digitial topo maps

[ralph]

An early discussion on maps for GPS

this site maybe helpful i ordered a cd for norther BC very happy with the product. 75 bucks for a couple 000's worth of topos. software comes with them for downloading GPS data



http://www.fedmaps.com/dealers.html

[JOG]

Ralph.

I've been looking at these products for a little while and now I notice that SoftMap has brought out a light duty GIS package I am even more interested.

What do you think of the resolution? Can you zoom in to 1:20000
and print out a legible map?

Can you move around easily or are they slow and jerky?

[ralph]

It depends on if there are 1:20000 for the area. I suspect for southern BC they do. On my cd 1:20000 are available for areas around populated sites, but in the northern reaches of the prov. Fort Nelson they are not.
I have found that all topos are somewhat outdated or mislabled, but that is more an issue of what is available.

the system works fine for me my machine is old and slow just like my cruiser. the way it works it goes to the CD as you keep clicking on an area first at 1:100000 and then 1:50000 and down to 1:20000 if its there.

You can print off maps just drag a box around the are you want.


it has a feature where you can mark points of interest with a sysmbol of your choice I don't have the download cable for my GPS yet but sounds lie it would download your routes and marked points. i just type in the coordinates from my GPS

Another feature is the ability to measure along roads, rivers overland just click along your route. i use it mainly for river and lakes to estimate fuel needs in my boat.

all in all not a bad product.

[JOG]

Thanks for your opinion.

I think I'll go ahead and get a the Southeast B.C. one and try it.

[Bushboy]

The coverage looks ok, but it seems as though the maps can only be used with the proprietary software. I have emailed the following questions to the company and will post the answers if I recieve any.

Hello,

I stumbled across your website from a link provided on BC4x4.com. I am
interested in your product, however I have a couple of questions:

1) Can the maps be used with any other mapping program, or are they only
useful with the Softmap program? Image or vector maps? File format?

2) Your site indicates a package of approx. 200 maps, yet your coverage of
northern Alberta would be over 400 maps. Can I count on getting all 1:50,000
topos and all 1:250,000 maps? I ask this because all your competitors
products that I have seen are priced considerably higher.

3) What year maps are you using for your data. Anecdotal information says
the Northern BC maps may be a little dated.

Please respond to xxxxx

Thank you


By the way there are some very good digital topos out there that can be used with any gps-mapping software. Spectrum Digital in BC make high quality up to date cd's for a reasonable price. There are others as well. check out gpscentral.ca for one source.

EDIT

Here is the (prompt) response

"
1. SoftMap products are not intended for use with other products. The maps are raster scanned.

2. Coverage at 1:50,000 and 1:250,000 scale in volume 3, Alberta extends from 55 degrees north to 57,30 degrees. North of this, the scale is 1:250,000 only.

3. As each title may have a different date, the individual dates cannot be ascertained. The latest edition available was the edition used for scanning.

Peter Andrews,
Federal Maps Inc."

They could work for some, but to me the product seems very limited both in selection of maps for remote areas and ease of transfer to, for example, your visiting buddy's system. However the price is right so if these are not a consideration then this product may be for you.

END EDIT

[JOG]

I bought the SouthEast BC disks and have been playing around with them for a while now. I was pretty unimpressed at first but I have got to like them a bit better as I use them.

First thing I noticed was that all the maps are different aged. Some have elevations in feet and some are in metres. Lots of colour variations and occasional mismatches/gaps at map edges.
However after reading the documentation I think that they have this issue in hand as far as georeferencing is concerned.

Although they are proprietary in format you can clip out the map and paste it to another application. They were scanned in at 250 dpi so you can zoom in a fair bit.

The movement is pretty smooth although you have to keep switching disks.

They are ancient as far as the roads go. Wiithout the GPS option (Fugawi powered) you are very limited as to the editing capabilities. I think I will skip right up to the GIS option when I need it.

There is a neat function where you can type in a place name and it will put show you the coordinates (Canada wide). Some pretty small geographical features are in the database. The measurement feature Ralph mentioned is pretty useful.

A pretty good product, especially for hikers, lots of possibilities once you have the GIS module. I can see it would be pretty easy to make my own vector format TOPO maps over a small area and then use a procedure I've read about to upload them into a mapping reciever.

[Tom P]

Does anyone know of a site with more detailed topo or aerial pictures such as Terraserver (US only) or "pixxures" which seems to only do Alberta . Theres one at www.multimap.com which has great aerial pics and maps of England that can be overlayed.