SSA6

I was wondering if this is similar to what the MMI does now when one keeps the data connection off? and uses Google maps for navigation:

From Google Maps: The offline mode that Google showed off last month arrived Wednesday in a new version of its Android Maps app. To use it, navigate to a location and select "Make available offline" from the menu; a blue square outline will appear, and you can then zoom in or out to determine how much of that area you want to save offline.

I understand one can save about a 600 sq mile chunk of map data. Never checked how much the MMI retains in off-line mode.
Regardless, every time I activate the Google maps data connection and "update" the map, I only use about 5 cents worth of data on my Tru sim account. Still very cost effective.

PJRed2008

The Audi does NOT USE GOOGLE MAPS. Nav data is hardcoded in the harddisk in the car. All you get over the T-Mob connection is Google EARTH data.

jetinder

The other thing the car will get is Google traffic (on later 2011 cars and onwards) overlayed onto your normal built in maps. But this obviously needs and active connection.

DirkM

Audi uses Sirius Traffic, not Google Traffic. And somewhere has been posted that the MMI caches about 25 miles of Google Earth data along the route.