Idrive controller with bus nav is the same.
Are you sure? Because there is also this other simpler controller like the pictures below.
My understanding is that voice control is tied into the advanced bluetooth option, not nav. It's fairly useless as is most voice control systems to be honest.
I have to admit that i don't use it very often, but sometimes comes very handy and i believe they have done a really good job this time.
My mom just got a 2013 528i with prof nav, it is a VERY impressive system. With an amazing screen and incredible graphics and clarity.
The 3D nav screen is very impressive indeed.
My 125i on order has the bus nav spec'd so it will be interesting to compare the two, although I've already used the latest bus nav on rental cars, it still does stuff like show you which lanes you need to be in at a junction and has quite good graphics.
In terms of other benefits of the prof nav:
The hard drive, well you can only load music off a cd or DVD, not an ipod or memory stick. I haven't used CD's in years, so to make one just to load the music onto the car, what's the point?
Wrong. You can load music & routes from mp3, ipod, etc from the USB socket located in the passenger glove box.
DVD player, yeah I've got movies showing on it, which turn off as soon as the car starts moving. But you can still hear the sound. Again, not really a feature that I think offers more than novelty value.
You can have it unlocked very easily with the dvd in motion software. Its only software, http://www.dvdinmotion.com.
It is nice to be able to show a map on the one side and other info on the other. But on bus nav you can just push the nav button on the idrive controller to bring up a map, then push say media to go back to your ipod (which shows album art and all that)
Don't get me wrong, if money wasn't an issue I'd have gone for prof nav of course But there are so many options I've added to the car, and so many I also wanted but decided not to take, at some point you need to start making a few compromises. Bus nav + harman/kardon = the same money as prof nav, a better trade off for me.