Magellan and Garmin seem to be the two names that rise to the top of the
recomended GPS lists. You really need to look at the features and how your
going to use it to decide which model would suit you best.
I have two in the truck, both Garmin, an eTrex Legend and a GPS 18. The Legend
is a great little hand held unit that I can take with me on my mountain bike or
just hiking or Geocaching. While I can up load map detail, waypoint and
routing data to it, it does have a limited amount of built in memory so I have
limit the amount of data I upload to the unit. No big deal as I can fit most
of the state of Connecticut (4 map segments) at once. If I'm traveling outside
the area, I have to remove segments to upload additional data. The GPS 18 is
strictly a USB receiver and requires an laptop to run cartography software.
Works pretty well though the receiver doesn't seem to be as sensitive as the
Legend is. However, once it locks in on 4 satellites, its far more accurate
though it will loose signal quicker in the trees.
The one thing that pisses me off about Garmin is thier software licensing
though, everything is separate and some Garmin cartography products won't fully
function with other Garmin cartography products. For example, I had their
Mapsource MetroGuide North America installed on my laptop. It had a feature
where it would display your real time location on a map on your laptop screen.
As you drove, you can see the icon on the screen moving on the map. During a
patch update, they removed that function in the Mapsource software, without any
warning. To get it back you had to install another Garmin software called
nRoute, which did the same thing, just as a separate application now. nRoute
can still import and export Mapsource MetroGuide data but some of its
functionality was disabled. nRoute requires you to have a Mapsource product
installed and has a step by step driving instructions function that will give
you verbal voice commands as you approach required turns needed to reach your
destination. But that function is disabled in nRoute, if your using the
Mapsource MetroGuide maps. You have to purchase another application called
Mapsource City Select, to enable that feature. Mapsource City Select is an
exact duplicate of maps in Mapsource MetroGuide, down to the last detail. The
only difference is the licensing and the additional $120 you shell out to
purchase it. Yet, Mapsource City Select doesn't support all the same features
Mapsource MetroGuide does and vice versa. It's just Garmin's way of selling
you the same product more than once. There are about a dozen different versions
of the Mapsource Maps and not all features as supported by all of them. But
once you get past their bullshit licensing schema, it's a pretty decent
product.
I've also heard some very good things about some of the Magellan products but I
don't have any first hand experience with them.
Walt
In article <4494E731.1060403@aol.com>, SilverEightynine@aol.com (Terrible Tom)
writes:
>
>
> Time to think about getting a GPS for the trip out west - recommendations??
.
.
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