Mapopolis UK Review

[Dave]

It's been a while coming, but it's worth the wait. The full comprehensive in-depth review of Mapopolis for the UK.



The full review is available here.

[StuBFrost]

Dave,



Excellent review and still leaves me unsure about buying !



Any idea whether there are any significant map holes in the Manchester area since this is where I live and mainly travel in.



Thanks



Stuart Frost

[Dave]

Yes, M60 has gaping holes, M56, Trafford, M67, and A580 to name a few.

[StuBFrost]

In that case I am not going to buy it yet. If it has holes in the M60 then it isn't going to work for me.



Have Mapopolis given any timescales for when these holes will be fixed ?



Stuart Frost

[Dave]

Unfortunately I've had no communication from Jeremy since I sent him the preview of the review...

[hollis_f]

70%! 70% for something that would be totally useless for many, many journeys!



There's no way I'd consider buying this. For a start, I live in one of the 'black holes'. Then again I suppose living in the middle of nowhere I should - Oh! Hang on. I live about 5 miles from the M25.



And the fact that they've released such a shoddy product suggests that they couldn't care less about their potential customers - so I doubt I'll be looking at any of their stuff in the future.

[Kram]

I was surprised that the review was so positive and gave such a high percentage. In my opinion (and experience, before I returned the product) the map errors alone make the product unusable in the UK at the moment. I also found the lack of support for roundabouts frustrating and confusing. While I was using it I didn't realise there was no support for one-way streets, but that would also be a show-stopper for me as there are a lot of one-way systems in UK cities.



I've heard "early March" for the next UK map updates, which they hope will fix the missing chunks problem.

[StuBFrost]

Dave



Now that a week has gone by since the review, has there been any reaction or comment yet from Mapopolis.



Thanks



Stuart

[Dave]

Nope, still nothing.

[hollis_f]

Quote: Originally posted by Dave on 14 February 2003

---

Nope, still nothing.

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Still nothing?

[Dave]

Still no comment. I sent Mapopolis a preview copy of the review before it was released as Jeremy said he'd like to make sure he read it, so all I can say is this.



I have requested a number of times from Jeremy when the map updates would be available for the UK, and received an email recently saying soon with no specific dates granted. Seeing that the North American maps have been updated recently to v5 for ClearRoute, I'd hope that the v4 maps for Europe would also be updated soon which would hopefully eliminate a lot of the map problems that we highlighted in our review.

[jsheathcote]

I have Mapopolis on my Sony Clie. On the whole I like what I see so far, but I hasten to add I have very little experience of anything else. My bad points are;



Despite what the Routeplanners site says, you have to manually move maps from memory stick to Palm before Mapopolis can use them. "If you have maps installed on your expansion card, Mapopolis transfers the map to RAM before displaying it in order to make the display and search functions as fast as possible."



It can be difficult to negotiate around traffic islands and complex junctions.



It does not seem to like crossing the J25 on the M1 if coming out of Nottingham heading to Derby, prefering to send you north through the busy rush-hour route ring road to J26 then along the A52 into Derby.



The North Durham (Just south of Gateshead and Newcastle)section of map is attrocious with the A1 North/South carriageways zigzag over each other like some non-existant demented bridge/tunnel complex.



Not sure if it is the way I use it but I have to keep going into the GPS menu and stop/start the GPS if I have pulled into Services and turned off my ignition.



I also have to go into GPS menu, GPS settings and SAVE so that it does not power down.



Problem I have is that I have a Clie and very little else will work on it.
_________________
Jason - HTC Touch HD with Garmin XT UK

[Dave]

The Clie's are good little machines, and I was very nearly tempted to purchase one about 12 months ago. The main problem with GPS is companies tend to support what they see as being the biggest market, and unfortunately that's always seen as Pocket PC. I think Palm are starting to turn that around, and getting rid of Graffiti areas are a start, the new Tungsten's look real nice, and so do the Clie's.



I think it really needs a big GPS player like TravRoute, Navman, TomTom or PowerLOC to do something on the Palm OS. If they can effectively transform a Pocket PC application and port it over to the Palm and get re-routing like in the latest offerings on the Pocket PC, then this will really open the doors to the Palm OS.

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