I have a Garmin Naui gprs which I find invaluable in the West, but how will it work in Thailand? The site for Garmin tells me the map for Thailand is discontinued. Whats the skinny in these matters?

Google 'gadgetrend' (link), they are an authorized Garmin dealer located in Bangkok and will load a Thailand Street Map into your Garmin Nuvi. The map will cost you, it isn't free. Works great, auto-routing covers all of Thailand. Wouldn't think of driving without my Nuvi 205.

Google 'gadgetrend' (link), they are an authorized Garmin dealer located in Bangkok and will load a Thailand Street Map into your Garmin Nuvi. The map will cost you, it isn't free. Works great, auto-routing covers all of Thailand. Wouldn't think of driving without my Nuvi 205.

Alternatively you can buy the Garmin NT SE Asia Map, which is advertised in the US at the moment for as low as about $80 (discount price). However, I have this and am not too impressed (see other thread). Although I am not entirely sure, this package seems to include the Mappointasia Thailand map. This is why I was asking whether anybody knows the exact differences between this map and the ESRI map. It seems premature to say get the ESRI map before somebody does a proper comparison, but that may turn out to be the best advice. Then there is the Rottweiler map, about which there are mixed reviews,

Further to my post above, GaryA was kind enough to send some image files of sections of the ESRI map which I compared with the Thailand map on my Garmin NT SE Asia SD card (possibly by Mappoint Asia). It was close but probably ESRI have a slight edge. The disconcerting thing is that each map seems to include certain rural roads that the other one does not have. I was surprised to discover that my map is almost identical to the Google Thailand map, while the ESRI map is a bit different. Often it was hard to say which was best but the clincher was that ESRI showed the Kanchanapisek bridge over the Chao Phraya, where both the Google and NT SE Asia maps show no bridge. So credit to ESRI on that score. The other factor may be quality of route instructions. As mentioned before, the NT SE Asia map often wants to send you off down mud tracks and sometimes needs over-ruling. I have no experience of the ESRI map but it wouldn't be too hard to improve on that.

Working with citizen33, I was a little surprised that the Garmin Tele Atlas Asia map had quite a lot of detail. I think most would be satisfied with it as long as it were the latest version available. Both my GPS units have an option to avoid dirt roads. I'm sure that option doesn't work 100 percent if at all with the ESRI map.

Does the Tele Atlas map come on a CD/DVD that installs into Map Source on your computer? My original Garmin maps installed on the computer then downloaded into the GPS using Map Source. That was handy indeed. The ESRI map only installs into the GPS.

The Garmin SE Asia NT map comes on micro-SD card with standard SD card adapter, so it doesn't seem very flexible. However, as mentioned, I was surprised to see that the area near Gary's home that he sent as an image was virtually identical on the Garmin TeleAtlas map and Google maps (right down to a non-standard label for a 'children development centre'). This made me suspect it is basically the same map and that if you want to see your Nuvi TeleAtlas map display on your PC you can get very close by just looking at Google maps.

I have the Garmin XT bluetooth in conjunction with my Treo 680 PDA. I use Rotweiler maps. I am very happy with both.

Cheers, Brian

I have a Garmin Nuvi 260W with an SD card and I bought that in New Zealand last year.

I contacted Rottweiler maps and bought the all Thailand maps.

I came back home last month and was having terrible trouble with the map on my Nuvi. The map on my PC was fine.

RT went through very carefully with me even to the extent of linking me to an unlocked copy especially done for me.

However that still did not work and in the end we went through line by line as his system he tells me is idiot proof and cannot not work unless there is a greater idiot in the world.

I now claim that dubious position.

After him asking me many times if the serial number is correct for my Nuvi and me telling him equally as many times les 1 last week the problem was an operator error.

I had misread 1 number in the serial so it would not unlock. :D

Having given the correct number he gave me a new password and my Nuvi lit up right away.

Point of the post is Rottweiler maps are excellent for me and the after sales service is even better.

Fortunately there is no smiley here showing blushes and great embarrasment.

Thanks a lot RT. :D

At the risk of boring everybody, I have now been able to try both the TeleAtlas SE Asia Map and the ESRI v.9 map on my Nuvi 250 and have somewhat revised the judgement I made above that the ESRI map is better. My answer now would be it depends where you live and which roads you will travel. What changed my mind was looking at the maps of the small Isaan village where I stay. The ESRI map just shows the main road through and two intersecting minor roads. The TeleAtlas (2008) map shows the grid of local village roads as well, including a very handy new link road that I usually use to get to my house. . However, as I found with GaryA's help, there are other places, such as a certain bridge in Bangkok, where ESRI is better (though of course I haven't seen the latest TeleAtlas map). So like many things in life there isn't a simple answer about which is best. I'd say that both are quite good, but that Garmin may not have lost much by changing map providers. I'm sorry that the v.9 map isn't better for my area because it leaves me in a dilemma about whether to go for an updated map or an older one with more detail.

Edited June 28, 200917 yr by citizen33