GPS in Australia - Which software?!?

[gonsped]

It seems there are so many GPS software out there that serves USA (obviously), Europe and other funny little towns but hardly any support Australia which is the biggest island in the world.

The only software I could find was:

* Travroute
* Navman (maybe?)

The popular software such as Tomtom doesn't even support Australian maps but it supports pretty much everywhere else :-/

Any Aussies here that uses GPS on their PPC? If there is, would you mind sharing what software you use?

[nodyel]

* Navman (maybe?)

No maybe about Navman - it does have Australian maps. However, it is my understanding that you cannot buy the software (SmartST) on its own - it only comes bundled with their hardware.

I have a Navman PiN. The maps are basically all the UDB directories for Australia, so has very good detail for all the capital cities and a large number of country towns. Haven't had a chance to go much into rural areas yet, so not really sure how good that coverage is, a quick look around on the screen indicates to me that it really only provides major road information.

DiscoverAus Streets & Destinations from Magellan (I also have a Magellan Meridian) appears to have a lot more detail for rural areas (rivers, 4WD tracks, etc), but doesn't have things such as auto-routing, etc.

The Navman software makes use of POI data from Sensis & Whereis, so provides a pretty comprehensive database, although sometimes the software itself makes it a bit difficult to find what you are after (why can't we just have a free-text search???).

Of course, with any package there is the age of the maps to consider. I have found that the Navman maps have stuff that is reasonably recent (i.e. about a year ago), but also has certain items that are about 4 or 5 years out of date. Plus the odd error in the map data itself :? .

I have had a play around with a couple of packages that allow you to download your own maps, but of course you lose a lot of the avanced capabilities such as auto-routing... I will probably invest in one of these as they are reasonably priced (why pay for maps you may never use?). I figure that when I go 4WD, I can make up my own detail maps for the areas I will be going into, since auto-routing is not really a requirement.

Destinator mentions support for Australian maps from Mapinfo. How good they are, or how good the software is, I can't comment as I haven't tried it.

Cheers,

Mike.

[gonsped]

Gosh it looks like GPS software still have quite some room to improve :?

The Navman 4410 seems to be the most affordable at AU$630 incl. GST and has maps as well.

But I hear from Pocketgps.UK they have problems with roundabouts where it constantly freeze intermittently - something you don't want happening while you're driving.

It does have excellent long life though.

I was considering the GlobalSat BT-308 Bluetooth receiver as it was tested to have one of the best reception - but the cons are no software and the closest thing to real Australian Map software would be Travroute at a whopping AU$500 just for the software :?

[gonsped]

I managed to score myself a Destinator 3 software and it looks pretty good, very close to Travroute CoPilot Live and Navman SmartST. Slightly finicky and about an hour or two worth of learning curve.

Quite speedy on the Dell 624MHZ X30 - still awaiting on the actual Bluetooth GPS unit coming next week but it looks like a fun and interesting way to travel by car :)