G-Squad

A girlfriend at work is looking to spend $200 - $300 on a mapping gps for her husband. He is a commercial flooring contractor that has to work out of town. Sometimes, he will finish a job in one city and then have to drive to another city. This could actually extend to 3 or 4 cities. He would always know before he leaves what cities he will be going to. He would use the unit for door to door directions. He is also a hunter and hopefully will take up geocaching. She would be the one to load maps onto the gps for his use before he leaves on his trips. He does not have a laptop so would not be able to load maps as needed. Due to the price range, I zeroed in on the Garmin GPS V Deluxe. It comes with mapping software as well as PC cable for about $250. It also comes with cigarette lighter power cable as well as an automobile mount. Although the model is about 4 years old, the more "modern" units seem to be out of her price range, especially when you consider all the accessories that will need to be purchased. From what I can tell, the only downside I see is the age of the model. Are there any other downsides? Is there an alternate mapping gps that is in her price range if you include all the accessories?

You are probably referring to Eisenhower Park. Although the name does not indicate a wilderness area, a reading of the trail guide spells it out. "To help preserve the health and beauty of this sensitive natural area, we ask that you observe the following rules while visiting the park: 1. STAY ON THE TRAILS!!!!....7. DO NOT DISTURB THE PLANTS, ROCKS, OR ANIMALS." That was taken verbatim (exclamation points and all-caps included) from the trail guide I kept when I did some of the "real" geocaches there. And yes, all of them were off trail. Thankfully, Cybercat was able to place a virtual there, Don't Bother The Birdies. On a clear day, you can see for miles and miles and miles. Or you could be referring to Friedrich Wilderness Park which is on the other side of I-10 from Eisenhower Park and a couple miles up the road. Taking a look at the information guide, it has the exact same wording as I quoted above for Eisenhower Park. Thanks again to Cybercat who placed a multi-cache that takes you through the park. The end cache is just outside of the park, Heywood Jabuzzoff #2 Actually, the "real" geocaches in Friedrich Park were archived before Eisenhower. I suspect that the banning there lead to the banning in Eisenhower. So, what did we learn? The cache-PLACER needs to be aware of all rules and regulations of the area they want to place a cache.

I have noticed in the forums the general recommendation is to use corn starch to highlight the bench mark. Although the cost difference is negligible, what property does cornstarch have (or not have) that makes it better than flour for this use? Just curious is all.

CNN.com article on Geocaching I'm surprised no one has posted this already. Or did I miss the post? Overall a good article. But, it does have a couple of minor misleading statements.

After you have clicked on identify, click on one of the caches in the map. The cache icons should then change to numbers. Below the map is a list of the caches correlating to the numbers on the map.

Today's Arizona Republic, on the back page of the Valley section, has an article on a toilet seat museum in Alamo Heights, TX (a suburb of San Antonio). The byline states the article originally appeared in the Chicago Tribune. The museum is a also a virtual....Barney Smith's Toilet Seat Museum. He even has a special seat for geocachers. Just wish when I lived there, I had done this virt. Oh well, maybe on a visit.

Try this link to Marky's Terra Server Viewer.

I currently use GPXSonar, but it is written for PPC2003. Fabian has an older version that runs on PPC2002 at the GPXSonar archive page. However, he no longer supports that version. Let me say I don't know if PPC2002 and CE are compatible, nor if the older version of GPXSonar would be compatible. With that said, I have seen some programs written for PPC2002 that state they are compatible with CE. I don't know if it would work for your situation though.

Yes it's for exchanged nothing.

Some time back, someone posted instructions on how to import your caches found page into Excel. The results were nowhere near PQ quality but at least it listed the cache, state, and whether it was found, dnf, or note. At the time, I tried it and it worked great with some minor tweaking. I tried searching the forums but couldn't find the instructions to make a link. Fortunately, I previously made a paper copy of the instructions and still have them. I tried using them again but it's not working right. I think it is because the formatting on the found page has been changed and I also upgraded to Office 2003. If you are interested, I will try to rework the instructions so they will work.

Just remember, a TB is not a cache. Looking at your finds, it seemsGroo Got Spooked, Too! was the cache you found Paula. It looks like you logged the cache as well as the TB correctly. So, with all this in mind, did you find 5 caches or 6?

I would think some of the spraycan insulation foam would work well. Spray the liquid through the straw, let it turn to foam and harden. That should fill up the inside of Signal. I'm just not sure how well that would work once you try to stick Signal on the antenna afterwards. Hopefully, after Christmas, I might be able to tell you.

When I cache alone, I usually tnlnsl. There is not much that I find in a cache that will interest this 41 year-old male. I will try to write more than tnlnsl unless it is one of the "on the side of the road" micro's or in a busy public place. I tend to expound more with my on-line logs. If I am with the kids, then trading usually occurs. But again, it will depend what's in the cache.

Yes, GPXSonar. When you first see a cache page, the hint area is blank. In order to see the hint, you have to use your stylus and drag it across the hint area to highlight it. Along with getting the cache name, cache type, d/t, and cacheowner, you can also input a set of coordinates to be center and you will get distance and direction. Further, you can enter field notes for each cache including picking up or dropping TB's. Bear in mind, these are field notes only. It does not interface with the website. You will still have to manually do all of that stuff. Oh, if you have MS Pocket Streets, you can export the caches as a pushpin file into it. Other mapping software is supported, just don't know which ones. I am sure there are other features I haven't mentioned. AJ

Since you are getting MS Streets & Trips, you might want to see this topic and you can rub the son-in-law's nose into it a little bit more . Good luck!

John, you hit the nail on the head with the amount of benchmarks in the AZ counties. That was what I was referring to about the amount and time spent searching. Just never said it. Rob, thanks for the alternate suggestions. I had thought of going that route before but blanched when I saw how many BM's would be involved. However, you do have me re-thinking it. Especially if I can figure out how to get them as pushpins in MS Streets & Trips on my PocketPC. Memory is not a problem there. If you have further suggestions, email me through the site so we don't derail the purpose of this thread. AJ

Started in 2001 with a 315. Sometime in 2002, upgraded to 330 when Sam's offered it in a package with MapSend, the car adapter/pc cable, and the windshield mount. Haven't had the urge to buy something else. It does everything I need it to do. I don't need more memory since I carry a laptop when I travel. I would like one with color but I'm not willing to pony up that kind of money when I have a perfectly fine unit now. Even when it finally gives up the ghost, I will likely send it in for "repairs" and get a refurbished 330 back from them. I wouldn't use it as credit against an upgrade as the savings against MSRP is not that great. Now, if they no longer take in 330's for repair, then I will be open and consider all makes and models.

For me, it would be convenience. Plain and simple. Example: I live in the Phoenix area but decide to take a day trip to Prescott or Sedona, maybe even Flagstaff or perhaps Tucson in the other direction. I can run a PQ of benchmarks and copy it to my PocketPC so I can see the page information. Then, load it into EasyGPS to upload into my GPSr. Total time? Less than 15 minutes. Without PQ's? I would have to configure multiple searches, download the results, then use some program (GSAK perhaps?) to combine them before loading to my PocketPC and GPSr. Time spent? Don't know but it would be much longer and tedious than using a PQ. Most of the time spent doing the searches. Along with PQ's, I would really like to be able to get benchmark files in GPX format.

Oh, I get what you are saying. It has been my experience (and several others on the forums) when using a Magellan, if you keep your eyes on the unit, you tend to overshoot the waypoint. You turn around, overshoot again, and come back, etc. Someone once called it the dance of the bumble bee. The key to preventing this is to let the unit "settle down" before continuing. I set my arrival alarm to 100'. When it goes off, I stop for a minute or two. Once it is settled down, I check my distance and bearing and head for what I think is that spot. I keep my eyes on the spot and off the unit. Once there, I look around for a few minutes for the cache. If I can't spot it, I stop moving around and let the unit settle again. If I am within about 20-30 feet, I put it away and keep hunting. If I am further away, I will check the distance and bearing and repeat the process. Changing the baud rate should have no effect on this. As I previously mentioned, the baud rate only relates to the speed of communication between the GPSr and your computer. Hope this helps.

I think Team 360 is too busy enjoying his new ride. He bought a Corvette this past week. Don't know if it will do him much good out here in AZ where a lot of caches are out in the desert though

I don't understand what you are asking. But in reference to baud rate, it measures how fast (or slow) your GPSr is communicating with your computer. I think it is the funniest thing that Magellan makes their GPSr's capable of communicating at 115,200 baud rate but their software, MapSend, can only communicate at 19,200. Yet, EasyGPS, 3rd party software, can communicate with the GPSr at max speed of 115,200.

It will import the caches as a pushpin file. So yes, you will see little flags on your map. It even has a different flag depending on the cache type. A traditional cache has a brownish triangle flag and flagpost. A virtual will have a yellow arrow that points to the right, a multi will be an orange-red square with 3 white flags & posts in it, etc. If you tap on the cache flag on the map, it will give you the GCxxxx waypoint name (or if you changed the waypoint name in GSAK, it will show that name), the actual name of the cache, the type of cache (traditional, virtual, etc), the rating, and last found date. Pretty good stuff but does not give all the info available on GPXSonar. You will still need to have GPXSonar open to get all the other stuff about the cache. And yes, I put all of my maps and queries on my SD card. In order for GPXSonar to do it's import thing, your query and the map need to have the same name.

Ooops. Pointy end bad! You just know someone is going to use that end instead of the bottle opener end. Ok. Spend 25 or 50 cents and buy a paint can opener. It's one long piece of round wire...think wire coat hanger, but thicker. Bent into a triangle on the top for leverage and the business end is smashed flat AND NOT POINTY!

Tie a churchkey to the handle and everyone will have a way to open it. But, as others have noted, it is likely not to get closed properly. And wouldn't you know, that will be just before a big rain.

I think what you were looking for is "Sehr schön!"...Very beautiful I just knew taking German instead of Spanish in high school would come in handy some day.