Garmin Topo USA 2008

City Navigator is street map data.

TOPO USA is topographic map data.

Topo doesn't autoroute on the GPS unit. Meaning it shows roads but won't route you (turn left, turn right, etc.) down those roads. The maps show contours, rivers, lakes, etc.

You can have both on your GPS unit at the same time and you would use the Settings > Map > Map Info screen to switch between them. You have to turn the CN maps off to see the topo maps.

The topo maps do not require an unlock code to be loaded to a GPS unit that you (as the owner of the DVD) own.

thanks for the info

...navigating outside of a car environment most likely. i.e. Hiking, kayaking/canoeing, power boating, etc. There are roads labeled on the 2008 Topo map series, but they aren't as thorough or up to date as City Navigator's.

My 2 cents of advice: if you want to enjoy the great outdoors with a topo map on a GPS, get an outdoor GPS to run them. It should be waterproof, which a car GPS won't be. Plus, it should have replaceable batteries (e.g. AA's), so when they poop out you can pop in a fresh set and keep on going.

Using a car GPS for outdoor navigation is sort of like using pliers as a hammer. You may get away with it, but it doesn't really work that well. Right tool for the job is my advice here.

GC

I am looking for topo maps for the nuvi 350 will the topo 2008 work in my 350 I'm going to use it for 4 wheel trips in death valley Ca

Yes, the TOPO USA 2008 will work with the nuvi 350.

The main reason I was interested in the Topo maps is for elevation purposes.

We are looking to winter down south in our 5th wheel. We live in Canada. Because I am unfamiliar with the western states and mountain ranges, I was looking for some highway, elevation and mountain pass information for our trip in order to avoid weather issues as we head south.

thanks

First time caller, long time listener....

Will the Topo map work for my Nuvi 750?

Thanks in Advance.

I had ordered the Az/NM topo from Garmin as soon as I saw they were available. Then after I posted that it was available (http://www.poi-factory.com/node/17988) then CraigW posted the link for free topos:

http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/maps/view/1/

I've installed a number of the topos for Az and my surrounding states onto an SD card and they work great.

You might consider trying these too.

I will also give KUDOS to Garmin. Their Customer Service told me to just refuse delivery and they'd credit me once the SD card with the topos arrived back there. I did and they did!

Yes.

Yes, I use Garmin's Topo 2008 with my 750. I divided the USA into four regions with a bit of overlap between maps so each would meet the 2025 segment limit and so each conveniently fits on a 1 GB SD card. Note that the Topo won't do routing like City Navigator does.

...Here's the map you'll need for Death Valley

http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/maps/view/28/

can you chat a bit about how/when you use the CN and Topo maps? I also have a 750 and am wondering about having both. Thanks!

The topo maps are much more useful for hiking and, I suppose, cycling in hilly areas, especially since the topo maps can't be routed to a destination.

Still, there are some times when the topo is best in an automobile. For me, the topo's benefit comes mostly as I drive the dirt roads through national forests. Even though City Navigator includes an amazing number of Forest Roads, knowing the terrain, as well as the road, with a topo map can be helpful. Also, in national forests, both the current topo and CN maps can have many unlabeled or mislabeled road numbers--or show some forest roads that the other map doesn't. There have been times that I found it necessary to check both maps for some roads' IDs.

In my home state using a topo map, I usually use a free Garmin-compatible 1:24k detail map of Arizona rather than the 1:100 detail seen with Topo USA.

One other thing to keep in mind with Garmin's Topo USA is that maps created with it are not tied to a particular GPS. So if you have a nuvi and a hiker's Garmin handheld GPS unit, your one purchase of Topo USA will let you use topo maps in both devices.

others feel free to chime in with their experiences...

Just received my new Hcx where can I find free maps for it? How do they compare with the Garmin 24K TOPO maps?

http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/

These maps tend to be very good.

And the free topo maps from gpsfiledepot (http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/maps/state/all)are in many cases of a much better quality than Garmin topo

Motorcycle Mama you rock!
I was able to download the USA NW TOPO and the WA TOPO and compare them side by side using Garmin road trip on my Mac. I installed the USA NW topo on my vista. Now I just have to go back to that site and donate!
Thank you so very much!

You are welcome. It's nice of you to donate. These are mostly compiled by a college student on his own time.

You can get the US Street maps there too. They are very good. They just won't give you turn-by-turn directions.

I use both. For general highway travel I use City Navigator in order to have the routing capability and POI alerts (which don't work in non-routable maps such as Topo 2008). A major hobby though is Jeeping around Arizona/Utah/Colorado back roads, and in that situation CN doesn't know the minor trails so routing is irrelevant. When Jeeping off-road I turn off CN so I can use Topo 2008. In Topo I can see minor trails, contour lines, geographic features, etc that don't show in CN, and I usually put it in 2D North up mode to minimize the confusion on the screen. I do have off-road POIs, but I have set them all up as TourGuide POIs so the proximity alerts will work in Topo 2008.

Do some nuvis offer better detail with US Topo 2008 then others? I just bought a nuvi500 and from my memory it seems like my Nuvi660 provided better map detail. I wish I could compare the two, but lost my 660. The 500 does not display hiking trails, springs, or the campground and trailhead icons that I believe were displayed by default on the 660 when my mapsource files were enabled. I'm talking about the actual mapsource files...not the preinstalled topomaps that came with the unit. I dumped those and installed the gps files from US Topo 2008, but they still don't seem to offer the same amount of detail as some of the other nuvi models.