Free Maporama Drive Me 7 day trial, and bargain downloadable purchase!

[Guest Paul (MVP)]

Just a few days ago I posted about Garmin Mobile XT satellite navigation, and how it was coming in at a bargain price of £49. Forget that! ;)

Take a look at Maporama Drive Me - it has a 7 day downloadable trial for UK / Ireland, France or Benelux, and can be purchased online for the princely sum of, wait for it, 39 euros (£27 quid). Yes, 27 pounds for a full UK and Ireland sat nav solution (or France, Benelux, Italy, Central Europe etc. etc)!

So I know what you're thinking, it's going to be rubbish right? Well, actually, i've been running it for a couple of days, and in my (admittedly limited to date) testing it seems to be one of the slickest, most performance navigation applications i've ever used!

So the all important links. You can check out the Maporama site (rather limited), the 7 day trial link, the shop and I also recommend checking out the Sygic Drive page. Why? Because that appears to be the same application by a different name, and the Sygic page gives you a great overview of the application.

What are you waiting for? Get downloading and tell us what you think! :(

P

[Edit: Check out this post before buying!]

[Guest Paul (MVP)]

BTW, on the order form 'Royaume Uni' = UK ;)

P

[Guest Phil Lee]

Going to give this a look even though I've just bought TomTom. I had problems downloading the UK map. In the end I got it by substituting united_kindom.zip for uk.zip.

I've installed it and got it working. First impressions are that the graphics are better than TomTom. I don't like the way postcodes are handled. You can't navigate to a complete postcode which is a major limitation. I'll try it out actually driving tonight on my way home from work and report back.

Another thing, the installer for the software doesn't create a shortcut to the program, it just activates a large Today screen plugin. Once you get rid of this there is no obvious way to start the program. In the end I created my own shortcut. The exe doesn't have an icon either which means the shortcut doesn't have one. A minor point but something that needs to be right in a commercial program.

Edited October 26, 2007 by Phil Lee

[Guest simon211175]

the Sygic page won't load the screens for me (probably blocked at work).

the registration page insists on me entering my company details, which is a pain

how much space is required for the software?

[EDIT]

got the screens to show now.

download shows United Kingdom as an option for the maps, but the link for the mpas then refuses to work.

Not holding out much hope at the moment.

Edited October 26, 2007 by simon211175

[Guest Paul (MVP)]

Well, I have the full UK / Ireland map and software and it's about 270MB.

P

[Guest Phil Lee]

Like I said in my post, the link to the UK map doesn't work. Use ftp://ftp.maporama.com/DRIVEME_2007/MAPS/uk.zip instead. I entered fake company details since there is no need for them to know this.

Edited October 26, 2007 by Phil Lee

[Guest simon211175]

thanks Phil - I missed that when I posted.

How big are the downloads? I might need to try this from home instead if they're too big :S

[Guest Phil Lee]

The installer is 34.7Mb and the maps 154.5Mb.

[Guest Looby]

Hi Paul, Maporama doesn't seem available for Smartphones only Pocket PC and I looked at Sygic Drive a while ago but that only seems to be available for Business users. Is this so? ;)

[Guest Paul (MVP)]

Yes, that appears to be the case.

I don't know why Maporama don't offer the Smartphone version! Maybe i'll ask them ;)

P

[Guest Phil Lee]

I'm also not keen on the way you set it to landscape. It doesn't pick up on the landscape setting of the device and always rotates in a clockwise direction. I want it to rotate in an anticlockwise direction to tally up with my VIII's keyboard.

Edited October 26, 2007 by Phil Lee

[Guest bydandie]

Does it do traffic info?

[Guest Paul (MVP)]

No, not that I can see.

P

[Guest jim.mason]

I extracted the installer prog and ran this. also downloaded the UK map via the link from Phil Lee, extracted and copied to SD card root. Inserted the card into Vario II and installed with no problems, however it says that no maps are found please check SD card. The maps are in a directory called GBR and there are 19 files.

I checked the quick start guide and it mentions there that there is another file that needs copying France.mlm so am I missing the uk version of this file.

Please help as I really want to get this working as TT are a pain in the butt to get any help with. Not getting any help in changing my device.

Thanks in advance

Jim

[Guest Phil Lee]

I extracted the installer prog and ran this. also downloaded the UK map via the link from Phil Lee, extracted and copied to SD card root. Inserted the card into Vario II and installed with no problems, however it says that no maps are found please check SD card. The maps are in a directory called GBR and there are 19 files.

I checked the quick start guide and it mentions there that there is another file that needs copying France.mlm so am I missing the uk version of this file.

Please help as I really want to get this working as TT are a pain in the butt to get any help with. Not getting any help in changing my device.

Thanks in advance

Jim

When you unzip uk.zip it creates the folders GBR and IRL and also the file British Isles.mlm. I copied this file to the root of my memory card and put the GBR and IRL folders in the root too.

[Guest jim.mason]

I extracted the installer prog and ran this. also downloaded the UK map via the link from Phil Lee, extracted and copied to SD card root. Inserted the card into Vario II and installed with no problems, however it says that no maps are found please check SD card. The maps are in a directory called GBR and there are 19 files.

I checked the quick start guide and it mentions there that there is another file that needs copying France.mlm so am I missing the uk version of this file.

Please help as I really want to get this working as TT are a pain in the butt to get any help with. Not getting any help in changing my device.

Thanks in advance

Jim

Found it!!!

[Guest Paul (MVP)]

Beat me to it!

BTW, i've noticed a few typos in the English language file for maporama. Thankfully it's just a text file though, so you can edit any text you like ;)

P

[Guest chucky.egg]

Maporama doesn't seem available for Smartphones

The Sygic site has a "Windows Mobile" section under Mobile Phones, which shows a Moto Q (?) running the software

http://www.sygic.com/mobile/windowsmobile.html

[Guest jim.mason]

When you unzip uk.zip it creates the folders GBR and IRL and also the file British Isles.mlm. I copied this file to the root of my memory card and put the GBR and IRL folders in the root too.

Now having problems with trying to activate. Doing a manual activation and it wont accept my trial code that I was given 'TRIALJJLUMOPT'.

Any ideas???

[Guest Paul (MVP)]

I just did a manual activation no problem with 'TRIALJJLUMOPT'.

P

[Guest Phil Lee]

My first manual activation didn't work, a second one did. I don't think the installation process is the best I've ever come across.

[Guest Paul (MVP)]

I don't get why it doesn't add a start menu item, but a today item instead!

It's not perfect, but it IS very fast in the menus with silky smooth graphics (especially once you turn antialiasing on). It IS still 27 quid too ;)

P

[Guest jim.mason]

I just did a manual activation no problem with 'TRIALJJLUMOPT'.

P

Dipstick here was putting that code into activate.maporama.com!!! All sorted now. Strange how very TT it is though ;)

[Guest Paul (MVP)]

Oops! ;)

P

[Guest Phil Lee]

Just did a 10 mile test route from work to home. Watching the route demo showed that the second turn on the route would have sent me the wrong way up a one way street!

Edited October 26, 2007 by Phil Lee