I just noticed that a place in Canada that I had bookmarked in Google Earth (one of the lodges I go to for hiking) was suddenly showing up in very low resolution. It had previously had much better resolution. I checked and saw that there is an update to the version I had. I downloaded it, and now it's back to its previous (higher) resolution. I have no idea why the older version was being denied the full resolution, but I just thought I'd pass this along. I had been wondering if they had cut down on the resolution of the free version in order to get people to pay for an upgrade, but it appears you just need the latest free version. The version I just downloaded for my iMac is 4.2.0205.5730
It happened to me too Daniel and I have the paid version., I had to change a setting and I forget which now.
Is it possible that they intentionally force outdated versions to display in lower resolution in a less-than-subtle way to get people to upgrade?
of course its possible. google earth does not store images on your computer. having software out of date can cause you to not get all you can... heck, cellphone companies do it all the time. force you to update one feature (usually call quality) in order to change or remove other settings. now that is not the only reasons cellphone companies update you, but that is an undeniable byproduct of some of them
Since the actual images and other data are stored on their server, and the program communicates with the server, I can understand that they might want to make sure the software is up to date so as not to confuse newer server software. But instead of cutting the resolution, I'd have preferred them to show me a message saying "Your version is out of date. You must have the current version to continue accessing the server." This is a very minor complaint. Hey, they're giving us valuable information for free! I use Google Earth nearly every day, to look at some place I'm curious about, or as an alternative to the atlas (it's easier to find a place on G E than in an atlas) or to measure the driving distance to some place to make sure it's within my Xebra's 35-mile range. I can even see elevation differences, which matter when you drive a 35-mile car.
i am also surprised that they dont at least advise that there is an upgrade available....weird, google seems to do everything else so well. i wish microsoft was as efficient.
