[Lightspeed]

It's the offical FS1 map. Best canon reference if you ask me.

[Jal-18]

Technically, that's the FS2 nodemap.  If you want to be anally canon to FS1, here's a more "accurate" version.

[Swamp_Thing]

Why is Alpha Centauri so far away from Sol like that? I f i recall my astronomy lessons right, Alpha C. is the closest star to Sol. But in that map it appears after a half a dozen other stars.
Unless of course, if these maps haven´t anything realist about them, and are just in-game gibberish...

[aldo_14]

Physical distance means little, though; substace distance and connections are what matters in the nodemap.  It's like the underground maps that don't show the stops in terms of their map placement, but the distance/time/stops between them.

[StratComm]

Actually the theory is that the node map is subspace-distance rather than realspace-distance.  Which still doesn't make a lot of sense, but it helps reduce the number of node-line crossings and gives a more readable picture of how "far" it is via subspace from one system to another.  In reality, though, it's probably pretty much jibberish.

[aldo_14]

Jibberish?  Jibberish?!

surely you're not suggesting this isn't all real?!

[NGTM-1R]

I suspect we're being shown a 2D representation of what should be 3D, but hey...

[Jal-18]

Actually, it's probably simply a matter of not having a really convulted looking map.  If you're travelling by subspace anyways, real-life distance doesn't matter, so you place systems in a fashion where the map looks good.

One thing that I have wondered about relating to the proximity of Alpha Centauri and Sol is why the Centaurians didn't radio Earth.  Sure, it's going to be a slow-ass conversation if each exchange takes 4 years to get there, but there's no reason they should be "completely cut off"