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Read Thread: Gps Which one should I buy?

Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Nov 30, 2006 6:02pm
Thread (disabled) Board
I recently have started geocaching as well as letterboxing and Think I need a GPS. I think it would come in handy for alot more things other than that, odometer mapping etc... Which one should I get that is under $200 The e trax Legend looks pretty good. Thoughts? What features should I be looking for? What is waas? How much more accurate is it? how handy are the $100 Topo programs you can buy to go along with the GPS?
thanks in advance for any and all help!
chadams
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54202 by chadams
Nov 30, 2006 6:07pm
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I am a total novice with the GPS, but I bought the $100 Garmin ETrex at Wal Mart. It does what I need it to do, and you can buy the little cord thingy (That's a technical term) to download if you like.

http://www.garmin.com/products/etrex/

I know there are bigger, better, more expensive models, but this one seems to do the trick, and it's a tough little booger. My kids have dropped it a bazillion times, and it works just fine.

Jenni P McD
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54202 by chadams
Nov 30, 2006 6:46pm
Thread (disabled) Board
I use the Etrex legend myself, and it works very well, I believe it is selling for $130 right now at target or shopko. It allows for connectivity to the computer and has mapping capability. The etrex yellow sells for about $100. there is no need for color in geocaching.
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54202 by chadams
Nov 30, 2006 6:58pm
Thread (disabled) Board
Despite my post a couple of days ago regarding my return of a GPS I got for Christmas a couple of years ago, I did do research on them. Thankfully not much has changed, and there aren't so many that it's tremendously hard to choose, as if you were buying a Toyota...

Basically, if you're really serious, the cheapest bare-bones model won't cut it for you. It's not as accurate and you can't plug it into a computer for updates. The owner of the local outdoors shop swears by this one:

http://www.brunton.com/product.php?id=264

StarSAELS
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54202 by chadams
Nov 30, 2006 7:47pm
Thread (disabled) Board
The E trex Legend is the one I was looking at to buy. It's now on my Christmas wish list because of the price. I hope Santa is good to me this year!

FG
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54202 by chadams
Nov 30, 2006 8:09pm
Thread (disabled) Board
Quote and Think I need a GPS. I think it would come in handy for alot more things other than that, odometer mapping etc... Which one should I get that is under $200 The e trax Legend looks pretty good. Thoughts? What features should I be looking for?


Believe it or not, what you want for geocaching is the GPSr with the fewest features. They just get in the way. You want the plain-jane model that just points the direction and tells you how far. All that mapping and whatnot just confuses things.

Of course, most people that buy a GPSr want it for things other than geocaching, which means having the other features may be desired.

You do want to make sure your GPSr comes with a cable that plugs into your 'puter. You don't want to be hand-entering waypoints. And if you have to buy the cable separately, you'll be amazed at how much they charge for them.

Quote What is waas? How much more accurate is it?


The basic GPS satellite system is a military product involving a zillion satellites in low earth orbit. WAAS is an FAA add-on, involving a couple of geostationary satellites waaaay up there. The GPS system is not suitable for airline operations primarily because it doesn't tell you how accurate it is today. There are base stations on the ground that know their own locations, and they check where the GPS system thinks they are. Then they send a correction to the geostationary satellites, and they relay it back down to airliners and geocachers. This provides a bit more accuracy, but more importantly to the airlines, it provides a real-time report on how much to trust the system today.

How much it helps depends on how close you are to a WAAS base station. If you're right next to one, the correction can get the accuracy down within 10 feet or so, compared to a more typical +/- 30 feet. The WAAS base stations are, understandably, located at major airports.

Using the WAAS also uses up the batteries quicker. You have the option of turning it off.

Regardless of how accurate your GPSr is today, you must remember that the placer's GPSr might have been acting up the day he placed it. So once you figure out where your GPSr says is ground zero, you need to start searching in widening circles up to 30 feet away.

Quote how handy are the $100 Topo programs you can buy to go along with the GPS?


Dunno, I have a cheap Garmin Etrex that doesn't handle topo info. I can tell you that, to load waypoints, the software to have is EasyGPS, which is free. There's a link for downloading it on geocaching.com.
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54202 by chadams
Nov 30, 2006 8:10pm
Thread (disabled) Board
I'm not a gadget person and don't know all the technical details about GPS units but I'll give you my experience. I have 2 GPS units, both Garmin products, (the other big commercial GPS company name that I've heard of is Magellan, there's another one that makes fish-finders but I forget the name, and I digress).

I started with a little yellow eTrex and still have it. It's very basic and does a decent job but there are no maps. When I'm under forest cover, it doesn't get a strong signal and quite often I have to give it time for the satellites to find my location. I still use it and give it to whoever goes caching with me, it's especially great when we go with kids. They love to hold the little yellow unit and follow the arrow. Plus it's not expensive and it's pretty rugged so I'm not as worried about someone damaging it.

After about a couple of years of using my eTrex I got a Garmin GPS V. I love it. It's got detailed maps. I plug in an address and then the unit guides me to the location and shows me where I am on the map. It tells me (audible beeps and text messages) when to turn right, when to turn left, how far to the next turn, how far to the destination, what time I'm expected to arrive at the destination. And when I reach my destination I remove the unit from the car bracket and take it with me for a hike. If I'm looking for a cache during the hike I switch the route preference setting from "faster time" or "shorter distance" to "off road" and the GPS goes into compass mode and points me in the direction of the cache location.

My GPS V is getting old. It has a black and white screen and I can download only 500 waypoints. You can get full color screens now and download 1000 waypoints. I would recommend spending a little more money to get a GPS unit that you can use for both driving and hiking. Check out the Garmin site at http://www.garmin.com and the Magellan site at http://www.magellangps.com

Lone R
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54205 by Jenni P McD
Nov 30, 2006 8:18pm
Thread (disabled) Board
Quote I bought the $100 Garmin ETrex at Wal Mart. It does what I need it to do, and you can buy the little cord thingy (That's a technical term) to download if you like.


I have an ETrex, but I should point out that mine is obsolete. The cord used to connect it to a 'puter has a 9-pin serial port connector on the other end -- and modern computers no longer have 9-pin serial ports. When I bought my new laptop, I faced the choice of buying a new GPSr or buying a serial port adapter for my new laptop. I bought the serial port adapter, but that's about $40 at Staples.

My Garmin did not come with that first cable, either. It was supposed to be another $35 or some such. Fortunately, I found a link describing how to make one using an old mouse cord:

http://www.jens-seiler.de/etrex/datacable.html

So, homemade cable connected to $40 serial port adapter to connect my ETrex to my laptop. Works fine, but obviously if I were buying a GPSr today I'd be looking to get a USB cable included in the package.

I certainly hope the ETrex sold today has been updated. I suspect it has, but make sure.
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54241 by Kirbert
Nov 30, 2006 8:45pm
Thread (disabled) Board
Quote I certainly hope the ETrex sold today has been updated. I suspect it has, but make sure.


I bought my ETrex over the summer, and it did NOT come with the cable. I just imput my coords and such the old fashioned way, and since I'm so OCD, it works for me. I can do it the way I want with my own shorthand, etc. Just have to make sure I imput the numbers correctly, because I have been known to transpose the numbers. Boy, THAT makes for interesting caching! :-)

But, for right now, since all I really use is the waypoints and the compass and such, the ETrex is perfectly good for me and the kiddies. It is a bit of a bear under canopy cover, and WAAS is a battery hog. But since it uses AA batteries, it's not like it's trouble changing batteries. I usually keep it in the 'normal' mode while getting to the general area, then go to WAAS mode when I'm within about 1000 ft or so of the cache.
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54250 by Jenni P McD
Nov 30, 2006 9:34pm
Thread (disabled) Board
Quote I bought my ETrex over the summer, and it did NOT come with the cable. I just imput my coords and such the old fashioned way...


Take it from somebody who USED to do that: Quit it. Make yourself a data cable and start downloading the waypoints directly to the Garmin -- before you wear out the buttons on that thing.
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54238 by Lone R
Dec 1, 2006 4:53am
Thread (disabled) Board
I don't do much geocaching, but I can offer my opinion on using the GPS for driving...

We have a Garmin GPS V that I absolutely love in the car. You can also search for stuff like the nearest wal-mart, etc. which has been a real time-saver for us on road trips to new places. It has served us well and saved us from being completely lost a time or two. (Of course, just because you have a blip on the GPS doesn't mean the road is also visible on the GPS... )

We upgraded recently to a new model from garmin, a gps 60 I think? It has lots of bells and whistles, and it may be great for geocaching, but I don't know since I don't do much caching. But I really find myself pretty annoyed with it in the car most of the time. When you plug in an address it doesn't necessarily show you the shortest or most sensible driving route as the V did. And usually by the time it plays the little audible signal to turn, you are already supposed to be across three lanes of traffic to turn RIGHT NOW.

My mostly OT $.02...

MB
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54265 by Kirbert
Dec 1, 2006 6:06am
Thread (disabled) Board
Quote before you wear out the buttons on that thing.


Good grief! I don't cache THAT much....lol
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54305 by MoonBunny
Dec 1, 2006 7:12am
Thread (disabled) Board
Thanks for the info about your experiences with the GPS 60. My husband and I are starting to talk about upgrading. Wish they would just upgrade the GPS V - give it a color screen, up the number of waypoints to 1000 and up the amount of storage space for more map capacity. Maybe I should email Garmin.

Lone R
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54330 by Lone R
Dec 1, 2006 7:17am
Thread (disabled) Board
My husband seems to be pretty happy with the 60, but he is the cacher in the family. He loves being able to keep tons of waypoints and tons of maps in the thing. I think the usability issues are less important to him than they are to me. He is wanting to upgrade the software now (mapsource, I think?) to the latest version but I don't know if that would help my issues any.

If you want more info about the 60, you can aq-mail ArmorGuy and ask him directly. He could definitely give you more details than I could.

MB
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54322 by Jenni P McD
Dec 1, 2006 9:31am
Thread (disabled) Board
Quote
Quote before you wear out the buttons on that thing.



Good grief! I don't cache THAT much....lol


Each waypoint involves 14 digits, and each digit requires pushing buttons an average of 7 times to enter. Yes, you'll wear the buttons out. And you'll make lots of typos, each of which can cause great consternation.

With a cable and EasyGPS, you can load three dozen waypoints into your Garmin in about five seconds. With no errors. If your 'puter has a 9-pin serial port connection and you have a scrap mouse and an old credit card laying around, anyone with the skills and tools to carve a rubber stamp can make a data cable for an ETrex, and the EasyGPS software is free. Just do it.
Re: Gps Which one should I buy?
Board: Geocaching and Other Stashing Games
Reply to: #54355 by Kirbert
Dec 1, 2006 9:47am
Thread (disabled) Board
Quote Just do it.


Awww, man.....but I don't wanna. I'm lazy that way. I'm sure I could figure it out, but, still.....