60CSx Tracks and MapSource/NG TOPO

[+yooper_gps]

Hi all - I've been playing with tracks from my 60CSx - importing them from the GPS into both MapSource and NG TOPO. I see odd behaviors that I thought I'd ask the experienced folks here about.

 

I went out yesterday and created two tracks. First, an outbound track from my house out into the woods, and when I reached the turn-around point, I turned off tracking, saved it (accepting the name of 22-MAR-07 as the name), and then turned tracking back on for the return leg. WHen I got back, I saved that track, and accepted the name 22-MAR-07 02. All seemed fine.

 

MapSource download: when I download the new tracks into MapSource, I find 4 tracks:

 

22-MAR-07

22-MAR_07 02

ACTIVE LOG

ACTIVE LOG 001

 

... and the 22-MAR-07 02 apparently is a route containing the TOTAL number of track points for the outbound and inbound legs. Also, the 22-MAR tracks have NO other data associated with them - no times, lengths, areas, or avg. speeds. What's going on here?

 

TOPO! download: I get two tracks showing up on the map, but they are not quite right. First, they are unnamed. When I click on these tracks on the TOPO! map, they don't show the correct distances - the outbound leg was much longer, and yet, TOPO! shows me that its distance is shorter than the inbound leg. It's as though it's confused about which track contains which track points. I also get some waypoints showing up, like 001, 002, 003 - where did these come from?

 

So, I'm wondering if anyone can help me make sense out of this. I would have expected that for MapSource, I would just have seen two simple tracks show up after the import, and for TOPO!, well, pretty much the same thing.

 

Thanks for any help you can offer!

Doug

[+yooper_gps]

ADDENDUM: I wa looking around on the 60CSx itself on the MAP page, and apparently 22-MAR-07 shows the outbound track (which seems normal), but 22-MAR-07 02 shows BOTH the outbound and inbound tracks all collected together. So, the 60CSx has two tracks saved - one that had the outbound track only, and one that has both outbound and inbound. I'm pretty sure I turned off tracking at the halfway point, saved the 22-MAR-07 track, and then turned tracking back on for the return leg. Was I supposed to clear something out to make it more obvious that these are TWO, separate tracks with no association? I apologize if this is a dumb question - I haven't seen anything in the manual about it, but I'll go back and reread.

Thanks!

Edited March 23, 2007 by yooper_gps

[CenTexDodger]

Turning tracking off then back on does not clear the track log/ On the tracks page there is a "Clear" button that will clear the active log. If you save your track from A to B, then travel from B to A without clearing the active log, it will record your entire track A to B to A.

 

When you save a track, you lose certain data--The GPS truncates the information. There is no way to stop it, it just does. If you want to retain that information, you need to tell the GPS to record the active track to your micro SD card. It will save the active track which will have all the information retained. Then you can upload that to MapSource and it will have all the data you want it to.

[+Red90]

OK....

 

As I understand what I read, tracking was on all the time when moving....

 

When you save a track:

 

1) It asks you what PORTION of the active track you want to save. If just select "OK" it will save the entire active track.

 

2) When you SAVE a track, it strips the date/time and elevation data, PLUS is filters the track to 500 points if it is larger.

 

22-MAR-07= Saved track at turn around point of the Entire Active track log.

22-MAR_07 02 = Saved tack at the end of the trip of the entire active track log

ACTIVE LOG = active track up to when you turned the track log off.

ACTIVE LOG 001 = active track log after you turned the track log back on again.

 

My suggestion if you want to keep a good record of your travels, is to turn the "save track to card" feature on. This will save a second copy of the ACTIVE track onto the microSD card. These tracks will be unfiltered and unstripped and are saved in GPX files by date. You can then edit the tracks as desired in Mapsource where it is much easier. The track "saving" feature should only be used for when you need to save in the field and want a viewable track before you have access to a computer.

Edited March 23, 2007 by Red90

[+yooper_gps]

Great info - thanks everyone! Kinda makes me wonder why they had to make tracks so complex, but there must be a reason. Does anyone know how I would import the track info saved to my microSD card to TOPO?

 

As an aside, the more I play with MapSource and TOPO!, the more I wonder why there isn't a better alternative. I thought that maybe Delorme's topo software might be the ticket, but I read a lot of negative reviews on it. I better not think about it all too much.

 

Thanks again...

[+Timpat]

Does anyone know how I would import the track info saved to my microSD card to TOPO?

 

Thanks again...

Sure, I do this all the time. When you have track data saved on the microSD you can choose Setup/Interface/USB Mass Storage and copy any tracklog data off the card to your PC. Then in NG Topo go to Handhelds/Import (from GPS or .txt) Wizard. Choose: "In a .GPS file which has waypoints, routes, and/or tracks"/Next. Then you can choose "Tracks as waypoints" or "Freehand tracks" since this is what you want to work with. Once imported you can edit track width, color, add notes and name things. It works quite nicely once you figure it all out. (I'm using NG Topo v4.2.7 having the 3-D upgrade).

[+yooper_gps]

Does anyone know how I would import the track info saved to my microSD card to TOPO?

 

Thanks again...

Sure, I do this all the time. When you have track data saved on the microSD you can choose Setup/Interface/USB Mass Storage and copy any tracklog data off the card to your PC. Then in NG Topo go to Handhelds/Import (from GPS or .txt) Wizard. Choose: "In a .GPS file which has waypoints, routes, and/or tracks"/Next. Then you can choose "Tracks as waypoints" or "Freehand tracks" since this is what you want to work with. Once imported you can edit track width, color, add notes and name things. It works quite nicely once you figure it all out. (I'm using NG Topo v4.2.7 having the 3-D upgrade).

Thanks! I just figured this out myself - in fact, I found a slightly simpler way by just pointing NG to the .gpx file right on the microSD card via the drive mapping that Windows sets up. That lets you skip the file copy to the PC disk step. (I didn't do it with a track yet but I did with with a waypoint.)

 

See....I generally think I'd like to use NG TOPO over MapSource, and as long as I can find ways to get things done like this, it will make things simpler for me Thanks!

[Grasscatcher]

Timpat,

That's "in a GPX file that has...." .

Your v 4.2.7 will import tracks from gpx but be aware that earlier versions of TOPO will not.

Just info for others that have a different version and try it and it won't work.

[n2stitch]

I just wanted to add that I have NG Topo and Mapsource Topo, and although I like the maps better in NG, Mapsource does a better job of joining/splitting tracks. Since I have recent versions of each, I have no problem with sending gpx files between the two programs.

 

Mapsource allows more characters in the track names (not just longer but also lower case letters) and allows for more colors to be assigned to the tracks.

[+yooper_gps]

I just wanted to add that I have NG Topo and Mapsource Topo, and although I like the maps better in NG, Mapsource does a better job of joining/splitting tracks. Since I have recent versions of each, I have no problem with sending gpx files between the two programs.

 

Mapsource allows more characters in the track names (not just longer but also lower case letters) and allows for more colors to be assigned to the tracks.

MapSource also preserves the cache icons, and is generally more integrated with the 60GSx. If the maps in MapSource had more topo detail, I wouldn't even own NG TOPO. If Mapsource had topo maps with more detail that I could easily download into my 60CSx, well, that would be great, and I'd have no problem paying more for it. But that's not the case yet - maybe they'll upgrade MapSource soon. A MapSource product with obvious enhancements coupled with their Garmin hardware would be a formidable market leader I think. (The Delorme PN-20 might be that kind of integrated package, but their firmware/hardware issues apparently aren't sorted out quite yet.) Anyway, thanks again for the info.

[rwolf]

Have you looked at topofusion? They have 2 different free demo versions you can try before you buy. It outs a "demo" watermark behing the maps until you pay. I bought the pro version for Mountain biking and snowboarding. I really like it for editing tracks and the replay functions. Im sure it does more, but I have not had that much time to play with it