I downloaded Microsoft Streets and Trips 2010. I was thinking that after all these years of continuous working MST2010 will be way better then its predecessor. I was wrong. It is not. But this is just my .02.
I'm a very straight and simple person. And I don't want to change that. I don't like bull and I don't talk bull.
Let's see what was really changed in 2010 version compare with 2009 version. Marvin explain it very clear and I will not start to repeat. Then try to weigh if 40+ $ will worth for just few (very) minor things changed or not. I love the gadgets too and I'm not Scrooge. But to pay money (again) for basically the same product it is unacceptable for me.
With all due respect for MST team, I will have to let them know that if they want 40+ $ from my pocket they have to make that software to worth those money.
If I want to find a pharmacy I will google it and I will find it very fast. If I want to send to someone a map I will print it and send it for nothing(rather then to pay money to send and receive a map on a phone with a 2 inch screen). Re-adding pushpins (that were there until 2009 version) are not suppose to be mentioned as "improvements". And examples could keep going.
Now, after all the suggestions (I've lectured a lot of those on this great forum) from here they improved almost nothing. Apologies, the annoying lady who was keep saying "off route, off route" finally stopped. (and that is a major improvement I have to admit). I was almost to punch one time the screen in a very tens situation when my senses were sharp to get out from a very dangerous place and the lady was keep saying "off route")
The night colors are still the same colors sad and uninspired. During the night map there is no way to make a difference between an Interstate and a rural road.(the same thickness the same color).
The "road work" areas are still only on "directions" and are not visible on the map after a trip has been set up.
If I want to check something in advance on the "directions" I do have to uncheck the "provide navigation" because ST do not let me to scroll(why???????).
The navigation pane is still tough on the position and is unmovable. After a ton of suggestion to make it auto hide or any way to be removed when I drive on full screen. No way, the navigation pane is there like the National Flag.(is embarrassing I swear).
The navigation view is useless.... The way it looks when checked is like a map drawed by my daughter when she was 5 years old.
The zoom in/out scale is the same exaggerated scale. But I assume that is very complicate to do something to make it smoother.
There are a lot of roads wrong pointed on the map. I don't know if there MST has any guilt or not. But this is the truth. A lot of them. And I'm not talking about Canada where 35% of the roads are lets say "out of the road" but I'm talking about USA (Miami, south Texas, San Diego, Colorado, West Virginia, Montana, etc). In Edmonton, Calgary and that area I'm most of the time "off route).
There is a funny part that makes my day after day. Speaking the street names is so funny. Is embarassing how the name Eisenhower is spoken, or Roosevelt. There are a lot of names so funny spoken. I'm not native english but the MS Lady make my day when start speaking. But hold on, if u drive with a friend and want to laugh hard, start MST when u drive in Quebec and I swear u guys will roll laughing when hear french names spoken.
I will stop now because I do not have to much time for this right now. But anyway from my point of view the 2010 version is not worth it the money. I'm not a kid no more to be happy for finding options like "send to a mobile phone" or "send to a GPS". I do have other things to do and MST team should work for one or maybe two or three more years to make me take out of the pocket money for 2010 version. Maybe what I say sound sad or bad, but this is my personal opinion.
This is an opinion of a truck driver that drive 10-12 K miles per month allover Canada and USA. I said once: I wake up in the morning and first thing I'm doing I start Microsoft Streets and Trips. And I stop it right before to go to bed. I don't think there are many users that are using this software harder than me.
P.S. Right now I do have a route let's say from Napanee(ON) to Detroit(MI). The distance is 363 miles. I do have no stops on the trip I've done in MST2010. So, on my navigation pan is shown : 6 hr to the destination(which is virtually correct), next stop 244 miles(which next stop because I don't have any stop planned) and distance to end 244(distance to what end? because to the end of my trip I do have 363 miles). I checked in "route" the "route options" start at 10.15 AM end at 10.15 PM, flexibility "none" and stop for 1 min after driving 4 hr.
Is funny because if I change instead of 4 hr with 10 hr the distance to the end is changing.
So my question is where am I doing a mistake? The 244 miles "to the end" I cannot find it in "directions". So where this numbers are coming from. Then changing the time shouldn't change the distance. But it change.
As I say this is just my .02 so don't take it to serious.