Poor aerial image quality?

[farther_closer]

Please don't bother me with comments about map oranges to song beer bubble comparisons as there are no other map comparisons to be made at this time.

Ouch. Touchy subject? I'm just stating my opinion and pointing out the facts. DeLorme server access is slow, everybody knows this. No offense intended.

fc

[Sanaghan]

Google's business model is a little different. They are a multi-billion dollar hedge fund investment company that has a small revenue stream from their advertisements and referrals. That includes from map programs.

The aerial imagery they purchase is not created by them, but it is proprietary and expensive. Google can display it for you for free, but you cannot re-use it except in limited circumstances; most of which involves viewing within a Google mashup. No GPSr I'm aware of lets you cache and display google imagery.

There's an excellent single post that discusses it hand highlights the appropriate parts of the Google Maps TOA here:
viewtopic.php?f=131&t=20663&p=134064

You probably have no idea that you signed away your rights on four levels just to use the maps.

[Hynr]

I agree with the point of view that the available imagery from DeLorme is disappointing at best, in relation to my expectations. The expectations were developed through use of Google Maps, Google Earth, and similar product from Microsoft. By contrast, the black-and-white imagery from DeLorme is totally worthless because of its poor resolution and old age (>15 years old around my home which is not on the image despite being 15 years old); and things I want to see, such as creeks, large trees, fences and trails, etc are not recognizable. The color imagery, although of higher resolution, is still not adequate in comparison to what I am accustomed to through the computer software I mention above. I am not expecting to be able to read the license plate on the car in my driveway, but I do expect to be able to tell whether it is a van or a sedan. I have not even bothered to use the rest of my free downloads as I see it a total waste of my time.

I also have data service on my cell phone that allows me to see Google Maps when out in the field. One thing I have learned is that I would never be able to install on my PN-40 all the imagery at the level of resolution that I would like to have at my fingertips, because of the huge amount of data that is required and because the region I cover routinely is a 50 mile radius around my home. You would need a GPSr with hundreds of gigabytes of memory or cellular data service. I guess I could order the data from DeLorme on CD or DVD, but for me the quality does not merit that expenditure.

[twolpert]

Pretty sure that both DOQQ and CDOQQ are 1m resolution everywhere.

Both DOQQ and CDOQQ are out of date in all areas, although the color stuff tends to be somewhat newer.

As to which provides better results, it depends on where you are. In our area, DOQQ sometimes provides superior detail for trails. This is because they were taken (around here) when there was less leaf cover (than when the CDOQQ were taken).

[Sanaghan]

Hmm. Google has been busy with their little street cars and has since submitted a termination notice to Tele Atlas for map data. Plus they released a new mobile version for use with the Droid phone. The plot gets thicker.....

By the way, Microsoft is also a hedge fund. Both companies (and some others) have to file with the SEC to remain technically classified as businesses, even though though on paper they are appear to be investment companies due to their large cash/stock/bond reserve. It's fairly normal for profitable dot com companies where you have a high revenue and small number of employees (and no legacy costs such as pensions). Once ebay is set up, for example, it's the millions of people out there paying to run auctions that generate the money, not the relatively small numbers of ebay employees who are just tweaking the established code.

[CowboySlim]

I'm just stating my opinion and pointing out the facts. DeLorme server access is slow, everybody knows this. No offense intended.

fc

Slow? Everbody?

But don't we all acknowledged that good results do not receive the volume of commentary generated by lesser results?
Such as the two topics below with the sum of over 200 posts?

I had not done any Netlink downloading in awhile.
[11/04/09 @ 2:30 PM EST].
I just downloaded a good size chunk of CDOQQ's (5 selections, 1 order, 398.2 mb?, according to netlink) in 8 minutes.
It settled in after about 4 minutes @ 850KB/Sec, that's a record on my end.
I hope it stays that way, and it's not one of those ISP quota of the month club deals.
Now I'm back to scratching my head whether I got lucky with my ISP, or something mighty fine got tweaked up at the Maine Map Pumps end, or something in between the 2?

Well, maybe everybody except these:
viewtopic.php?f=133&t=20880

[farther_closer]

Well that's looking more promising!

fc

[soulfinger]

The aerial imagery works for me, though the quality does vary considerably from place to place. Sometimes the color imagery in particular can be quite dark. I usually download color and b&w to compare them and pick the one with the best contrast. Then again, I guess it depends on how you use it. For me, it's enough to know that I'm on the right four-wheel-drive trail in a maze of criss-crossing desert tracks. If I need to know what that fuzzy object on the screen at zoom 16 is, I'll just look out the window.

[WestportRiver]

As noted in an earlier post. DeLorme uses USDA aerial imagery at 1 m resolution. It is available for the entire country, so it is a uniform product that they can program TOPO, XMAP, and GPS to handle. Google Earth searches and finds the best publicly avaailable imagery it can, so in developed areas (urban, suburban, some rural areas) they are able to pick up imagery that has been flown for local/county planning departments down to 6 inch resolution. Google has more money and bigger servers than God, so they can deliver the best possible image to your computer. Note thouhgh, that you can only use the Google imagery live and cannot store it on your hard drive and use it in another application. In some cases, (around my house) the Google imagery is several years older than DeLorme's. In my work I also download imagery from the state's GIS website in MrSID format. Most states a GIS site that has all sorts of imagery available. If you have XMAP pro ($99 if you have a PN) you can load this information. You may find better imagery to put on your GPS that way. To fit any significant area (hunderds or thousands of acres) on the GPS though, the DeLorme imagery is likely to be at a more managerable file size for the GPS. Imagery files are HUGE, so the lower resolution DeLorme images will be more manageable on a GPS when you are doing large areas (note that with Google Earth you are only seeing a very small area in high resolution - Google ups the resolution as you zoom in). Earlier year I loaded a large area of DeLorme wilderness imagery on the PN-40 for a back-country elk hunt in Colorado, and now I'm just back from several days of forestry work on a 9,000-acre tract in eastern Maine. Having imagery on the GPS was a huge boost in both cases. Yes I wish the DeLorme imagery were better, but that would require a bigger processor in the GPS and hence even more battery drawdown. I think the imagery and other maps and charts are a great deal for $30/year and use it on your GPS for play.