GPS Navigation any good?

Looking at a laptop while driving. There's a good idea. You, too, can drive like an 18 year old, forever.

How about a paper map, and investing two minutes to look at it?

Grasshopper - they talk to you these days . Not the bulky maps.

I understand that. A friend of mine still stops to check his visually because it tells him to take a right when there's nothing but ditches to the right, or curbs.

So that's why SUV's are so popular now!

Try asking over in newsgroup sci.geo.satellite-nav. It would be polite, of course, to download all the headers you can and see if someone else has already asked the question or one similar and then ask followups if it's already been addressed.

Or try this web site:

One of the first few items on that page is a link to an article about "my first gps for automobile" and the utility of the site generally is high.

My $.02 - paper maps are the better value, unless you go so many different places you'd need a trunk full of them.

The screens on those auto units are kind of small and I also think there'd be an unfortunate tendency to start an "IFR driving style" (i.e., principally watching the screen, rather than the road), which could lead to "adverse outcomes in automotive itinerary execution."

As for the systems themselves, in decent conditions, GPS technology, with WAAS correction, can tell you "you are here" with impressive accuracy (to within 10 feet - or little more than the width of your lane). At least, they do so MOST of the time. Sometimes, not so hot. In the city, with tall buildings and obstructed sky views, you might have accuracy and multipath problems and your GPS could start lying to you. I have a handheld unit for walking and biking and, one day, it was entirely wrong by about a half mile for a portion of a 3 mile trip and my peak speed was about 1000 mph. Wow! That's pedalling!

Then there's the quality of the map database. If the map source is wrong, then you'll get interesting results from routing and directions. Mostly, I guess they're pretty good, or you'd hear more about their errors. New roads might not show up for a couple of years (I don't know) and closed roads might not go away for a couple of years (ditto).

Try those two resources. Good luck.

I use a laptop loaded with DeLorme Street Atlas software.

I was using the DeLorme Earthmate GPS LT-20 USB GPS receiver. That SUCKS!.

Now my GPS driving the laptop is a Magellan Meridian running thru a serial/USB converter.

It is an excellent system.

Yes, auto ones are better if you dislike the need to remove the stand-alones and lock them up somewhere out of site so you won't have to buy a new window when they break it and steal it. Standalones have better features, imho, like the ability to do a route or trip at your computer and load it into the stand-alone. You need to sit in the car to do most of the built-in routing. Some will run on their own batteries as well.

Regarding paper maps, most will not tell you the address numbers. Many of the new gps units will. They'll also locate the nearest fuel stops or food locations where archaic paper maps won't.

I got 7 of the things now, fwiw. Never ending improvements yearly to all models.

Mack

I print up a set of paper printout maps, long shot, medium, close-up, etc. from my CD-ROM of Streets and Trips. They work out very well, including a distance indicator at the bottom border. Cheap, portable, and accurate. There is also a version called Autoroute that covers most of Europe.

I can't verify it, but I read a while ago that a fellow was driving his new big Mercedes-Benz car in Germany, and the talking nav. system told him to make a turn and then go straight. He did, right into the Rhine River. Whoops.

Good luck.

Morton Linder

All well and good if the roads are clear and no accidents happen ahead of you. Then GPS saves you!

i bought a garmin i-que refurb off ebay for $260. It takes SD cards and is basically a PDA with GPS functions. it runs windows mobile and has windows media player built in, as well as the usual PDA functions.

ive got a 2GB card in it right now, with maps from bakersfield to sandiego, and over to las vegas. that takes 75MB. ive got another 10mb of pictures and documents, and a 200mb full length movie. that leaves me with 1.6G free. converted movies run from 200 to 400MB. So ive got room for another 6 or so movies.

ive got my garmin ique plugged into the AUX port in my scion. no need to look at the screen :)

Thanks for the links. Checked all 1557 messages - lots of details???? The web site is good NO EXCELLENT.

My need is really for accurate maps and a GPS 'dot' for location on it. Updates should be cheap or free. Typically you come into a strange town that now has built a ring road, beltway or bypass in the last 5-10 years that is not shown on the maps you have. Typical of this is Santa Barbara, CA where one can drive through the entire town and never see it because of sound walls, slopes and landscaping blocking all views.

Perhaps a laptop with MS Streets & Trips 2007 for $99 from Amacon etc. (free slipping) is just the thing. Reviewers are not kind in that street names are not called out with directions. Perhaps not even shown on the maps???? I really want ALL streets shown with ALL names regardless of how small. There are several packages in that price range where one just plug in the GPS in a USB port in the laptop. BUT it sounds like a less than perfect rat race. Any suggestions? At present I have neither a lap top or any GPS - I'm in the US.

jl

Or you could invest in a laptop version and have it shout the directions at you instead of having to look at it or stop. Sounds better to me.

In the vast majority of situations they work perfectly. Some of the more odd places (coastal locations etc) and very low inhabitance places they seem to send you down roads that arent exactly well maintained but if you dont drive in outback locations it wont be too much of a problem. Slow ? Not sure how they can be slow - once they've warmed up and located you they're realtime items. Miles off? Never. In heavy high-rise cities they can get a little confused i admit, but newer ones are better at maintaining location between lost signals.

Map: $3.00 Really fancy map book: $10.00

Nobody breaks into cars to steal maps. :-)

Cant imagine when you'd need to leave your laptop/GPS in the car - seems like stupidity to me. See your point but a lot of people at totally incapable of reading maps, even after training. I have done a fair bit of work teaching mapskills to people and some are just not capable of dealing with it lol. For them, GPS.

Give me 3 examples of places you'd travel, and take your laptop w/GPS, please.

To a business meeting in a place i didnt know. Usually taking laptop anyway and need to be on time. To a friends new house who i hadnt visited before. Can take laptop inside no problem. To a hotel, again happy to leave laptop in the hotel room.

More's the point - where would you need to take a navigation aid and NOT require a laptop/gps with you? If im not going to somewhere strange/remote/new i dont need any sort of map - i generally go by my sense of direction and signs. Never had a problem yet. I have a map in my car but ive only used it once, and it was useless as it was not at the scale i needed (as they never are on the outskirts of cities).

I've had exposed film stolen in hotel rooms, so I'd be twitchy about leaving a laptop there. But, that's just me.

I go to reputable hotels, not seedy motels and with photographic equipment..... . You can always ask to leave things in the hotel safe? But seriously a PDA with GPS ability is tiny and fits in a jacket pocket. When could you not take that with you? They really stand out in town/city driving more than open highway anyways. As i say, ideal for the likes of my mother who'd like to concentrate on driving, not navigating, and just throw it in her bag when she gets there.