GPS Coverage

The Garmin site suggests that GPS cover in Norway and Republic of Ireland is unreliable ??? their techies will not say much more either. Has anyone actual experience of the use of GPS in Norway or the Republic and if so how sporadic is it.

GPS in Norway

I took my GPS to Norway last October & the only coverage is that of the 'base map', in other words main roads & towns/cities......but it wasn't too bad....still need to take maps!!

Oslo is covered in much more detail.

When I contacted Garmin at the time they said there were no early plans to do detailed mapping of Norway, but I was referred to the Norewgian Garmin site (sorry, no URL) where non-Garmin/MapSource detailed mapping was available for download, at a charge, which was compatible with the Garmin/MapSource product.

I didn't use these downloads myself, as each one covered a fairly small area, and were quite expensive.....

I see that V5 of MapSource now covers all of Sweden, and would guess that with the continued proliferation of GPS in Europe, it's only a matter of time before Norway gets detailed mapping also.

coverage

gpas coverage ok in ireland but mapping is pure shite base map has very few roads.
unlass I can get better use of it adroad it will have been a waste of money

well i live in ireland and am using map source version 4 . i find dublin is detailed perfect but when you go outof dublin to wexford where i live on on the map it shows all the big petrol stations and bmw garages , it will list hospitals , food , etc, show all main road maps but not small roads and i find it good it depends what kind of roads you were thinking of traveling ,it s fine hopefully version 5 will be better updated

It's not a Garmin problem, it affects all road navigation systems. The vast majority of navigation systems get there mapping data from one of two companies either Navigation Technologies (NavTech) or TeleAtlas. They in turn gather it from the national mapping agencies for each country and compile datasets for the whole of Europe (and the rest of the world). The reason why the data is patchy in coverage and quality is primarily due to crap data from the original National Mapping Agency who either don't have good data because their methods of compiling it are old fashioned (Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland springs to mind) or for commercial reasons they are not prepared to license the best most up to date data for basic navigation systems in case they lose business in other areas (Ordnance Survey Great Britain only licence data compiled in 1995 to Navtech and TeleAtlas, because they want to charge upto 10,000 pounds for the up to date but essentially the same data for a single user 1 year licence).