Home › Microsoft Streets and Trips › Microsoft Streets & Trips 2008 vs. DeLorme Street Atlas USA 2008
In previous posts I have explained not being able to use Microsoft Streets and Trips 2008. I still can't and wonder if anyone knows if DeLorme Street Atlas USA 2008 would be a fairly good replacement while I am still on our 6000 mile trip ?
Thanks,
Mike Flannigan
Thanks,
Mike Flannigan
Mike, if you have your Streets & Trips 2007 with you, I think it would be easier for you to use an older version of a program you are familiar with, rather than learning a completely new software in the middle of your trip.
However, if you wish to give something new a try, here's a brief review of DeLorme Street Atlas 2008, and here's our List of laptop GPS navigation software programs and reviews
However, if you wish to give something new a try, here's a brief review of DeLorme Street Atlas 2008, and here's our List of laptop GPS navigation software programs and reviews
Thanks for the link to the Street Atlas review. I'm pretty sure it is not what I need or want. I rely on Map Source and my Garmin 2610 to get me where I want to go. I use Streets & Trips to make a route, with stops and then transfer to my computer and on to the 2610. (I'm probably not explaining this so someone else can see what I do).
I'm going to try to find a Streets 2007 while I'm out of town (1600 miles away from home).
Thanks again for your help.
Mike Flannigan
I'm going to try to find a Streets 2007 while I'm out of town (1600 miles away from home).
Thanks again for your help.
Mike Flannigan
Quote:
Originally Posted by flannigan
... I rely on Map Source and my Garmin 2610 to get me where I want to go. I use Streets & Trips to make a route, with stops and then transfer to my computer and on to the 2610.
What do you use to transfer the routes from S&T into MapSource?
Do you find that the routes created by S&T are better than those created by MapSource? Or is it just easier to use S&T for the routing?
...ken... (who has MapSource and lots of Garmin maps)
I use Streets to locate stops (motels) etc. I copy and paste the info from Streets information balloon into a push pin window. I then connect all the push pin stops into a route. (Many times I use this route to copy and paste into a Word document to send to someone else)
Once I have my route in Streets, I open map source and locate all the stops and save as a waypoint in map source on my computer - save the map source with a route name. (I save all the Streets maps in a folder and all the Map Source routes in a separate folder for future reference.)
Turn on my Garmin 2610, transfer all the waypoints of the trip to it and then I'm in business to "go to" each individual waypoint or make a complete trip in the 2610.
I hope this explanation is understandable. Sometimes you do something by habit and have a hard time explaining it to someone else.
Feel free to ask me about any of these steps and I will try to clarify.
Regards,
Mike Flannigan
Once I have my route in Streets, I open map source and locate all the stops and save as a waypoint in map source on my computer - save the map source with a route name. (I save all the Streets maps in a folder and all the Map Source routes in a separate folder for future reference.)
Turn on my Garmin 2610, transfer all the waypoints of the trip to it and then I'm in business to "go to" each individual waypoint or make a complete trip in the 2610.
I hope this explanation is understandable. Sometimes you do something by habit and have a hard time explaining it to someone else.
Feel free to ask me about any of these steps and I will try to clarify.
Regards,
Mike Flannigan
Forgot to answer the part about S&T better than Map Source.
I think S&T is MUCH better for giving you an overall picture of a long trip than Map Source. Also S&T lets me add information to the route on the map, ie, "text", "direction arrows", individual mileage between stops and I can copy and paste the S&T route map into a Word doc and send to someone that can open it, where they would not be able to open a Map Source documment if they don't own Map Source.
There a couple of other reason I prefer to start a route with S&T but I can't think of them right now.
Regards,
Mike Flannigan
I think S&T is MUCH better for giving you an overall picture of a long trip than Map Source. Also S&T lets me add information to the route on the map, ie, "text", "direction arrows", individual mileage between stops and I can copy and paste the S&T route map into a Word doc and send to someone that can open it, where they would not be able to open a Map Source documment if they don't own Map Source.
There a couple of other reason I prefer to start a route with S&T but I can't think of them right now.
Regards,
Mike Flannigan
One other thing I use often and prefer S&T over Map Source is to print the map and mail or give to someone. I think the printed version of Streets is far superior to Map Source.
Mike
Mike
Thanks, Mike. That all makes perfect sense. It's too bad there isn't some easier way for you to export/import to get the waypoints into MapSource from S&T. I have not looked really close at S&T features yet. I bought it mostly as a cheap and easy way to get the GPS receiver so I could use it on my laptop with Garmin's nroute. I'll have to take a closer look at it for travel planning now that I've got a laptop.
I rarely use MapSource for the sort of travel planning you mentioned. For many of the trips we take I already have the majority of my stops set up as waypoints in my iQue 3600. I've got all the hotels/motels and gas stations we normally stop at on our usual routes between here and the west coast (I think I have the location of every Superstore gas bar between here and Vancouver waypointed in the address book!). It's dead simple to get them into MapSource from the iQue. Now I'll have to see if there's a utility to transfer them from MapSource into Streets and mess with it for a couple of our typical trips.
The routing is so easy to do with my iQue that I usually just do it all on the fly. If I need hotels or gas stations before we leave, I look them up on Google Earth or Google Maps. Then I mark them as waypoints right on my iQue so they are automatically saved straight into my address book complete with the address, phone number and location data. That way I can just do the actual routing on the fly in the iQue .. pull up a waypoint in the address book and "route to". As you have pointed out, MapSource is not strong on that sort of thing. Perhaps I will find Streets a little more useful, at least when we're on the road. When I'm at home I still tend towards Google Earth or Google Maps because the points of interest are so much more current than the Navteq maps that come with Streets or the Garmin products.
...ken...
I rarely use MapSource for the sort of travel planning you mentioned. For many of the trips we take I already have the majority of my stops set up as waypoints in my iQue 3600. I've got all the hotels/motels and gas stations we normally stop at on our usual routes between here and the west coast (I think I have the location of every Superstore gas bar between here and Vancouver waypointed in the address book!). It's dead simple to get them into MapSource from the iQue. Now I'll have to see if there's a utility to transfer them from MapSource into Streets and mess with it for a couple of our typical trips.
The routing is so easy to do with my iQue that I usually just do it all on the fly. If I need hotels or gas stations before we leave, I look them up on Google Earth or Google Maps. Then I mark them as waypoints right on my iQue so they are automatically saved straight into my address book complete with the address, phone number and location data. That way I can just do the actual routing on the fly in the iQue .. pull up a waypoint in the address book and "route to". As you have pointed out, MapSource is not strong on that sort of thing. Perhaps I will find Streets a little more useful, at least when we're on the road. When I'm at home I still tend towards Google Earth or Google Maps because the points of interest are so much more current than the Navteq maps that come with Streets or the Garmin products.
...ken...
I appreciate your feedback. I used Streets long before I had a Street Pilot from Garmin. I was used to a Garmin on our boat. I guess it just became a habit to start with Streets and then "formalize" the trip with Google, Map Source and then the GPS. We have traveled, since retiring ten years ago, and we seldom take the exact same trip. Streets has given me so much disappointment and trouble while on our current trip, I think I'll wean off of it. I personally believe Streets & Trips is quite a bit better than Google Maps and of course it doesn't require you to be on-line. Great when you want to plan a trip and can't get to Google for some reason.
We just planned a 1450 mile trip from here, in Phoenix, on the Pacific Coast Highway and I didn't have any trouble with waypoints, motels, etc., using Google Earth and Map Source.
Regards,
Mike Flannigan
We just planned a 1450 mile trip from here, in Phoenix, on the Pacific Coast Highway and I didn't have any trouble with waypoints, motels, etc., using Google Earth and Map Source.
Regards,
Mike Flannigan
We don't do as much travelling as we would like since we both retired but we sure do lots more than before.
We seldom do the exact routes, either. That's why I have accumulated so many motels and prefered gas stops in the three western-most provinces! But we do head west frequently and there are parts of any trip that are common, depending upon which mountain pass we plan to go through to get to British Columbia. And we do have a few favorite places we like to go, even though we try to find new ways to get there (eg. Regina, SK to Vancouver, BC via Dawson Creek, BC, Tumbler Ridge, Prince George, Lillooet, Pemberton, Whistler). I'm becoming notorious among family and friends for being able to compress a three-day trip into two weeks.
Most of my advance trip planning has little to do with maps and lots to do with "What is there to see and do between here and there?" Once I find something interesting, and we have decided some of the things we want to do, we'll look for interesting accomodations. It's not until we have reservations somewhere that I finally do anything related to maps and waypoints.
At that point I find the location of our motels and of any preferred gas stops along the route and plug them straight into the iQue. I use the iQue's "Find" capability so if I get a hit I can just save it as a waypoint and don't have to enter anything. The iQue just copies all relevant info from the POI database into its address book. Otherwise I find it with Google Maps, point to the location on the iQue's map and save the point as a waypoint. This, of course, requires me to manually enter all the other information. I generally end up manually entering perhaps a quarter of the waypoints.
Until I got my laptop this summer I did all the on-the-road planning with the iQue alone, and the CAA (Canadian version of AAA) Accomodations Guide. For some strange reason Garmin did not make it possible to transfer waypoints and routes from MapSource to the iQue so I'm still in the habit of doing that part directly on the iQue, even with the laptop available. Now that we have the laptop on the trip we just use MapSource like you would a paper map, the advantage being that you can zoom for detail and easily check the distances between two or three different potential routes to the same place.
As you mentioned, Streets has a much more attractive display for the maps, so we may use it more than MapSource for on-the-road planning. But Streets maps are Navteq-supplied data so I don't find any difference in the accuracy between Streets 2008 and Garmin City Navigator North America v8. All the same omissions and errors that I'm already familiar with in the Garmin product exist in Streets.
I find Streets horribly slow to load. On my desktop it takes 25-30 seconds to display the map on startup versus 4-5 seconds for MapSource. Both are slower to start on my laptop but still the same magnitude of difference. Not being a particularly patient person, if I want something quickly I'm still more likely to fire up MapSource .. or just grab my iQue. From turned off, push one button and it has the map up and ready to go in under two seconds. Even I can wait two seconds.
...ken...
We seldom do the exact routes, either. That's why I have accumulated so many motels and prefered gas stops in the three western-most provinces! But we do head west frequently and there are parts of any trip that are common, depending upon which mountain pass we plan to go through to get to British Columbia. And we do have a few favorite places we like to go, even though we try to find new ways to get there (eg. Regina, SK to Vancouver, BC via Dawson Creek, BC, Tumbler Ridge, Prince George, Lillooet, Pemberton, Whistler). I'm becoming notorious among family and friends for being able to compress a three-day trip into two weeks.
Most of my advance trip planning has little to do with maps and lots to do with "What is there to see and do between here and there?" Once I find something interesting, and we have decided some of the things we want to do, we'll look for interesting accomodations. It's not until we have reservations somewhere that I finally do anything related to maps and waypoints.
At that point I find the location of our motels and of any preferred gas stops along the route and plug them straight into the iQue. I use the iQue's "Find" capability so if I get a hit I can just save it as a waypoint and don't have to enter anything. The iQue just copies all relevant info from the POI database into its address book. Otherwise I find it with Google Maps, point to the location on the iQue's map and save the point as a waypoint. This, of course, requires me to manually enter all the other information. I generally end up manually entering perhaps a quarter of the waypoints.
Until I got my laptop this summer I did all the on-the-road planning with the iQue alone, and the CAA (Canadian version of AAA) Accomodations Guide. For some strange reason Garmin did not make it possible to transfer waypoints and routes from MapSource to the iQue so I'm still in the habit of doing that part directly on the iQue, even with the laptop available. Now that we have the laptop on the trip we just use MapSource like you would a paper map, the advantage being that you can zoom for detail and easily check the distances between two or three different potential routes to the same place.
As you mentioned, Streets has a much more attractive display for the maps, so we may use it more than MapSource for on-the-road planning. But Streets maps are Navteq-supplied data so I don't find any difference in the accuracy between Streets 2008 and Garmin City Navigator North America v8. All the same omissions and errors that I'm already familiar with in the Garmin product exist in Streets.
I find Streets horribly slow to load. On my desktop it takes 25-30 seconds to display the map on startup versus 4-5 seconds for MapSource. Both are slower to start on my laptop but still the same magnitude of difference. Not being a particularly patient person, if I want something quickly I'm still more likely to fire up MapSource .. or just grab my iQue. From turned off, push one button and it has the map up and ready to go in under two seconds. Even I can wait two seconds.
...ken...