CP6 French maps ~ anyone using them?

[Searcher22]

Hi All

I have found the CP6 UK maps very good if somewhat quirky at times :P

But with an upcoming trip to France I was thinking of adding the French/EU maps. Has anyone used the French maps and are they as comprehensive as the UK ones?

TIA for any feedback

PS Unrelated to this question ~ I submited 2 new cameras a few months back and never heard if I was the first to spot them. Is it 'normal' to only hear if you are the first or should I have been informed that someone had beaten me to it?

[PeterBowen]

I recently installed the european map upgrade for a two week trip to France. Copilot's road coverage was excellent, not only the major roads, but also the local roads around where we were staying.
I am one of those people who likes to have a trip well planned, so using copilot in planning mode, I saved a whole load of potential trips in advance.
The only problem, and to be honest I should have realised this before we went, was Roger's appalling pronounciation of French street names. Oh how we laughed. I am not too sure if you can download a french text to speech voice using data download from your pc/laptop and even if you are able to do this, is it any better?

[neil01]

While the street names might improve, the directions would probably end up like an episode of 'Allo Allo'!

[Robin2]

The original French maps I received with CP6 were broken - some motorway exit points were not accessible according to the maps, so CP6 chose crazy routes in France to avoid them. About 6 months later I received a revised set of CDs from Alk, and the mistakes I had noticed earlier seem to have been fixed.
I returned yesterday from 4 weeks in France, where I used CP6 and TomTom5. In general, TomTom produced the better routes, but those from CoPilot were not bad. Sometimes it tried to take me on main roads through a large town rather than on perfectly decent and more direct D roads. I tried using waypoints but CP6 kept losing them and reverting to its chosen route. The following day I could not reproduce this behaviour - it accepted and retained waypoints - very strange!
All in all, the French maps do a reasonable job and would always get you to your destination, but TomTom'sroutes were significantly better
Robin
_________________
TomTom One v3 Europe, Navcore 7.903, Western Europe 835.2420
TomTom Go 720 Europe, Navcore 8.351, Western Europe 855.2884
Satmap Active 10
Plus a lot of other PDA GPS kit, seldom used

[redhorse]

My experiences pretty much match Robin's. Original maps bugged, replaced after complaint. I've just come back from 2 weeks in France using the replacement maps.

ETAs on routes using D roads are very pessimistic. I don't know whether it's Navteq's classification of roads or how CP6 uses the data, but CP6 seems to assume that a D road is a small "local" road (and assign very low average speed) where many are as good if not better than N roads.
Also significant tendency to route through the middle of towns rather than round bypasses. Again I suspect this may be because it can't distinguish between a D road bypass and a local road through a traffic-calmed centre. I did complain to ALK about this, but they couldn't offer any solution.

One final point: Care is needed when joining motorways to ensure you are travelling in the right direction! On several occasions CP6 was not explicit which slip road should be taken. You need at least a high-level knowledge of your route so yo can supplement CP6 with road signs. Total reliance on CP6 is unwise.
_________________
nick

CP6 6.0.0.68
Pocket PC 4.20.0 Mio168

[Searcher22]

Thanks all for the feedback.

I have gone ahead and bought the EU map license upgrade ~ will be 'installing' soonish.

In respect of the remarks by Robin2 & redhorse. My CDs are labelled CPL6PPC.68 and I have run the recent update, so are my maps likely to be the most current?

Lastly, I asked "support" about updating on the PPC and was advised that the best and most relaible method was uninstall completely from the PPC and recreate the new UK and EU Storage/Quick Start card. Rechecking my notes and the emailed advice what I am unsure about is the license key entry in the PPC ~ having reinstalled the UK&EU card do I just use the upgrade license key because the ALK server knows I have already registered the original i.e. no need to initially use the UK only license.

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