[Forkeye]

I have had some of these guys books for years and they are very good ,lots of trails and way more roads than any other maps I have ever used .I have used them to find some of the most remote places in B.C. and now I see they are mapsource and gps compatible .Just wondering if anyone has them loaded on a gps and can comment on them ? Their books contain far more detail than Garmins or Ibycus maps http://www.gpscentral.ca/accessories/backr...aps-canada.html or http://www.backroadmapbooks.com/shop/

This post has been edited by Forkeye: 20 June 2010 - 07:30 AM

[northernpenguin]

Forkeye, on Jun 20 2010, 11:17 AM, said:

I have had some of these guys books for years and they are very good ,lots of trails and way more roads than any other maps I have ever used .I have used them to find some of the most remote places in B.C. and now I see they are mapsource and gps compatible .Just wondering if anyone has them loaded on a gps and can comment on them ? Their books contain far more detail than Garmins or Ibycus maps http://www.gpscentral.ca/accessories/backr...aps-canada.html or http://www.backroadmapbooks.com/shop/

The product sure looks decent. Also looks like someone who is Garmin licensed as they have 3D/DEM in the maps.
I wonder why it has more features when used on a Dakota vs the Colorado?

[KFBradley]

I got the disc for Alberta maps, but I wasn't very impressed. I found I have more accuracy using a combination of Garmin's Topo maps for the DEM, Ibycus' free Topo maps, and Red90's Southern Alberta Trail Maps or Moun10bike's Northwest Trail Maps.

[WCoaster]

A geo bud of mine - not sure if he is still around? Dagg? - once told me that he loved Back road maps. He said they made excellent fire starter and in a pinch toilet paper.

Having used them myself I can agree with the former but not absorbent enough for the later.

Good Luck though.

[Forkeye]

KFBradley, on Jun 20 2010, 01:01 PM, said:

I got the disc for Alberta maps, but I wasn't very impressed. I found I have more accuracy using a combination of Garmin's Topo maps for the DEM, Ibycus' free Topo maps, and Red90's Southern Alberta Trail Maps or Moun10bike's Northwest Trail Maps.

That sounds dissapointing ,the books for B.C. are very good at showing more roads and trails than Garmin or Ibycus,and always seemed acurate when I used them from the books long before I got my gps ,but as far as actual co-ordinate accuracy of junctions ,turns and other geographic details I cannot comment on that.The newer books do show UTM and Lat. & Long..I was kind of hoping that they would be of adequate accuracy on a gps.

[Ken in Regina]

If anyone is interested, here's my review at Laptop GPS World.

http://www.laptopgpsworld.com/3545-review-...pbooks-gps-maps

I had no issues with accuracy. I'm not sure what was meant by KFBradley's comment.

Here's an excellent review at BC4X4.com.

http://www.bc4x4.com...kroad-gps-maps/

He also does not mention any issues with accuracy.

As you can see from examples in both reviews, Backroads GPS Maps has considerably more trail coverage than Topo Canada and even Ibycus Topo 2.1 at least in the areas reviewed. Both reviews are for the BC version of the product.

I agree that using the Calgary Area Trail Maps with any set of road or topo maps is very useful if you are in an area they cover. I've also been using the Quad Squad maps in the Crowsnest Pass and Flathead Valley areas for a few years and found them very useful. I actually find the overlay maps like these can sometimes be more useful with the Metroguide Canada road maps. I find for some of my purposes the contour lines on topo maps add too much clutter.

I have downloaded the Northwest Trail Maps just recently so I have no idea how good they are yet. I'm hoping to get a chance to try them out once or twice this summer/fall. Living in Saskatchewan is hell when you would rather be exploring trails in the mountains.

...ken...

[Forkeye]

Thanks Ken ,that is about as good a review as anyone could expect,just have to decide which version to get now.

[Red90]

Ken in Regina, on Jun 20 2010, 06:08 PM, said:

I agree that using the Calgary Area Trail Maps with any set of road or topo maps is very useful if you are in an area they cover. I've also been using the Quad Squad maps in the Crowsnest Pass and Flathead Valley areas for a few years and found them very useful. I actually find the overlay maps like these can sometimes be more useful with the Metroguide Canada road maps. I find for some of my purposes the contour lines on topo maps add too much clutter.

I have downloaded the Northwest Trail Maps just recently so I have no idea how good they are yet.

Just a little clarification of what is going on in Alberta. The Northwest trails maps use the data from the Southern Alberta Trail project (SATM), thus within southern Alberta, it is the same data. Moun10bike and I work together sharing data back and forth as needed.

The data from the CNP Quad Squad was absorbed and expanded into the SATM quite a while back with the blessing of the CNPQS.

This post has been edited by Red90: 22 June 2010 - 01:58 PM

[Bigd74]

I have used the back roads maps on my oregon for about 2 months now. It has worked great for back road atving and geocaching as well as used around the city. I have already recommended it to all my friends with GPS.

[Ken in Regina]

Red90, on Jun 22 2010, 01:45 PM, said:

Just a little clarification of what is going on in Alberta. The Northwest trails maps use the data from the Southern Alberta Trail project (SATM), thus within southern Alberta, it is the same data. Moun10bike and I work together sharing data back and forth as needed.

The data from the CNP Quad Squad was absorbed and expanded into the SATM quite a while back with the blessing of the CNPQS.

Thanks for the clarification. That will make my map loading simpler.

...ken...

[snomchfun]

I've spent a ton of time comparing the ibycus vs topo CDN vs Backroad mapbook.....there is no question that Bkrd Mpbk is way better....expensive but superior..

[Viajero Perdido]

I bought the Backroads maps recently, so I can offer a mini-review and comparison with Ibycus.

First off, Ibycus maps lost a lot of backcountry detail going from 2.1 to 3.1. All references to Ibycus below are for the 2.1 version, which I consider the best version.

Topographic (contour) data appears identical in both.

Backroads ("BR") definitely has more trails, minor roads, and cutlines. Not always however; there are times when Ibycus has a road etc. that BR doesn't. But mostly, BR wins here.

BR has "feature" trails marked with big dashed lines. For example, Trans Canada Trail, snowmobile trails, etc. However, my first impression with these is that they're only schematic. That is, their location is very approximate. I rode the trails near Long Lake Provincial Park, and found the mapped trails not even close to reality on the ground. This inaccuracy seems to affect only the "feature" trails marked with the big dashed lines; by comparison, unnamed trails, roads and cutlines do seem to be accurate AFAICT. I understand the BR people are encouraging people to submit their tracklogs to improve the trail data.

Ibycus doesn't auto-route. BR does auto-route, but doesn't seem to understand that Edmonton's freeways are divided roads. No, I cannot go up that ramp against traffic! I think Ibycus-the-person declined to add auto-routing because he couldn't resolve this problem.

BR will auto-route down minor gravel roads, but not the super-minor ones. I was impressed by this.

Ibycus uses color to show vegetation, green = forest. BR uses color to show legal status, green = park or natural area or similar. I like both these approaches, but it's great to see natural areas on the BR maps.

BR has DEM shading for units that support it, and the maps look gorgeous in MapSource. BR also has reference info for POIs, likely the same info as in their books.

BR shows WMUs, which hunters may appreciate. And oilwell names, and land descriptors of some sort ("NE-23-42-10w4") all over the place.

In BR, if you zoom out to about 50km (at least in my Garmin 60Cx with detail set to Normal or higher), all you see is a black smudge of "campground" POIs. At that level, all you want to see is cities and major highways. Looks like a bug.

BR's installation fails miserably if you don't have enough space for gigabytes of maps on your C: drive. You can try to specify a different drive, but it'll fail. This is a showstopper, and I've urged them to fix it. Given BR's premium price, I expected better. Ibycus installs flawlessly to drives other than C:.

~~~

In short, I'm happy with the BR purchase - IF they fix the installer. I'll be carrying around both BR and Ibycus in my unit, with BR displayed by default. I'll keep Ibycus available for tricky situations where I need a second opinion about trails etc.

This post has been edited by Viajero Perdido: 21 August 2010 - 09:42 AM

[Red90]

I'd really love to see more first hand info on accuracy of the minor road and trails. That is the only selling feature to me ATM. Lots of data is only good if it is accurate. If it is not much better than Ibycus 2.1, it would be hard to justify the cost.

Are backroad named properly?
Are small campgrounds named and searchable?

[rovers3]

I see that there is now an Ontario version available for $150. Covers the entire province.

http://www.backroadmapbooks.com/shop/gps-m...ard-8-7185.html

Has anyone tried this yet?
If so, what is your opinion of it?

[Ken in Regina]

Viajero Perdido, on Aug 21 2010, 10:55 AM, said:

BR shows WMUs, which hunters may appreciate. And oilwell names, and land descriptors of some sort ("NE-23-42-10w4") all over the place.

That translates to "North-East quarter of Section 23 in Township 42 Range 10 West of the Fourth Meridian.

If you're interested, here's the explanation of the Dominion Land Survey.

http://en.wikipedia....ion_Land_Survey

Quote

In BR, if you zoom out to about 50km (at least in my Garmin 60Cx with detail set to Normal or higher), all you see is a black smudge of "campground" POIs. At that level, all you want to see is cities and major highways. Looks like a bug.

What do you have your display Details set at? Perhaps changing it to a lower setting will help.

Quote

BR's installation fails miserably if you don't have enough space for gigabytes of maps on your C: drive. You can try to specify a different drive, but it'll fail. This is a showstopper, and I've urged them to fix it. Given BR's premium price, I expected better. Ibycus installs flawlessly to drives other than C:.

That's a "feature" of Garmin's installer, which Backroad Mapbooks uses. The same thing happens when you try to download one of Garmin's downloadable maps and there's insufficient space on C:. It appears that the installer insists on downloading to the C: drive and doing the actual installation from there.

You could probably subvert this behaviour by changing your TEMP folder location to the target drive instead of leaving it at the default (C: drive).

...ken...

[Viajero Perdido]

Q: Are backroads named properly?
A: Roads do show names, though sometimes it's just "Road" or "Unpaved Road". Range Roads and Township Roads are marked. Onion Lake Road and Ya-Ha Tinda Ranch Road are marked. As to accuracy, I don't know yet.

Q: Are small campgrounds named and searchable?
A: Sort of. There are at least two kinds of campground icons.
1. Tiny green tent icon, just called "Campground". Searchable under "Lodging", but you just see lots of "Campground" in the list.
2. Big black tent/trailer icon (like the road signs), named (eg, Hummingbird Recreation Area), but not searchable by any means I've found yet, either on the 60Cx or in MapSource. (These are the ones that blot out the display when you zoom back too far.)
Sometimes a campground will have both icons side-by-side.

Do you have any areas of specific interest? I could probably post a screenshot or two.

PS: I think I was sold when I realized the BR maps - unlike at least three others - showed the way to this cache. BR shows the "Unpaved Rd" that goes right by it.
PPS: Ibycus and Google show a road (correctly it seems) to this cache, but BR leaves out the final kilometer or so. One example of why I'm going to carry Ibycus 2.1 around as a backup.

This post has been edited by Viajero Perdido: 22 August 2010 - 10:59 AM

[Viajero Perdido]

Ken in Regina, on Aug 22 2010, 08:59 AM, said:

Quote

In BR, if you zoom out to about 50km (at least in my Garmin 60Cx with detail set to Normal or higher), all you see is a black smudge of "campground" POIs. At that level, all you want to see is cities and major highways. Looks like a bug.

What do you have your display Details set at? Perhaps changing it to a lower setting will help.

Just now I set all the Points settings to Auto, and Detail to Normal, and it still blots out with campgrounds at the 50km view. (If I zoom out any farther it says "no map".) So even with default settings it's not exactly ideal. Normally I set Detail to More or Most, meaning less ideal.

Ken in Regina, on Aug 22 2010, 08:59 AM, said:

Quote

BR's installation fails miserably if you don't have enough space for gigabytes of maps on your C: drive. You can try to specify a different drive, but it'll fail. This is a showstopper, and I've urged them to fix it. Given BR's premium price, I expected better. Ibycus installs flawlessly to drives other than C:.

That's a "feature" of Garmin's installer, which Backroad Mapbooks uses. The same thing happens when you try to download one of Garmin's downloadable maps and there's insufficient space on C:. It appears that the installer insists on downloading to the C: drive and doing the actual installation from there.

You could probably subvert this behaviour by changing your TEMP folder location to the target drive instead of leaving it at the default (C: drive).

I think BR uses Garmin's installer differently. I downloaded a self-extracting ZIP, which I managed to extract to G: (a network drive); that part was fine. Temporary files weren't an issue, but the final destination for the bulk of the map tiles (C:\garmin, hardwired), was the problem. I did manage to free up the necessary space using drastic measures, and ended up with a broken installation because it only partly honored my G: request. But I can repair broken installations. Not everybody can.

BTW, thanks for the info on Dominion Land Surveys. (That'll probably help me solve a puzzle...)

This post has been edited by Viajero Perdido: 22 August 2010 - 09:45 AM

[Ken in Regina]

Did you notify the Backroad Mapbooks folks of the two issues (installer and icon display)? They typically try really hard to fix things if they can. A good example happened when I was evaluating the first release of their GPS maps (BC). I pointed out that their custom POI file could not be used in Mapsource on the PC nor in many of the handheld models that people using their maps will likely use for navigation.

There is nothing, so far, that they can do about the Mapsource limitation but it did not take them very long to come up with a version of their custom POI file that would work in all of Garmin's handheld devices.

...ken...

This post has been edited by Ken in Regina: 22 August 2010 - 01:44 PM

[Viajero Perdido]

I did send them feedback about those things, yes. It's good to know that they listen.

So that was you that nudged them to create supplemental POI files? Thanks for that. I checked them out, and suggested in return that while they're nice to have, it'd be even better if the text could be split across several POIs (a la cache hints as POIs), rather than being cut off.

PS: I just realized it was also you who wrote the review at laptopgpsworld (link above); I'd been referring back to that review, especially the screenshots, while trying to decide whether to buy the maps. Good job, thanks.

This post has been edited by Viajero Perdido: 22 August 2010 - 06:58 PM

[Viajero Perdido]

As to the wonky auto-routing I mentioned with the BR maps, it looks like they think we drive on the left, at least on some divided roads. As I was going up Edmonton's divided 91 St, there was a lot of beeping and bad advice about moving to the other side. Uh, no.

But to their credit, I see the maps are quite up-to-date with new roads, which I noticed while toodling around some of Edmonton's newest neighborhoods. The roads are there, and I got auto-routed through them ably - on the undivided roads.

Edmonton's Anthony Henday Drive is up-to-date (including the SE corner, and with at least some of it auto-routing correctly), and I see the maps include Calgary's Stony Trail right through the Hwy #2 junction and farther east.

[Red90]

Viajero Perdido, on Aug 22 2010, 11:31 AM, said:

Do you have any areas of specific interest? I could probably post a screenshot or two.

Try a shot centered on N51 43.621 W115 03.200 I've been doing a lot of mapping around there lately and every map has different ideas....

and any campground, say ram falls, N52 05.225 W115 50.755

Thanks!!

[Viajero Perdido]

Red90, on Aug 24 2010, 10:50 PM, said:

Try a shot centered on N51 43.621 W115 03.200 I've been doing a lot of mapping around there lately and every map has different ideas....
and any campground, say ram falls, N52 05.225 W115 50.755

Here you go:


Ram Falls. There's a campground icon hiding underneath the viewpoint icon. The Red A is river access. The "29" and "5" might be waterfall height in metres, but that's just a guess. No airstrip.


Just west of Ram Falls. As I mentioned before, the big dashed trails in general seem to be approximate.

This post has been edited by Viajero Perdido: 25 August 2010 - 06:23 AM

[Red90]

OK, thanks. The first shot is no better than other options and quite inaccurate. There are a lot more forestry roads in the area and half of the trails are wrong.

On the third, I see they have not used my data...as I have that trail correct. The data is around for that one if they look.

[Viajero Perdido]

More on the wonky auto-routing of Backroads Mapbook maps:

In general, they seem to not understand one-way roads, including the fact that each half of a divided road is one-way. It's almost as if it sees a divided road as two opportunities, each as good as the other. I'm seeing that all over Edmonton as I drive around.

Also unusual: I was going up St. Albert Trail/Road from Edmonton to St. Albert, a long road going more-or-less north. Normally the unit would say something like North on St. Albert Trail, which is correct. But every time I went by a cross-road (or even over one with no connection), it would say North on [cross road]. That's just weird, and looks like a symptom of deeper unfinished-ness.

At $150 per province, I was optimistic the maps would work better than this. Maybe in the next update...

[Red90]

Have they stated any estimate on price for updates?

They are also locked maps, which makes life more difficult at that cost.

[Viajero Perdido]

I found their updates page after I registered the purchase.

What I found interesting is that they're also offering an update credit for people who submit track logs and POIs, ultimately leading to "free upgrades for life" when you submit enough info. I'm not sure how much is "enough", but they did mention a $5 credit per tracklog; that's not too shabby.

[Red90]

LOL... I guess the updates would be free for any of us. 20 tracks gives 5 years.

[rovers3]

Back on August (post #14) I posted a link for these maps for Ontario and did not get any reply to my post.

I looked at the website again today and the maps are not available for Ontario any longer.

Anyone have any ideas as to what's going on there?
Thanks

[northernpenguin]

rovers3, on Sep 25 2010, 12:13 PM, said:

Back on August (post #14) I posted a link for these maps for Ontario and did not get any reply to my post.

I looked at the website again today and the maps are not available for Ontario any longer.

Anyone have any ideas as to what's going on there?
Thanks

Maybe they're waiting for the next Ontario Trails Project update

[Red90]

rovers3, on Sep 25 2010, 10:13 AM, said:

Back on August (post #14) I posted a link for these maps for Ontario and did not get any reply to my post.

I looked at the website again today and the maps are not available for Ontario any longer.

Anyone have any ideas as to what's going on there?
Thanks

What is this??

http://www.backroadmapbooks.com/shop/gps-m...13hsrbhha34lpj0

[rovers3]

That's strange because when I checked the site on 25 Sept, the day I posted it was showing as not available.

[Viajero Perdido]

Viajero Perdido, on Aug 21 2010, 08:55 AM, said:

In BR, if you zoom out to about 50km (at least in my Garmin 60Cx with detail set to Normal or higher), all you see is a black smudge of "campground" POIs. At that level, all you want to see is cities and major highways. Looks like a bug.

Update on that. I had the built-in Basemap turned off, so I guess the unit would show the BR maps at any and all zoom levels, since that was the only enabled mapset. Just recently I turned Basemap on, and bingo - the unit switches to showing only that at way-out zoom levels. That's perfect. I can zoom way out, find Vancouver (or wherever), and zoom back in again. Once zoomed in, the detailed BR maps show up as expected.

So maybe not a bug after all. (I just hoped that turning off the Basemap would hide a zillion worldwide place names when trying to search by city name, but no. BTW, oilwell names show up from the BR maps when you search by city; interesting.)

Oh, and in defense of rovers3's sanity (just above), I can verify that the Ontario maps were indeed shown (temporarily, as it turned out) as unavailable.

[Red90]

Viajero Perdido, on Nov 2 2010, 09:52 AM, said:

So maybe not a bug after all.

It is not really a "bug". It is just poor design of the maps by the authors.

[Viajero Perdido]

Version 2.0 is now out. I downloaded the upgrade and gave it a try.

I'm going back to 1.0.

First impressions:

• The display is a lot different than 1.0. Whether you like that is a matter of preference. I'm undecided, but leaning toward the original.
• Installer still insists on using drive C:.
• Auto-routing which used to be useless in the city (unable to deal with one-way roads) is now near-useless in the country too. It takes my 60Cx about 5 minutes (!) to calculate a route into the nearby countryside, even with "fastest calculation" selected. EDIT: I switched my routing from "pedestrian" (oops) to "car/motorcycle", and the routing has sped up - for some destinations. For others, it still takes several minutes.
• For my favorite sample destination, the maps are able to route down the nearest "Resource Road", but not the final "Unclassified Road" to the campsite. Same as in Version 1.
• The maps use a lot of memory in MapSource, and for me it's excruciatingly slow to zoom out, over, and back in again to choose a new position. I've resorted to switching to a different mapset (Ibycus) when I want to do that. If I zoom the Backroads map out to an "overview" altitude like 100km, it can take minutes to draw. Grab a coffee. (My Windows is inside a virtual machine, and it doesn't have much memory. But even Backroads 1.0 drew much faster than this.)
• Contours are spaced farther apart, and many of them only show as "Contour" in the unit, or "Invalid Depth" in MapSource. Depth? (Yep, depth. If MapSource is configured to show depths in feet, the contours that DO show elevations are labelled in feet.) So no more intermediate elevations. DEM shading is gone too.
• I've noticed the contour lines in the new maps drift back and forth across the local major river. The old maps didn't do that.
• They've incorporated some user-supplied tracks (good), but with little apparent editing. For example, somebody's there-and-back track will show as two interwoven trails instead of one. Or a trail following a road through a town will weave back and forth, showing off the original GPS drift.
• Some map labels display oddly on my 60Cx. For example, "Rose Creek" shows as "R... C...", "Unclassified Road" as "U........... R...". Looking closely, it seems those periods are actually tiny triangles, so maybe this is a character-set problem in combination with lowercase.

Bottom line: Keep a backup of 1.0 before upgrading to 2.0, try 'em both, and choose which one you prefer. They're quite different.

This post has been edited by Viajero Perdido: 08 June 2011 - 11:34 AM

[Viajero Perdido]

I took screenshots again, of the same three places as the first time around. Detail=highest.

Vicinity of N51 43.621 W115 03.200. Definite trail improvements here. Version 1, then Version 2:



Ram Falls.



Just west of Ram Falls. The mountains seem smoother in Version 2.

This post has been edited by Viajero Perdido: 08 June 2011 - 10:26 AM

[911turbos]

The problem I have with version 2.0 is that many of the POIs have proximity alarms. On the Oregon there is no way that I can find to turn them off. It is rather annoying to be told you are at a park 10 times while looking for a cache.

[Ken in Regina]

First, just as a bit of information, Backroad Mapbooks has moved development of the GPS maps inhouse so they have better control over the development. There has been a massive amount of work gone into this release but, understandably, there is a learning curve. Especially with the scale of some of the improvements they are trying to make. For instance...

Viajero Perdido, on 08 June 2011 - 08:46 AM, said:

First impressions:
The display is a lot different than 1.0.

Yes. The initial maps were done with the assumption that probably only people with handhelds (eTrex, Oregon, Dakota, etc.) would buy them. They allowed the object attributes to pretty much default to the same as Garmin uses in their topo maps.

Anyone who has ever tried to use a Garmin topo on a Nuvi or Mobile PC, where the display attributes are totally different, will know what a disaster that is!!

They have discovered that a bunch of people with Nuvis have bought the maps and are genuinely dissatisfied with how badly they display. So one of the major changes Backroad Mapbooks is making is to force the object types to display "properly" on any Garmin device.

While the new map display is a little different - not necessarily worse - on my eTrex Legend HCx, it is HUGELY improved on my Nuvi 765T and Mobile PC. To the point where I would not hesitate to use it with either of them now.

Quote

DEM shading is gone too.

Yes. A simple logistical decision based on two factors.

One, it reduces the download size by quite a bit, and

Two, the basemaps on most Garmin devices already contain the necessary DEM data. So just make sure your basemap is not disabled.

I miss the DEM display when using them in Basecamp and Mapsource where there is no ability to display multiple maps. I'm not sure the saving in download time is worth the tradeoff when using them for planning on the PC. But I have a high speed internet connection so perhaps others will feel differently.

Quote

Bottom line: Keep a backup of 1.0 before upgrading to 2.0, try 'em both, and choose which one you prefer. They're quite different.

Excellent advice, always!!

...ken..

[Ken in Regina]

911turbos, on 08 June 2011 - 12:21 PM, said:

The problem I have with version 2.0 is that many of the POIs have proximity alarms. On the Oregon there is no way that I can find to turn them off. It is rather annoying to be told you are at a park 10 times while looking for a cache.

That's an issue with the way they've chosen to name the files that the custom POIs are loaded from. It shouldn't be that difficult to fix, I hope.

I've forwarded the link for Viajero Perdido's first version 2 post to the Backroad Mapbooks lead developer so I hope they'll read these posts and add the appropriate cases to their change request list.

...ken...

[Viajero Perdido]

Optimized for the Nuvi? I'd believe that. I have a feeling they didn't try it out on the 60Cx.

The last thing I noticed in the handheld before reverting to 1.0 was just how low-contrast some of the displays are. An orange trail on a green or grey background is basically mid-tone on mid-tone, and even in broad daylight I had a hard time making it out. (The 60Cx is brilliantly readable in daylight, but this foils it.) When I stepped indoors into dimmer light, the trail I had on the display basically became invisible to me.

And yes, 2.0 is significantly smaller. It's roughly a 1GB download vs 2+GB for the original.

Over the last year I sent them a bunch of my tracks and some POI updates, so I could qualify for free updates, and now, sigh, I don't even want the updates. I'm even more happy with 1.0 than I was a week ago.

[Avernar]

Ken in Regina, on 08 June 2011 - 02:02 PM, said:

Two, the basemaps on most Garmin devices already contain the necessary DEM data. So just make sure your basemap is not disabled.

The basemap has very coarse DEM data. The only thing that shows up around here is the Niagara Escarpment and with very little detail.

So to get decent DEM I'd have to have Topo Canada V4 loaded and active as well. In that case I think I'll just stick with Topo Canada.

[Viajero Perdido]

A 60CSx version - that would be nice.

I remember reading something - I think it was in the V2 readme - about needing to select car (eg Nuvi) vs handheld use during installation. But I never saw that option anywhere, so I suppose somehow I got the Nuvi-optimized version.

If you guys can restore the readability for my poor little handheld, and restore the full topo contour data which somehow got smoothed out in V2, I'd be glad to have another look. Thanks.

[Red90]

Viajero Perdido, on 22 June 2011 - 11:48 AM, said:

A 60CSx version - that would be nice.

I remember reading something - I think it was in the V2 readme - about needing to select car (eg Nuvi) vs handheld use during installation. But I never saw that option anywhere, so I suppose somehow I got the Nuvi-optimized version.

If you guys can restore the readability for my poor little handheld, and restore the full topo contour data which somehow got smoothed out in V2, I'd be glad to have another look. Thanks.

Not having the map, I can't say what problem you are having, but I assume it is simply the TYP customization. Have a look for a .TYP file in the Mapsource install directory for these maps. You can easily edit the TYP file here: http://ati.land.cz/g...comp/editor.cgi Then replace the file and send new tiles to the GPS. You can change this file to your heart's content without messing anything else up. Obviously save a copy of the original file if you want to revert to stock. Easy peasy pudding and pie.

This post has been edited by Red90: 23 June 2011 - 08:29 PM

[Viajero Perdido]

Thanks for that tip; I might try another install to see if there are multiple TYP files provided. I'm not about to go editing the file myself, since I feel that goes beyond my duties as a customer. To me a task like that is comparable to rearranging the dashboard in your car by pulling out the engine chip and recalibrating the flux capacitor. Um ... what?

But in reality I'm not likely to reinstall unless I know they've fixed the auto-routing (I can't wait five minutes every time), and put back the full topo detail. (Notice the difference in my last two screenshots above?) In the meantime, I'm off to the mountains now with Backroads 1.0, Ibycus 4.0, and your trail maps, and I expect I'll do a lot of comparing.

This post has been edited by Viajero Perdido: 24 June 2011 - 06:54 AM

[Red90]

Viajero Perdido, on 24 June 2011 - 06:51 AM, said:

...and put back the full topo detail. (Notice the difference in my last two screenshots above?).

Yes, I saw that. I wonder if they are using the DEM data to make the topo lines instead of the federal topo line data. Regardless, I agree, they have lost a lot of detail.

Also, Ibycus Topo is a lot better to use with TYP customization. Changing the vegetation so that it is faint really helps for screen visibility. I find the solid green really hurts visibility.

This post has been edited by Red90: 24 June 2011 - 08:44 AM

[MaliBooBoo]

I am afraid to upgrade to Version 2 due to the lack of DEM/shaded relief. It was one of the absolute best features of the Backroad Mapbooks maps and now it has been removed. What a disappointment!

[MaliBooBoo]

From that list I take it you have chosen to not re-introduce the amazing shaded relief that was part version one yet?

What a terrible shame. This was one of the best features of this product and to now exclude it is madness.

[Viajero Perdido]

Waiting with baited breath...

I spent a couple of weeks driving, hiking, and caching around AB/BC over the last month or so, and compared BR 1.0 vs Ibycus 4.0. I found I preferred BR for driving (good zoom-out readability on my 60CSx), but Ibycus for walking (BR's "fat line" trails were so inaccurate up close as to be a distraction). When I used BR, I sometimes turned on Ibycus transparent "Old Roads" layer as well, which made usable forest roads stand out more. Best of both worlds.

But I won't upgrade from BR 1.0 unless they restore the full topo detail (smaller download shouldn't be a design goal for a premium-priced product), and bring auto-routing back up to the semi-usable state it was in 1.0.

[MaliBooBoo]

"smaller download shouldn't be a design goal for a premium-priced product"

Exactly! Good point. The cost of these maps is great so the goal shouldn't be to have them fit on a cheaper 1gb card. DEM/shaded relief should not have been removed.

[Viajero Perdido]

Backroad 2.01 mini-review:

On the plus side, I see definite trail improvements. For example, it looks like they've incorporated the Southern Alberta Trail Maps data.

Route calculation is still quite sluggish compared to 1.0. When I asked it to give me a route from central Edmonton to central Calgary, it took several minutes to give me this route. (The route is the wide purple line; the thin green one is just a recent track log.)

Beyond Red Deer, it has me detouring onto country roads, then finally bee-lining somehow (helicopter?) to my destination. Settings: faster time, best route, car/motorcycle, avoid carpool lanes but nothing else. I'm pretty sure this worked better in 1.0.

Topo detail - now that's interesting. I use topo contours to help me choose a route up a mountain. For that you need consistent contour spacing.

Here are a couple of screenshots of 2.01 showing uneven contour spacing; the first manages to show 10, 20, 30, 40 and even 50m spacings all on the same display. (I moved the pointer to each contour to confirm each elevation since not all are labelled.) The second shows mostly a mix of 10, 40, and 50.

Detail: normal.

Sorry, I can't use this.

This post has been edited by Viajero Perdido: 08 August 2011 - 11:09 AM

[northernpenguin]

Viajero Perdido, on 08 August 2011 - 10:53 AM, said:

On the plus side, I see definite trail improvements. For example, it looks like they've incorporated the Southern Alberta Trail Maps data.

I sure hope they asked first.