Mapsend Topo GB

Gareth Jones said:

Has anyone experience of using Mapsend Topo GB?

I've had a copy for 6 months or so. I use it, but I'm hanging onto my
paper maps too .. it's not very readable on a monochrome GPS, and has
very little in the way of detail - really just contours, paths, roads,
water. Almost no other features. And some of the minor roads that
approach tracks are missing, which is a real pain. The worst aspect is
that although the GPS will display OS grid references as normal, the
PC software only works in lat/long. Although footpaths and tracks are
shown in reasonable detail, ROWs are not distinguished.

In fact, most of the things you'd expect to use it for are flawed
in some way .. it's quite nice to have but hard to see that it's
worth spending much on.

Quoted message said:

It is very expensive. Is it worth it?

Given that it covers the whole country, I'd say it was relatively
cheap. But it's not as good as a raster OS map like Memory Map
so I'd try to look at it before you buy : you're likely to
be disappointed. If you can get to the Outdoor Show at the NEC
in a month or so you'll probably see it demoed - it was last year.

Quoted message said:

How large are the maps produced? How big an area can fit into 8meg?

Depends on the area (number of countours, paths etc. ) but 8meg
would probably hold the equivalent of a couple of landranger
sheets - enough for a single trip, if you choose the area
carefully. I use it on a Platinum which has a 256M SD card :
that holds Direct Route maps of all of England, and Topo maps
(about 16M each) for about 5 areas that I've visited.

Quoted message said:

I have Memory Map on my PDA but find battery life and fragility a
problem

I get a full days walking out of a pair of NiMh cells and don't
have to worry about the wet. But I still want a paper map.

-adrian