Delorme Street Atlas / Microsoft Streets & Trips Manual Routing Question

Hi everyone. Can anyone tell me if it is possible to put a route in manually in either Delorme Streets Atlas or Microsoft Streets & Trips? We escort oversize truck loads and would like a program in which we can set all the roads as per the permitted routes by the states. Also, I have heard pros and cons with each product. I want to use my laptop in my vehicle for a bigger screen instead of my TomTom GO720. I have a lot of things going on at once and need my focus to be on target at all times. Is either program "Easier" to look at? Thank all!

Configuring a route manually in Streets and Trips is very easy. Depending on how much background work you want to do with the program, you could set up the trip with scheduled stops and layovers, fuel stops, etc. Navigating with a laptop is a bit more of a chore but very doable. If you get your computer mounted correctly and an auxillary speaker system for the voice prompts it should work very well. I would think that a daylight readable screen on the laptop would be something of a priority for what you are trying to do. The only one I am aware of is the "Toughbook" but I am sure there are a few others. Your general run of the mill laptop screens don't do well in sunlight. Good Luck

Hi roncarter17, and welcome to the forum. Both, Streets & Trips and Street Atlas, are able to modify a plotted route much easier and faster than any other solution. Something that would take you extremely very long time to achieve on a PND (personal navigation device), can be done in most cases by a few mouse clicks on a laptop using Microsoft Streets & Trips.

I'm much more familiar with S&T, so it would be unfair for me to say which program is easier. I know there are many DeLorme fans who would strongly suggest Street Atlas.

Thank you. I know about the screen problems in the sunlight and i'm working on that problem. So... with Microsoft Streets & Trips it is possible to design a route where I can tell the software to make a turn at a specific place? Some of the permits we deal with are mind-boggling. We have to take alot of secondary roads and most of time cannot stay on the route my TomTom says to take (i.e. shortest mileage, shortest time).

* On S&T map you can draw rectangles to cover areas you want to avoid.

* Or you can simply click & drag the plotted route to another road, and thus force the route to to go via your desired streets/highways

Wow! That sounds pretty good! Can't do that with my Tomtom! A guy told me that with the Delorme Street Atlas you can import a designed route and special notations, such as "low bridge ahead", from excel, and the program will follow that route and say the special notations. Is this correct and can you do this with Microsoft Streets & Trips?

Ok...here are a few more questions. With either company, is it possible to save a route that I have made up to use at a later time? And, which GPS receivers are the latest new models for each company? Thanks again!

Hi Ron,

You are correct, with Street Atlas USA 2009 Plus you can import spreadsheet files such as Excel, Access, or Text files. There is a website called discoveryowners.com where users have created draw files that show low bridges, truck friendly poi's etc., that can be imported through Street Atlas USA.

While Street Atlas USA 2009 does not have "commercial truck routes", you can draw a "route avoid" which is a polygon or a circle that will route you around that location.

Also if you want to force the route to go a certain way you can insert a via to force the route to take another way. From start to finish, "via" your preferred road. Our current receiver is the LT-40 and we've had great success with it.

Hope this helps.

-Jason
Team DeLorme

With Street Atlas USA 2009 you can create and save a route to pull up later. I would assume that you can do the same with Streets and Trips.

-Jason
Team DeLorme

Here's the link to that page: http://www.discoveryowners.com/cginfolinks.htm

The files are created by a community of users, and while they are very popular and helpful, one can never 100% rely purely on these files routing a big rig. The files are used by many truckers and RV-ers.

Wow...great info! Thank you! I just downloaded the trial version of Streets & Trips. I'm going to play around with that for awhile. I wish Delorme had a trial version for people to try. I have spoke to a lot of different people and it seems as if they split down the middle on which product they like. I guess trial and error is the only way to decide.

For your line of business, why don't you buy both, use both for a while at least, and then you decide what's best for you. They are so inexpensive. A GPS receiver from one of the products works with the other software, too, so you only need one GPS receiver.

Really? I did not know that, Marvin. Thank you for that info. Any opinion on who has the best GPS receiver? I'm just reading up on the Delorme LT-40 and have not looked at Microsofts yet. Or are there others out there that are better? Thanks again!

You've already have the 60-day trial of Streets & Trips. I'd recommend now buying DeLorme Street Atlas 2009 Plus with the USB LT-40 GPS receiver. I do like the Microsoft software, but I'm not that fond of the Microsoft hardware.

Good deal. Thank you for all of your help!

Unfortunately, the LT-40 GPS hardware won't work with other navigation software without a 'helper' program. This can be an irritation if you expect to put the computer in Sleep /Standby mode during navigation.

Terry

Terry, I'm not sure if this is the case with the new LT-40. In previous versions the driver for 3rd party software was included in the installation DVD, or it could be just downloaded from delorme.com. Perhaps Jason could confirm this, but I think this is still the case. I think the following page is still valid even for the new LT-40: http://www.delorme.com/support/supporttemplate.aspx?id=319

I can't test it but this still appears to be a program rather than a driver. The program would have to be run to emulate a serial port and, from experience with similar approaches (eg GPS18 and Spanner), it would not survive a Sleep cycle. This has been mentioned before.

The Pharos, Navation, and GlobalSat units have true USB to serial drivers which appear in Device Manager. I would bet this one doesn't.

Terry

if you are using the LT-40 with third party software, just run the Serial Emulation driver in the above link and everything should work fine.

-Jason

Hi Jason,

Those who have used the LT-40 with other nav programs agree that the emulator works. The question seems to be whether the DeLorme emulator will survive a "sleep" or "hibernate" cycle.

It's an emulator program, not a driver. It has been the experience, at least of some, that, because of that, it won't survive when the laptop sleeps or hibernates and so it will have to be run again every time. That means you have also have to reestablish the connection in your nav program each time. Whereas a proper USB-to-serial driver will always survive and maintain the connection because it's a proper driver process, not an executable program.

Is it correct that the emulator will not maintain a connection between the GPS receiver and the nav program through a sleep or hibernate cycle?

...ken...

Thanks Ken, That was far more polite than I was going to be. Not having this device puts me at a distinct disadvantage but Jason should be able to clear this up.

Terry

The page at the above mentioned DeLorme URL reads:

I personally run my PC at all times - I don't use sleep or hibernate while on the road, so something like this would be a non-issue for users like me, but I know for some users this is an important piece of info.

Have you guys ever tested Streets & Trips sleep/hibernate w/S&T USB GPS receiver? Does it at all work? I know Garmin Mobile PC is good at handling coming out of hibernation, but my few tests with S&T were not much successful.

Yes, I have tested various USB and Bluetooth receivers with Mobile PC, Streets & Trips and iGudance to ensure they will survive a sleep cycle. That is one reason I abandoned the Garmin 20x twice.

If I am in a location I feel is secure and my stop is not long, I put the computer into sleep/ standby mode to preserve the battery. I may or may not shut down the navigation program. This allows a quick return to full operation (10 sec for USB 20 sec for BT). I see this as an issue on any trip where I might stop at a picnic site for lunch or some other short duration absence. I would rather not have to remember which actions to perform each time I want to resume a trip as I usually forget to do it and start driving.

For going from here to there, it is not important but the Nuvi is better for that anyway.

Terry

I just did a quick test of SA 2009 and the Pharos 500. in a static situation with SA running and locked to the GPS, I put the laptop in sleep mode. On restoration SA came up right where it left off. Whether this would translate to a routing situation, I can't say.

I guess part of this issue is whether leaving the laptop running would have any appreciable effect on the vehicle battery over the short term. It probably wouldn't but it is another issue I am careful about. The truck went through a starting issue recently and I was concerned there was a draw when I wasn't using it. I have since determined the battery was faulty but I am still overly cautious.

Terry