Thread: Some warnings about Deluo Routis 2004, MapPoint 2004 & XPort

I started off with Mappoint and moved on to Routis. The voice and navigation directions are thousands of times better in Routis than agps, so I rarely use mappoint now. But as you mentioned there is a big downside to using programs like Routis, in order to achieve that 'smooth' navigation feel to it, is that it uses software algorithms to predict where you are going based on your speed/direction etc. Often I find myself plotting a route and on my way, (this is especially true for higher speeds such as highways) I take a shortcut that I know off or just to avoid the traffic. Now if the speed is over 90km/h I often find that my 'car' on Routis in fact keeps moving as if I havent exited the highway for another ~5 seconds. Only after that it jumps to my real location and starts to recalculate the route...

I dont trust the 'destination' house number through GPS, it's often very inaccurate. But I do have to admit, that 2/3 times so far it has been dead on. And it's neat! "Destination on the left" - And I'm dead on where I needed to go to. In fact I did a few tests, I often plot courses that I know how to get to and let Routis guide me by voice. Every once in a while I get bogus commands on the highway, but overall it's a decent enough system.

What I would like to see is some sort of map editing tool in the package, so we can adjust the actual numbering and correct it. It's kinda annoying to see my 'house' number always be about 150m down the road...

As for paper map? Naahh

The lag you're experiencing might be the result of how often your GPS updates its info. If you've got a programmable receiver, make sure it's refreshing as often as possible. I've got a Garmin GPS16 and it's set to update once/second.

As for Routis not finding house numbers. That can be very difficult to do as many cities either have a complicated numbering system, or no real system at all. Thus making it impossible for Routis to know. I like to think it gets you close enough to use your brain and your eyes.

Thanks "ncamara", but I'm very sure it's not the GPS receiver, since it does update every second & I was able to confirm my correct location by just shutting down the buggy Routis & fireup the MapPoint feeding data from the same COM port. Just another speculation that Xport might have screwing up Routis' response to the port detection - just a theory ...

Even though the functionality is great, I always find vector maps such as Routis are a little "dry" & too "abstract"-looking compared with feature-riched bitmaps in Mappoint, even though Mappoint doesn't have the bells & whistles of "3D View", "Map Heading & Auto Rotation" or "NMEA sentence display" like Routis. You can tell how wide the roads are in MapPoint while in Routis, streets are represented by grids of similar lines differed only by color.

I'm quite pleased with the house-number-range display in Routis. MapPoint does has all the data but it needs to show them out, loud & big !

I, too, was first so impressed with the voice feature in Routis, but after many times it started to fail me with all the wrong directions running amok, I will be more careful from now on (after the recent re-installation). By the way, Routis 2004 is just a "version 1.0" software or so from the company, so more improvements will still be needed. If having to make a critical decision (ie. guiding a cruise missile!) I'd prefer MapPoint than Routis. Unless, the Routis 2005/2006 proves me wrong !

i've heard a rumor that since 9/11 GPS software has a build in 'location-shift' to prevent 'people' from using it for the wrong purpose.
If you would use older versions of the software (prior to 9/11) than they are much more accurate. This in combination with the refresh rate earlier mentioned...

Although I don't know if this rumor is true...

Don't scare me like that Corolla. I just ordered the Delou Navigation kit yesterday.

I suspect the rumor could be true (despite the WAAS capability!), since when I'm driving near certain tall buildings in the downtowns of some Northeastern American cities, my GPS pointer suddenly jumps off a few blocks away, as if there's an invisible force at work to "repel/dispel" its accuracy ... Especially those financial & government buildings even though the sky openning above my head is wide & clear ... What I'm describing is more to do with the receiver end rather than the software end as Corolla mentioned.

I personally don't think that changing the GPS accuracy in certain areas would work though, since you can program a smart missile to reach a known location, ie. a nearby coordinate without any jamming/interference, near the target & change the bearing from that point to reach the destination. The terrorists must be dumb & lazy for not calculating this ... This is actually creating more hassles for us the GPS users than protecting national security ...

From the coast guard website:
Selective Availability has been set to ZERO
Also check this FAQ from the good folks at the FAA.
Especially this one that says:
"It is not the intent of the U.S. to ever use SA again. To ensure that potential adversaries to do not use GPS, the military is dedicated to the development and deployment of regional denial capabilities in lieu of global degradation through SA" so maybe, just maybe this is right, but I seriously doubt it.

They will upgrade routis (which is the same as iGuidance and another one that I can recall the name)

The v2 is WAY better than the previous version, at least it has colours...

The main problem is that it recalculates a route way too often, it should have a late recalculation option, since in anyways, there is often a lot of distance between exits, it could wait a little before doing a new route. Since sometimes when in complex overpasses the programs is fooled into thinking you took teh wrong route.

Check www.gpspassion.com it have ALL the information you need concerning gpa software and hardware for your pocketpc or notebook or carputer.

Etienne