Help for Getting from Point A to B

Jon Pepper

The classic question "Where are we on the map?" is now a lot easier to answer with Microsoft's Expedia Trip Planner 98. This comprehensive travel and trip planner, which was formerly called AutoMap, is a valuable tool for business or personal travel throughout the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. The heart of the program is the updated route planner, which allows for customized and rapid point-to-point planning from start to destination. It includes numerous automated features for tweaking and fine-tuning your trip.

The new version provides excellent travel information, including 17,000 restaurant listings from the Zagat survey and detailed listings on 19,000 hotels. Direct links to the Microsoft Expedia on-line service let you book flights, hotels, or rent al cars for a trip. Trip Planner has plenty of detail on points of interest and stopovers, though this is probably of more appeal to a family on vacation than to a typical business travel er. Still, this extra information, along with attractive and well-done maps, helps round out this product. Support for the Global Positioning System is built in, though you need to purchase a GPS receiver separately.

Overall, the features in Trip Planner 98 are pretty much on par with Rand McNally's new TripMaker (and TripMaker Deluxe). Both products let you plan your itinerary, print out detailed directions and maps, and access their additional resources. Trip Planner has superior hotel and restaurant information, while TripMaker has a few more features for route planning. Still, for $39.95 (including a single-use Kodak camera), Trip Planner 98 is an excellent and well-priced resource for any type of general business or family travel in North America and Mexico.

---

Where to Find

Expedia Trip Planner 98..................$39.95

Microsoft
Redmond, WA
Phone:    206-882-8080
Internet: 
http://www.microsoft.com

Enter HotBYTEs No. 1008.
Information on 
this product



HotBYTEs
 - information on products covered or advertised in BYTE

---

Mapping It Out Gets Lots Easier

screen_link (72 Kbytes)