GPS units

[AESOP]

After doing some research it was down to the Garmin Sp 2610 or the Quest. Since I intended to use it on the motorcycle for cross-country trips the lack of memory in the Quest, and thus not wanting to drag a laptop around on the bike, I went with the Streetpilot 2610 with a 2 gig CF card. I must say I don't know how I did without it. It comes with the more detailed map City Navigator vice City select. According to the Garmin web-site the difference is the City Select will tell you to turn left, the City Navigator will tell you to turn left and stay in the left lane.

The only downsides to this GPS is it does not have an internal battery, and cost.

Last month I flew from Nova Scotia to Florida. After letting the GPS know where I was by pointing to the city of the map it had satellites within 15-30 seconds.
A very fast CPU it took less than a minute to initially route from Jacksonville Fl to Lowes Motorspeedway in Concord NC. When I went off route it would re-calculated in probably 10 seconds at most. As I am sure you can tell I just love this thing. If anyone wants to ask questions about it my phone number is 902-847-1097.

Michael

 

[weaponlight]

Matt,
The 60CS works great in the car! The screen is just not as large and no voice prompts. I also recommend you stop the vehicle if you have to enter an address and you are the one driving. (I bet you see the effects of distracted cell phone users.) But otherwise, for a Jeep it is just better than a big car system and for much less money

COMSEUR,
Check out the real price at gpsnow.com (4X4Books)
I have purchased many GPS items from them and thier customer service is outstanding. They sent 6 hard to get GPS units via overnight mail when my unit decided to buy them at the last minute before we deployed. They have all the Garmin software too.

Spudman,
In the box with the GPS you will find a 'Quick start guide' I used that first because I too was kind of overwhelmed. But after you fool around with it for a few days, it's really easy to use. All the features use either a single button, or the rocker switch on the front and a computer like drop down menu on the screen.

 

[weaponlight]

AESOP,
I just checked out that 2610 at gpsnow. SWEET! Looks like it would go good in the Durango where I would not have to worry about it getting wet. The touch screen looks easier to input addresses in with. Might be better for him to use in the ambulance. Now I just have to find another $600 /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/broke.gif

 

[Spudman]

weaponlight,

Thanks for the help. Good luck over there. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif

Gary

 

[weaponlight]

Spudman,

Anytime. I have my 60CS and all the manuals with me. Feel free to PM me if I can help. I will reply when I can.

 

[CroMAGnet]

[ QUOTE ]
AESOP said:
After doing some research it was down to the Garmin Sp 2610 or the Quest. Since I intended to use it on the motorcycle for cross-country trips the lack of memory in the Quest, and thus not wanting to drag a laptop around on the bike, I went with the Streetpilot 2610 with a 2 gig CF card.

[/ QUOTE ]

The 2610 is excellent and I considered it too but the Quest has plenty of memory for cross country trips. You probably already thought of these. All you do is load the areas on your trip route. You don't load areas that you don't expect you will be going.

Say you live in Sacramento CA and you're going to Houston TX and a few places in between. All you do is load in the main freeway areas and towns along the way or sections of big cities if you don't want the whole city. I would load Fresno, Bakersfield, Palm Springs, Phoenix, Santa Fe, Austin, Parts of San Antonio and Houston. I'd probably add or delete a few others towns in between. You don't need to enter all the areas of a big city and it's suburbs if chances are remote that you would go to the area. Also the sparse areas take a lot less memory.

I think we loaded most of Northern CA at least the major parts like San Francisco, San Jose, Oakland, Sacramento, Greater LA area and San Diego with some of Las Vegas and all the connecting Freeways. That's about 30 million people!! I can't remember the exact cities but I'll check when I get some time.

You could also take the map disk and just stop off at a Kinkos to swap out maps using their computers.

With the lower cost and the excellent portability, the quest is sweet. It's not perfect but would be if you could have enough memory for the whole country. If you just need a few areas or along a route it works well. Remember you don't need your home area when you're out of town. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

 

[03lab]

[ QUOTE ]
COMSEUR said:
add-on: Holy Moly! I just saw the price on Mamazon, whoa!

[/ QUOTE ]

OMG, that price is just unbelievable!! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/faint.gif I have desperately wanted a 60CS ever since it was first released, but they cost over $750 here in Germany and the only difference is the stupid basemap which I don't need anyway. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon23.gif

 

[CroMAGnet]

Oh I forgot to mention that the Quest gives you voice commands through the power adaptor while plugged into your car. It beeps at key points when you use it while walking.

 

[nethiker]

Take a look at the Garmin GPS76cs. I was looking for an auto-routing unit that would also go into the field for search and rescue. I was seriously looking at the 60cs, lots of great reviews. I ended up going with the GPS76cs because it had twice the memory at 112 mb and has marine features. I don't boat much, but when I do it will be nice to have. This unit's a little bigger, but has all the bells and wistles. It works awesome in the car. One beep when you get close to a turn, two beeps when you're right on top of it and the screen zooms in to give a close-up of the intersection. Very slick. It's basically the same unit as the 60 series with the added memory and marine features. Can't go wrong with either one.

Greg

 

[matt_j]

does 76 or 60 has expandable memory? how big are the maps if for example I wanted to load up long island, new jersey and 5 nyc boroughs?

 

[KC2IXE]

Matt,
I've got all of Long Island, all of NYC, Metro NJ, and the I-95 corridor of CT, plus some of MD in my 60C, and have room

Charlie

 

[nethiker]

No expandable memory on the 76 or 60. I was looking at the new Magellan explorist 600 since it just came out and has removable media, but the reveiws were not that great. 112 megs covers Montana, parts of Wyoming and Idaho, Virginia, DC and the surrounding area. It's plenty to keep my home area and load a destination I plan to visit. Even if you venture outside your detailed map coverage, the base map has all the main roads and you can still use the other navigational tools.

Greg

 

[senecaripple]

i just received my 2610 just before the 4th of july weekend. i had to drive to brooklyn to pick up my cousin, we had to go to connecticut. i have no idea of brooklyn. as a newbie, i relied on my cousin's directions until prospect pkwy was closed off! i got off the brooklyn queens expressway. my cousin is giving me directions counter to what my gps was saying! after awhile i realized my cousin has no idea what she was saying. i got off the cell phone and listened to the gps instead. had i listened to her, it would've added another hour of driving and getting lost. the 2610 got me to her house in 10 min. and that was the first time i ever used it. i have the whole u.s and canada on my unit. it takes about 1.6 gbs.
check out gpscity.com for some ideas!

 

[COMSEUR]

[ QUOTE ]
03lab said:
...they cost over $750 here in Germany and the only difference is the stupid basemap which I don't need anyway. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon23.gif

[/ QUOTE ]

About the same pricing I get where I am, ridiculous, innit??
That's why I've started looking stateside, too. The only difference from what I can tell is that in case of warranty trouble, you'd have to ship the unit back stateside.
Not a real problem, is it, giggle? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

One can buy TWO units stateside for the price of ONE unit bought in Europe. Just doesn't make sense... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif

 

[03lab]

In fact, Garmin UK will handle the warranty, we wouldn't even have to send it back over the pond. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/banghead.gif

 

[senecaripple]

buy.com is only $609 usd, with $10 off coupon its onl $599. shipping isnt free however. and they've been out of stock for the last 3 weeks.

 

[matt_j]

I'm going to go to jandr today and check it out maybe I can implement my ex employee discount program.

 

[Darkcobra]

I got mines here: http://www.gpsonsale.com/garmin/products/60cs.htm
The 60cs is great and I love mines, don't really know how I went through life without one? LOL If your able to download only the maps you'll need for a trip you'll be OK, but it definately will not hold an entire map of the US.

 

[senecaripple]

what unit are you leaning toward or decided on?

 

[matt_j]

Well I just came back from the store and realized that the salesman had no desire to sell me anything so I just looked at the items... I'm leaning towards 60cs BUT when you add the sync cables, cradle, adapter and map that $450 grows to $600. For that proce I can get a dedicated unit for my car and use my Rino 120 for my wilderness stuff.

Now there is also another option like a blue tooth gps adapter for my dell axium pocket pc. I have to make a decision soon.