Nokia Drive+ Beta for Windows Phone 8 Updated, power saving added

We contacted Nokia a short while ago to check in on their navigation apps and we were told to expect some updates soon. Today one of the first of the updates has arrived to bring the Nokia Drive+ Beta to version 2.1.

So what’s new? As well as the usual bug fixes they have introduced a better way to manage power consumption. Read on past the break for more details.

We have been using Nokia Drive+ Beta since it first popped up and on the whole have been pleased with its performance. That’s not to say it has been all plain sailing, there have been instances where the map stops updating and the occasional crash here and there. We’re still waiting for Drive on Windows Phone 8 to pick up the much vaunted “My Commute” feature that exists on the Windows Phone 7 version.

Highlights of the update

In the settings menu you’ll now find the Battery Saver option.

“Save battery power between charges with the battery saver. When you switch this on, the app runs in the background, and you’ll hear navigation instructions when being guided along a route. In other cases the GPS will be switched off to reduce power consumption.”

On the main map display, you can return to your present position by clicking on a button to centre the map again. Hardly a drastic UI improvement, but its welcome nonetheless.

After we updated the app we were also prompted to update the voice files for the app which didn’t take too long. We’ll need to test the latest version over the next few days and we hope that the overall stability of the app has improved. Good to see the updates starting to hit for this app, we’re really keen to see this pick up existing features from the Windows Phone 7 version while taking full advantage of Windows Phone 8.

Nokia Drive is one of the crown jewels in their app line up and so we’re expecting great things down the line with this. You can download it from the Nokia Collection on the Windows Phone Store here. Thanks, ryansstuff, for the tip!