Todger O'Toole <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
> Is it possible to get TomTom software (or similar) that will work on a
> PC/Laptop
Tom-Tom, no. You can get a version to work on a PDA or Smartphone but
AFAIK there's no PC version. This is one reason why I really, really
don't like Tom-Tom.
It also seems to induce a blindness among Tom-Tom users. As far as they
are concerned there is Tom-Tom and nothing else is available. As
mentioned here, there's Microsoft Autoroute for the PC. It works but
it's always been fairly clunky, and Microsoft seem determined to make it
worse with every revision.
It's the grandaddy of navigation and routing software and the original
was created by a bunch of guys from the Bedford area who worked on
military mapping and routing software. Hence it was sparse and
functional. It had features that I still miss in current software such
as the ability to compile lists of roads to avoid (e.g. avoid the M1
extended roadworks, don't use the A3 through Hindhead). That feature was
removed from Autoroute some time ago and replaced with a useless "paint
a rectangle to avoid in yellow" feature which ignores the fact that
roads are not convenient rectangular blocks.
Anyway, there are alternatives to Tom-Tom.
Despite what I and others have said, Autoroute is still at least as
usable as Tom-Tom. So that's one alternative.
Another is the excellent GPSS which has one huge advantage, it's free.
http://www.gpss.tripoduk.com/
This has features that aren't seen in either Autoroute or Tom-Tom, but
it's a difficult product to install and use. It's worth it though
because it works over a wide range of hardware and can o tricks like
navigating from aerial photographs, ordnance survey maps and admiralty
charts as well as vector maps. It should run well on a netbook.
There's also Memory Map, which is pay-to-use:
http://www.memory-map.co.uk/software.htm
And Garmin produce PC software that can export its routes to their
mobile GPS equipment, it's Garmin Mobile PC and it uses the same Map
disks as the PDA/Dedicated GPS versions of Garmin software.
I've no experience of that one, but I've seen good things said about it
by other users.
One other that I was very keen on was PrymeNav. However that seems to
have been discontinued which is a great shame. It was an excellent
package with better navigation features than Tom-Tom.
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