BikePGH Message Board Archive

maps for gps?

I while ago I bought a used garmin GPS (etrex vista c). I had wanted to try to add some missing trails to maps of Frick Park people had put out there. Didn't get too far with that, but hung onto the unit. Now I'm thinking it might be good to have for some of these longer road rides I'm planning, in case I get lost. For the trail stuff, I didn't need anything in the way of maps loaded onto the gps, but for this I will. The unit comes with a basemap that includes things like major highways, but alot of smaller streets/roads are missing. I contacted garmin to see if they had maps that would be compatible with this old device, but the maps they showed me don't sound any more detailed than what I've got. And they were expensive (they package large geographic areas together - it doesn't seem that I can just get what I need). So I'm posting to ask if anyone knows of any sources for maps out there that I might be able to load onto my old garmin. I'm looking for this area (southwestern pa) and out toward state college.

Thanks!

bikefind

2011-01-11 21:52:18

I have a garmin etrex legend hcx. Similar to what you have, but I think your device does not have a micro SD slot, so any additional maps need to be loaded onto the build-in memory, which according to the spec sheet is only 24MB -- not much.

As I think you know, the official Garmin product is City Navigator North America. When you buy this and use the PC software for loading it onto your GPS, you can be selective about what you load. But it's really expensive.

I looked up some alternatives, and this looks really promising:

Free routable maps for Garmin brand GPS devices

On that site, you navigate a world map and then select area tiles to be assembled into a link that you download. The data is based on Open Street Map data. I haven't used OSM data myself, but from what I've read that its quality varies -- sometimes it's supposed to be even better than commercial products, sometimes worse. I don't know what the western PA data is like, but it seems worth trying. If you do, write back to let us know how it goes.

abrenner

2011-01-14 20:49:13

Thanks! I'll check it out.

bikefind

2011-01-14 21:08:53

Made my first attempt - requested the files yesterday and today there was an email waiting for me letting me know they were avail for download. You get a file for installing on your computer (I had a problem with the install, not sure why, unresolved at this point) and an img file for placing directly onto the gps. For me, that img file was 33,494KB, ie over 24MB. I had requested three tiles and I'm guessing that's just too much for my unit. So my plan is to wait until my 48 hours (for downloads) expires and make another request, maybe just try one or two tiles. Does this make sense?

bikefind

2011-01-15 16:40:14