Corey

I was just playing around with my Topo software. I plugged my GPS into it during the weekend to upload the waypoints from last Saturdays trip into it. I have heard from Yoda and Alanh on the borad here (Alan runs a laptop in his rig) that you can have the software loaded on a laptop and see yourself on the screen when you move. I just found that option in the software. This is pretty cool. What is the minumum CPU for a used laptop to run with Windows 98 to let this run good? Boeing Surplus had deals on laptops all the time, but I don't want to get something to slow. What's cool is the software can also mark your waypoints for you on the map it is creating without you having to constantly push the enter button on the E-Trex unit to mark one. This would be the ultimate way to map out a run and get back to hidden spots like that lake we found last week. The area we were in for our trip is marked by the red flag on this map. I'm going to have to learn how to run the GPS more. It's a lot of fun. Between that, taking pictures, it can keep you very busy while wheelin'.

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Corey 2007 FJ Cruiser
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arjan

Corey, that's neat stuff,

I noticed that the software communicates through the serial (comm) port. Keep in mind that some laptops don't come with serial ports anymore. I got burnt with my ibm laptop which didn't have one. I ended up buying a usb to serial port adapter. Those things come in different flavours too. The second one I bought acutally emulates the interrupt which a lot of programs still need. I use PLC's for work and I install climate control computers in greenhouses, which also communicate through the serial port.
Enough rambling, just wanted to give you a heads up.

Arjan

Bob_98SR5

Hey guys,

Can you run a laptop running a dvd-rom to a LCD screen? I'm sure you can, but has anyone done it?

Bob

mtnbkr

Are you talking about watching a DVD movie on your laptop? Sure, you can do it. I've done it several times. I've even hooked my laptop to my parents' TV so we could watch a DVD at their house. You'll need special software, but it normally comes with the DVD drive. If not, it can be purchased online.

Chris

mark from uk

you should be able to get 98 to run no just about anything without much trouble if you can get cheap try at least a 200mhz
also if you can get it to do bird impressions (cheap cheap) then you could always mod the laptop apart and do a permanent install in the truck, just a thought.

__________________
too much month left at the end of the money


1990 Hilux Surf 2.4 turbo diesel
Japanese import
(2nd gen 4runner)

Yoda

Hey Corey,
Those Boeing suplus laptops were 233 processor speeds when I was employed there. Now I need to find out if there is a county surplus store.

__________________
David
TLCA 14788
71 Landcruiser FJ-40 TBI 327, TH-350, Warn 8000, disk axle swap.
76 Landcruiser FJ-40 project/parts (haven't decided)

BTOWN4RUNNER

Corey, I am going to get this GPS soon. Where do you get that software at? I am interested in it if I get one. Thanks! :fireman:

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Ryan

2002 Toyota 4Runner Sport Edition

Friendship Hook & Ladder Fire Co., Boyertown

Corey

Ryan, you can get a one CD from Garmin for your area.
However the maps are PC generated.

The best one is from Topo which is now owned by National Geographic.
I have the 7 CD set.

They are also taken from real maps, and not PC generated, so they look better.

I have not messed around with the cheaper Garin one to see if it has the option to track you on a laptop while moving.
I'll look later for that.

Both of these can be had from REI.
The Garmin one is here for the topo version.
They also have city maps too for driving.

This page here lists more CDs.
However I don't see the National Geo one, but they do carry them.
I beleive my 7 CD set is just for the state of WA. too.
They are that well deatailed it takes several CDs to cover one state.

You can probably get the NG one above at the URL I posted for their site.
Corey

BTOWN4RUNNER

Cool, thanks Corey! I am trying to figure this out. I am guessing what you do is mark your waypoints, and then go and load them into the computer to show where they actually are on the map? That is what I am getting out of it! Thanks for the info. :fireman:

__________________
Ryan

2002 Toyota 4Runner Sport Edition

Friendship Hook & Ladder Fire Co., Boyertown

alanh

Corey,

I have a Boeing surplus Dell Latitude CP with a 233MHz CPU, 64MBytes of RAM and a 3.2GByte hard drive. Mine came with a floppy and CD, network/modem PCMCIA card, serial port and USB plus the AC adapter. I bought a DC adapter I plug into the 12v outlet in the 4Runner.

So far it has been adequate for me.

Warning! the following rambles on for awhile

I got a XENARC 6.4" LCD display during a group buy on MP3CAR that runs VGA resolution and plugs into the monitor output of the laptop. I plug the GPS into the serial port and have a small trackball from CompuUSA plugged into the USB port. (about the size of an egg that you can use with one hand) The XENARC has a touch screen, but I wasn't super impressed with it - its kind of touchy with double-clicks, etc. but without the extra serial port I can't use it anyway. I decided to spend $20 or so on the trackball instead of $50 (cheapest I saw on Ebay) for another serial port and so far I'm satisfied with that. So far I haven't got a real solution to no keyboard conveniently located, but I downloaded a free piece of software that puts up a keyboard on the screen and you can click on the keys to enter text which would probably be minimally acceptable for typing in a simple waypoint name or something.

As for mapping software.....
I have not used any of the big names and have not used anything that does trip planning or autorouting with turn directions, etc.

I've tried a free product called USAPhotoMaps which downloads satelite photos from TerraServer. It will do moving map and works reasonably well and the price is certainly good. It has no actual topo map capability as far as I know. If your GPS reports a location out of bounds for the photo you have loaded, it stops receiving and you have to click on a pop-up box which is a little annoying. As I recall, it doesn't read any of the other GPS info like altitude, speed, time, etc. Some times its neat to be able to see a photo instead of trying to interprete a topo map. Of course, the photos have the same problem as the topos, in most cases they are quite a few years out of date.

I played a little with Fugawi using photos I downloaded from Teraserver (don't actually have any CDs with topo maps). That process was pretty tedious - had to do some conversion and then enter the coordinates of 3 corners of the photo so it could track on the map. It seemed a little slow updating the position driving in town. I suspect more horsepower to deal with a picture file of 50MBytes would have helped there. I didn't try it with topo maps, and it has some other nice features, so don't consider this a non-endorsement at this point. (One thing I liked is 3 different brightness modes - day, dusk, night - which helps dim the screen at night.) You can display alt., compass, speed, time on your Laptop screen so you don't need to even see the GPS receiver.

The last trip, I used ExpertGPS, which cost around $60 off the web. It comes with no maps, but you can download topo maps and the Terraserver photos from their site. They say they have maps for the US and you don't pay any other fees to get as many as you want as long as they don't go out of business. (They have a demo version that lets you download for one state and randomly blocks out areas.) This one seems to work pretty well too. You can switch back and forth between topo and photo mode at different resolutions. It downloads masses of small files instead of a huge one - # of files could be a limiting factor at some point. You can also put up small boxes with alt., speed, time, compass etc. similar to Fugawi. The map/photo download process can be time consuming. As far as I can tell (but I am not an expert) you can't just give some coordinates (like two opposite corners) and have it download the data. Of course, downloading megabytes of data would be a killer without the cable modem.

Hope all this longwinded rambling has been of some use. I've still got more experimenting to do so this isn't the end of the story. I'm looking into an aux battery setup so I can keep this stuff powered when I stop and not worry about leaving something on and running my starting battery down.

Alan