BigOpe

Leaning toward the 20 too, but still open to inputs good/bad. Remember, not looking for Star Wars level technology, just reasonable geocaching features and Windows 8/10/newer compatibility. Maps nice, not essential, just give me the ol' pointy arrow and I'm mostly good. But it's clear the Etrex H is a dinosaur.

In re: batteries, used to get at least a couple extended caching sessions from a new pair of AA's, now almost a certainty that 30 minutes in it'll start complaining, while back at home the batteries test at 1.45v or thereabouts. Repeatedly, not a single occurrence.

While waiting for responses (thanks for all so far, by the way) I saw many Etrex 10/20/30 out there, new and used. The 10 seems to be adequate but maybe already on the brink of obsolescence?, 20 looks good, 30 too but maybe overkill and an extra Benjamin for stuff I might not ever use. Any experiences to share with those three? How did you like them, what did they NOT have that you wanted? Have used smart phone a few times too, by the way, but still prefer a purpose-built device.

Have been caching for 15 years with the Etrex-H and was happy with it. Compass, little arrow, "xxx feet to cache," all I wanted. But it's dying again, complaining about low battery every 15 minutes, and not worth finding another Etrex-H for sale somewhere (not to mention incompatibilities with newer Windows versions). So I have to upgrade, but don't want something so fancy I can plan a moon shot on it, just something lowish-end that does what the -H did plus maybe longer cache names, maybe descriptions and hints, maps okay but I can live without them. So what do y'all suggest from the used market, or the lower-end new market? Spare me the lectures about joining the 21st century, please, not here to seek pity or condescension, just whatever friendly advice folks might have to offer who have worked their way up the technology ladder more than I have and can speak to the capabilities of GPS units somewhat more sophisticated than my old standby.

I've been happy with my old Etrex H, had to go shopping for drivers and cables when I moved up to Windows 8.1 but all good. Just had to move to Windows 10 and latest (7.whatever) version of EasyGPS, same issues, won't talk to my vintage GPS for upload/download. Anybody know if there are drivers and cables out there that will bring it back to life, as it is still working fine for my needs? Spare me the lectures, by the way, about "join the 21st century." I'm asking a simple question, as I'd like to stay with my current stuff until it dies, not for $$$ reasons, just because it gives me the enjoyment and challenge I want from our hobby. Does anybody know for a certainty that the Etrex H/EasyGPS 7.???/Windows 10 configuration can be made to work? If not I'm fine with spending a few bucks to upgrade, but I enjoy doing things the legacy way as long as I can.

Long time user of Etrex H and EasyGPS (I like it cheap and simple, not too many bells'n'whistles), but latest version of EasyGPS no longer lists the Etrex H as an option. EasyGPS says they no longer support GPS's with serial connection, so it looks like I may have been run over by the technology bus. If indeed my Etrex H is just plain too old, wondering what to do. Plainest Etrex listed in EasyGPS now is the Etrex 10, could buy one of those but how likely is it that six months from now it'll be too old too? How much must I upgrade to be reasonably sure the technology won't overtake me again, while still keeping it relatively cheap and simple? And if I switch to another brand altogether, where in their product line do I fit? Not familiar at all with anything but Garmin. Any advice anyone can offer before I plunk down my money will be welcome. Oh, yeah, and would switching to something other than EasyGPS solve my problem, or are GSAK etc. also snubbing anything as old as my Etrex H?

Not even going to bother to read other posts about this Pokemon phenomenon, just soapboxing. These smart-phone Millenial (for the most part) twits are threatening our 15-year fun experience, as far as I can tell from news coverage. Not saying our "group" should get involved, but I don't like what I'm seeing and hearing. If these idiots keep desecrating cemeteries, trespassing on private property, etc., nothing good is likely to come of it for traditional geocachers. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

I'm not sure I follow. Why did you need two cables for your laptop and desktop when the USB ports on the computer are the same? And if you're talking about the GPS end, they would only be different if you've had more than one GPS. My point is that all GPS models in the past.... 8-10 years all connect with a standard USB cable. Thus if you need extra cables, you can get one at radio shack or wal mart. The GPS has a mini-USB type A and the computer is a regular USB type A. This is an improvement over old eTrex line which connected via serial cable, which is no longer supported, and required a special cable to convert to USB. Normally I'd agree that that older GPS technology is still functional today, but this is one case where I advocate leaving unsupported standards in the past. The difference was actually in the SOFTWARE that enabled whatever the GPS speaks to communicate with Windows. The plugs at the computer end were both normal USB, the plugs at the GPS end were the same as far as the contacts, but were different shaped. (BTW, on the Etrex-H it is NOT a mini-USB Type A, but rather an oddball slide-on connector with four copper contacts, never seen it anywhere else but on the Etrex-H.) But the REAL difference that required a second cable was that the software for my first, Windows 7 cable did not work with Windows 8 and was not going to be upgraded, so I had to get a second cable. Second cable, in turn, had the right connector at the GPS end but terminated in a serial connector, so I also needed a serial-to-USB adapter. Simple problem, really, but the various bits and pieces to solve it were most definitely NOT to be found at Radio Shack, BestBuy, etc. All hail the Internet, I found them all there eventually. But the good news, found an Etrex-H on EBay, so I'm back in business.

Will read up on the Vista. Problem I've encountered before is different plugs at the GPS end, not the computer end. Had to have different cables for my Windows 7 desktop PC and my Windows 8.1 laptop, and the plugs at the GPS were different on the two cables.

Lost my Etrex-H yet again. Anybody have an old one -- but fully functional, please -- they'd think of selling? Would rather not have to buy a bunch of new cables, etc., that would be needed for an upgrade. The ETrex-H is good enough for my needs.

OK, thanks to all.

Thanks for all replies. Hosting is kind of a non-starter, as we're only up there for a few months in summer. I'll look into Pup Patrol's post, though.

This has probably been answered many times, but I'm not in the mood for a bunch of searching. Non-friendly interfaces really annoy me. (1) I set up a query for caches within 10 mi. of a particular zip code and submitted the information. (2) It ran and offered me a preview, containing 300 or so caches. (3) But nowhere could I find a "OK, nice preview but now EMail them all to me as a .GPX" button, even though I thought I had it set up that way in the original query definition. How the heck do you do that? The query definition itself is still there, with "run it once and then delete" as my chosen option, but after the preview nothing more seems to happen. Behind the query definition, BTW, it says it has never been run, so how the heck did I even get a preview?

Hoping somebody is working on getting this restriction set aside, as it rules out a HUGE chunk of Arizona, but haven't heard anything much. Also wondering why, if State Trust Land is off limits, there are a couple hundred caches in a state park near my home. Talking out both sides of their mouths up in Phoenix, are they?

Was wondering if there's going to be an event this summer where we have our second home, but under Community/Events it looks like it only goes out as far as the current month. Is there a search I don't know about?

It really is annoying when a developer puts years of work into a program and then expects you to pay for it Which is why I stick with EasyGPS. Its developers don't seem to feel that way.

Well, with the "Desert Paws" series in Tucson that I mentioned, I manually changed the troublesome names to just DP1001, DP1002, and so on (actually there are two such series, so I have DP1001 and DP2001). Using a text editor and find-and-replace made it a bit easier, but still somewhat tedious. I tried GSAK once, but got annoyed when I started getting nag screens after a few weeks. EasyGPS has always been adequate for my needs other than this one thing, and hey, free is my favorite color. As for using the GC codes, whenever possible I prefer an at least somewhat meaningful name to help me remember which is which when out in the field.

OK, thanks for all the Day 1 responses. As I anticipated, half or so were in the vein of "buy something better," but there's some helpful stuff here I'll investigate. I do know how to manipulate HTML code to find and truncate certain strings, but it can still be a little tedious. Just trying to plant a seed in the minds of those who hide long strings of caches with almost-identical names that with very little effort they could make some other cachers' lives a bit easier. Had a great caching day today, love this hobby despite all frustrations. And six million others (wow!) seem to feel the same. Y'all keep on cachin'!

I've vacillated back and forth about whether to even post this, as it may only be a concern to cachers like me who still use vintage GPS's and software, but what the heck, forums are where you ventilate. I still use, and am perfectly happy with, an early-generation Garmin Etrex H and EasyGPS software. The ETrex does all I want it to, but when loading cache data it only allows six characters. When people put out a whole series of caches with long names that differ only in the last couple characters ("My Uncle Ed's Arthritic Right Elbow Memorial Cache #1, #2, etc.) EasyGPS tries to crunch those long names down to six characters, but they all tend to come out the same, so when dumping them into the Old ETrex, the first one goes thru and the rest are rejected. It would be a service to my small sliver of the world's 6 million geocachers if COs would try to put the DIFFERENT part of those repetitive names somewhere toward the front. Otherwise, it can get tedious manually editing all the names to be different. (See the "Desert Paw" series in Tucson -- probably a couple hundred caches, and they all translate the same in my particular technology environment.) (OK, so now will come the smart-alecky responses: "Man up, buy a better GPS and software." As they said in the Battle of the Bulge, "Nuts!" All that foofy newer stuff reduces the challenge as far as I'm concerned.

As my granddaughter would say, "What ... ever." (Rolling eyes ...)

Focus, folks. My OP was about the idea of an attribute. Thoughts on the value and feasibility of that idea would be more useful than off-topic quibbles.

Well, maybe I misspoke with "all over the world," but "all over a 1000 mile radius" is equally not useful. And searching by size is equally non-helpful, thanks for the thought. My idea was that if someone specifically intends for a cache, generally a "large" I would think, to be a repository for TBs, an attribute saying so would help cachers home in on them and drop/pick up TBs. If the cacher picks a poor location, or finders don't play by the rules as far as "find one, leave one," that's unfortunate. But the operative word here is "travel," and the odds of a TB moving on as intended would likely be better if dropped into a TB Hotel rather than a large cache on top of a mountain, or whatever. Hope that's clearer.

As a non-Arizona resident, it took me about 20 minutes of research and a bit of reading to conclude that the state agency is correct, in that the land in question (I'm talking about trust land in general, not that specific cache) is NOT state property, but simply held in trust by the state. They are legally required to only allow usage that provides an economic benefit to the trust, and the enabling act makes it pretty clear that by arbitrarily allowing other usage the officials would be opening themselves up to prosecution. The people who placed geocaches there were both in violation of the rules of geocaching by not having land manager permission, but also the terms of their use permit (if they had one). To be perfectly honest, the state could be FAR more aggressive than simply requesting that the caches be archived, by pursuing legal measures. As far as the specific cache, if you actually LOOK at the parcel map, you'll see that the area in question is shown as State Trust land that is under commercial lease. The Maricopa County Assessor's Office also shows both parcels located at 5350 Marriott Drive, Phoenix AZ as being held by the Arizona State Land Department. While I'm not saying that Marriott doesn't have the right to allow a geocache on property that they hold under lease (I'm pretty certain they do) it's usually better to rely on authoritative sources before you go off the handle about something, instead of relying on the results of a phone conversation with a middle manager about something that's probably well outside of their sphere of responsibility. I'm not understanding why having to buy a permit each year does not constitute an economic benefit to the state. ATVers buy a permit, cattlemen lease grazing land, why is it not a benefit when geocachers buy their permit? As to whether this belongs in a regional forum or a broader one, there are state trust lands in many, many (mostly Western, I would guess) states, and it would be wise to have geocachers in states other than AZ aware of this situation so they can at least try to forestall any such thing in their own state. And, to further sweeten the pot, I could envision the currently cash-strapped Feds pulling something similar for BLM and National Forest lands, which would have MUCH broader implications for our hobby. I know I've already alerted geocacher friends over in New Mexico to keep an eye on what the state and the Feds might be up to over there.

Apparently the weenies in Phoenix have decided that placing geocaches on state trust land, even though one already has to buy a permit to go there at all, is a no-no. POOF! Millions of acres of otherwise public land, closed to geocaching with the stroke of a pen. Never mind that the ATV/dirt bike crowd can do their thing, ranchers can graze their cattle until it all turns into a dust bowl, etc. -- responsible geocaching is going to somehow destroy the land. What rubbish! Is there any organized movement emerging in AZ to contest this arbitrary, wrong-headed bureaucratic nonsense? And for that matter, New Mexico too, where I spent a good part of each year. Haven't heard of anything like this there -- yet -- but I could easily imagine it coming.

Seems to me it would be useful if there were an attribute that could be assigned to a cache intended as a TB hotel, or failing that, a way to include the words "TB Hotel" as part of a pocket query. You can do the latter as part of the basic "Find a cache" query, but it produces hundreds of results all over the world, no way to narrow it to a zip code or a state or whatever. Or is there, and I'm just not aware of it?