|
| TOPO! National Geographic USGS Topographic Maps, Colorado | 
 enlarge | Brand: National Geographic
Category: CE
List Price: $99.99
Buy New: $79.95
You Save: $20.04 (20%)
New (3) from $79.95
Avg. Customer Rating:  26 reviews
Format: Cd-rom
Media: Electronics
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.2
Dimensions (in): 10 x 8 x 2
MPN: Colorado
Model: Colorado
ISBN: 1597750336
UPC: 749717205178
EAN: 9781597750332
ASIN: 1597750336
Release Date: April 1, 2006
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
|
| Features:
| • | Print photo quality USGS topographic maps | | • | GPS Ready - Easiest Way to tell your GPS where you want to go and record where you've been | | • | Navigate in three dimensions with 3D fly-thru and instant elevation profiling | | • | Customize maps with photos, notes and icons | | • | Live Map Update ensures you always have the most current maps and software |
|
| Similar Items:
|
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
With the TOPO! Colorado, National Geographic has taken the interactive topographic map experience to a new level. By combining its own standard-setting maps with the high-quality scanned versions of the actual paper USGS topographical maps, the National Geographic TOPO! State Series offers five levels of map detail that is unprecedented in its accuracy.Simply load TOPO!, and you'll immediately begin to see the benefits of this award-winningsoftware. With TOPO! you can customize any of the hundreds of state maps available with your proposed routes, notes and even photos. You can also create and view elevation profiles that will help you visualize your planned trek. By connecting to any standard color or black-and-white desktop printer, TOPO! allows you to select the exact area that you want to print, even if it is larger than the screen or covers multiple quad maps. TOPO! makes it a breeze to add map border information to printouts, including UTM or latitude/longitude grids, scale bars, north arrows, and magnetic declination. With Adventure Paper (sold separately) you can print out waterproof trail mapsTOPO! is also GPS ready, with no extensions or upgrades required. Transferring waypoints and routes between your GPS and TOPO! couldn't be easier.The many advanced features that make the TOPO! mapping software the ultimate topographic map experience.* TOPO! USA Place Finder: Use TOPO!'s advanced search functions to find trails, camps, lakes, parks, towns, and much more in a matter of seconds.* Export Features: With TOPO! you can export customized maps in a number of different raster file formats (.gif, .jpg, etc.) for use in other applications.* Import Features: Import GPS and vector data from a variety of sources, including GPS receivers, spreadsheets, and the web, to overlay on your maps.* National Geographic mapXchange: Download custom map overlays and swap files with other TOPO! users on the National Geographic mapXchange Website.
|
| Customer Reviews: Read 21 more reviews...
 Worst user interface that I've ever seen October 16, 2008
TOPO! has the worst user interface ever created. It doesn't follow the standard user interface designed by Apple, Adobe, and Microsoft.
- There's no hand tool to move around the map--rather you have to move your cursor to the edge of the screen and click to push the map around. Hard to control and creates lots of cursor movement
- The tool to draw routes is hard to control
Horrible UI, slow, and crash-prone October 15, 2008
Do not waste your money on this horrible software. Even on a 2.4 GHz, 2 GB RAM MacBook Pro, it staggers to run. It takes an average of 20 seconds just to change zoom levels and pans incredibly slowly. Try drawing a route and half the time the whole thing freezes and crashes and you have to start over. I'll say it again - DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY!
 How To Increase Its Value October 11, 2008
With TOPO, it makes a big difference if you copy the maps from the CDs to your hard drive. That results in a much faster and better experience. Directions for copying the maps to your hard drive are on the Topo web site. Some reviewers do not realize that.
The digital maps are an extremely good value compared to paper maps!! Live Map Updates is a feature of version 4. You can download the current maps and street overlays for the quads you are interested in! And that is free.
I have used versions 2, 3, and 4 of this product. Version 2 was excellent. Versions 3 and 4 are incremental improvements. On Amazon, it isn't always clear which version you are buying. Go by the dates -- version 4 was released in 2006.
The software is excellent. My only complaint is that it is a bit complicated to install. I don't think it has ever crashed on me. I use it a lot, and discover new features all the time. It is not hard to learn. GPS support is great, in my experience.
No backward compatibility. Very poor support October 7, 2008
I now have their latest TOPO! 4.5, but cannot use it with my California State series maps. I've been exchanging e-mails with their customer support and they basically just recycle cut and paste's from their web site. At first I took their instructions (often contradictory) seriously and did everything they said, but none of it works. To make sure I tried it on a different computer. No go. The software often hangs up for long time, so anything you try kills a lot of time. I think it is just a very badly written code with no backward compatibility. I'm going to start looking for another product.
 Offline map sharing functionality, great source for geotiff raster maps October 1, 2008
I have been using Topo! since it was a Wildflower product back in the early 1990's. The interface does take some getting used to as mentioned before, but like all powerful software programs (vi/emacs) eventually, it becomes second nature.
I mostly use TOPO! to annotate my previous trips, plan future trips, share travel guides with family, and create georeferenced raster maps for handheld GPS devices.
My trips primarily used to be hiking and backpacking trips, which I would dutifully record using an old Garmin Etrex GPS receiver. The tracks and waypoints would be uploaded to the desktop and saved as separate .tpo files. Back in the day, I was plenty happy just to see waypoint times and elevation gains as documentation of my backcountry trips. I would also use TOPO to create waypoint routes (up to 30) to be uploaded to the GPS receiver so that I could plan/program my future hikes into the Etrex.
Since those early primitive days, both TOPO! and I have changed a lot! TOPO! has improved significantly in its featurea. Now that I have two kids and more money, my outdoor travels consist mostly of Jeeping, dry car camping, and ancient rock art hunting.
Now, with the newer versions of TOPO, it is possible to add pictures and notes. In turn, these more detailed maps can be useful as travelogues not only for nostalgia, but also as travel guides for family members and friends who are using TOPO! as well.
While similar functionality could be obtained by using Google Earth or Maps, this map sharing is dependent on "cloud computing". This may be feasible when sitting in a coffee shop in a metropolis or even at home, but out in the desert without cellphone access this is not a viable option. Further, Google Map data is only protected by obscurity. Any person who knows the URL to your map data can view it.
Since I don't have to carry gear on my back anymore, I primarily use TOPO in the field on a laptop with an external GPS receiver. Though bulky, it is a much more useful combination than simply a tiny handheld receiver alone due to the larger size of the laptop screen and the ability to search for waypoints using the standard keyboard. My family uses a similar setup and they too find it reassuring to know that they have a clearly mapped GPS route available to them in the wild.
Finally, the most useful aspect of TOPO! is unfortunately no longer available, unless you can beg, borrow, or steal a boxed Xport Pro package. NatGeoMaps recently and quite quietly killed off its entire TopoPro line (including for ArcGIS). Xport Pro (formerly $199) allows the user to export high quality USGS maps in the georeferenced GeoTiff format. These GeoTiffs could then be used in shareware GPS programs like OziExplorer for Windows computers or OziWince or NoniGPSplot for WinCE GPS devices (many personal navigation devices can be cracked to run these apps in addition to the installed street mapping software). It used to be that you could call in a credit card number to NatGeoMaps customer service and for $99 get the functionality activated through a PIN, but no longer :( .
Admittedly, GeoTiff, mrsid, and many other georeferenced maps can be downloaded from state governments (usually from depts of ag or wildlife management), but having it all in one software package on CD's is pretty sweet.
|
|
|
Copyright
©
2006 Adminpal LLC | |
