UPDATE: I’ve posted my hands on review of the Satmap Active 10 TREK.
The Satmap Active 10 is finally coming to the US this week, as the Satmap Active 10 Trek. National Geographic is partnering with Satmap to offer TOPO! state series maps, Adventure Maps and Trails Illustrated maps. The unit will include a basemap, but I expect that most users would want to add some of these other options, which could make this one expensive unit, since the maps will retail for $99.99 each, on top of the $369.99 for the unit. Lets see, that’s a hundred bucks for the Carolinas, another hundred for an upcoming trip to California, and I can’t stay away from Utah. Sorry guys, raster imagery is nice, but unless I’m misreading this, your map pricing model is DOA.
UPDATE: Here’s a review of the UK version. Sounds nice.
Here’s the full news release.
About Rich Owings
Rich, i have never heard of this unit. Curious if this competes head to head with the Oregon in Europe? Or, is it on another level altogether? Maybe geared more toward professional users? Thanks
Rick
I believe their biggest market is the UK.
I think the large screen size is great but agree with Rich; the cost of additional maps is a show stopper.
Somehow this doesn’t seem surprising (at least from the NatGeo side). I use a variety of their products and think that the maps are first-rate but they’ve really done an awful job in trying to bring their technology out of the 1990′s (products are either too expensive or too buggy).
My questions are:
1. If one already owns the Topo! software for a specific state, can those maps be transferred to a blank SD card?
2. Can the pre-loaded (hideously) expensive SD card be read on the computer?
3. Any word on features (such as a barometric altimeter?)
4. OS accessed bvy buttons, touch screen, voice recognition or what?
Looks nice but I ain’t gonna bite until I know it can track as well as the Garmin Map60CSx…I’m just saying.
1. Doubt it.
2. Unknown.
3. Not sure. This review may help, but I don’t see that feature listed…
http://www.pocketgpsworld.com/satmap-active10-handheld-topo-gps-a10115.php
4. Buttons.
I expect a review unit by December 1 and will probably do a first impressions post since I expect the full review to take a couple of months.
Initial impressions from looking at UK reviews of the thing:
1) It’s big — about the size of one of the old Palm Pilot PDA’s.
2) It takes *three* AA batteries, which probably accounts for the size.
Not going to lure me away from my Delorme PN-60 in other words, even though I hate the PN-60′s tiny screen.
I like the formfactor of the Garmin Colorado etc., which is considerably more hand-friendly and has a much better screen than the Delorme PN-series (not to mention that Garmin’s software was fairly recently totally rewritten and has entered the 21st century, while Delorme is still flogging the same pathetic “user interface” their software had 20 years ago), but the maps issue on the Garmins is terrible — the vector maps, even their 24000:1 maps, simply don’t have all the detail that’s on the actual USGS paper maps (or rasterized version thereof).