot. Being design for the North America market, it’s no surprise that these sporta pre-loaded map of North America, but on the off chance that these should actually reach UK shores at some later date, then I’m guessing we’ll be using the expansion slot to install maps of extra European regions.
The more expensive NV-U83T nav-u, which is expected to retail for around $500, also offer Bluetooth handsfree functionality and Sony’s intriguing POSITION Plus technology, which according to the press conference provides “accurate, interruption free positioning”, by continuing to navigate even if GPS signal is lost. We’ve no idea how this works, although we suspect the use of the dark arts.
CES 2008 Special
Read all our coverage from the show in our CES 2008 category
