Need Help Selecting Software & GPS for Seriously Long Trip

[LouInAL]

Hello. I am plannig a bit of an unusual business trip and I am in desperate need of advice. What is unusual is that I will be visiting more than 1,000 specific destinations in 16 northeastern states in a single trip. I need trip planning software with the following capabilities:

Input waypoint/destination data from an Excel spreadsheet or text file.

Calculate the most efficient route that will takee me to all 1,000+ locations in a single trip.

Link to a GPS to transfer the trip data, with waypoints in the correct order.

If Microsoft Streets & Trips with GPS Locator (2010) is up to the task described above that would be great, and I will still buy a GPS to use as a backup or for when more mobility is required. The database of locations that I have to visit has street address, city, county, state, and phone number but, oddly enough, not ZIP codes. I know that you can enter a phone number into Street Atlas USA 2009 Plus and it will find the location but I don't know if Streest & Trips has that capability.

The GPS should have the following features:

Text-to-speech with spoken street names.

Construction alerts and updates.

Traffic advisories.

Hot spot locator (is that available?).

I have very little time to plan this and much to do so I need to decide what to get and go buy it ASAP. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

LouInAL

[glc]

You can get a free 60 day trial of Streets & Trips. It *IS* capable of importing data from MS Office and exporting maps to a standalone GPS. Take a look at this.

[LouInAL]

That is quite helpful, thank you very much. It looks like S&T 2010 is what I need.