Navdy is an Android Head Up Display for your Car Controlled by Voice and Gestures

Following up on yesterday’s Android rear view mirrors (ARVM), where I and others mentioned safety of such devices in comments, it has been brought to my attention that there’s a possibly safer alternative with Navdy, a 5.1″ Head-Up Display (HUD) running Android 4.4, that’s placed right in front of your eyes on the top of the dashboard, and coming with both common and different features compared to ARVM.

Navdy’s preliminary specifications:

• Processor – Unnamed dual core processor
• System Memory – N/A
• Storage – N/A
• Display – 5.1″ wide transparent Head-Up Display (HUD) with high quality projector
• Camera – IR camera for touchless gesture control
• Connectivity – WiFi (802.11 b/g/n), Bluetooth 4.0/LE
• Sensors – Accelerometer, e-compass, ambient light sensor
• Audio – Via Bluetooth or 3.5mm minijack mini-USB port, Internal speaker and microphone with noise canceling DSP
• Data / Power interface – OBD-II power and data connection to car computer, with optional 12 volt power adapter
• Mount – Portable, bendable, non-marking, powered friction mount, with magnetic connection to the device
• Dimensions – 130x140x95 mm (excluding mount, and including display)

Navdy can also be paired with your smartphone (Android or iOS) to access your apps and data. It is fully controlled by gestures and voice input, and I could not see any buttons on the device, which allows to answer/give calls, read/write SMS, control your music, and drive with GPS instructions right in front of your eyes. To better understand what Navdy does, watch the promo/demo video below.

The apps are not displayed as-is on the HUD, but a simplified version is shown to make it more HUD friendly. Compared to Android rear view mirrors, it has the advantage of sitting right in front of your eyes, it does not hide anything on the rear view mirror, supports gesture control, and has built-in support for ODBII, but does not come with cameras for DVR functions or parking assitance, and it looks like you may only be able to run a subset of Android apps.

Navdy is available for pre­-order for 30 days at the introductory price of $299, at 40% discount from the expected $499 retail price, and will ship “early 2015”.

Thanks to Connolly for the tip.

Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft)

Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.

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