gitarmac

It is sitting beside my venture, my venture says I have gone 21 feet, I walked from outside to inside. The vista says I have gone .14 miles!!!11 Over one 10th of a mile!!! It says I have been moving for over 3 minutes! It's much worse when plugged into the computer. At first I thought it was because the cord was interfering with the electric compass but then it started just setting there. Just got off the horn with garmin. They had me do a master reset, it seems ok so far. I will try it out over the weekend and compare it with my venture hc.

I just got a factory refurbished one yesterday. At first I thought it was really neat, then I noticed the backlight only worked so far. I remember reading about that so I checked for updates. The factory refurbished unit was not updated apparently. It seemed to fix the problem. Then I noticed the drifting and wandering while still. It may have done this all along, I don't know. I vaguely remember reading something about that as well. I upgraded the chipset, whatever that means, and it seemed ok. Today I notice it is doing it again! It got worse with the compass off. I had it hooked to the computer but I unhooked it to get my phone to call garmin. Now it seems to be OK. I plugged it back in, still seems ok. OPPs, spoke too soon, it thinks I'm moving again!! WTH!!!! I am on hold and the hold time is long but I'm going to hold out! Makes the odometer, or the track log for that matter, pretty useless. Come to think about it, it makes it pretty useless for anything!! What kind of bug is this!

I just realized something, I had recently updated my garmin nuvi 200 and it is not as bright either. I know because it was so bright I had to turn it down to 50% or lower. I'll bet the new dimmness is intentional, for conserving battery power. I don't really need it on 100% bright, and the nuvi was ridiculous at 100%. That's my theory anyway.

I just got a factory refurbished vista today! It seems like it's going to be awesome, there are a few features on it that are not on my venture that seems useful, in addition to the new tracks I can save. Then I noticed the brightness not going up. I remembered reading something so I did a search here and found this thread. So I updated and the brightness worked fine (although overall not as bright as my venture). Then I noticed it "wandering". It did not know I was still, the odometer kept increasing even though I was sitting still. I kept reading this thread and saw the chipset update. I went back and checked that and it seems to have stopped the wandering. I hope I am done for now. I would have thought it would have come all updated and all seeing as how it was factory refurbished but maybe this update was more recent than the refurbish. It seems like every gps I have had has had a bug. I cannot turn "turn gps on" on my venture once I turn it off, it locks it up. That's not really a big deal though. My first one, a rino, had a couple of bad channels. That's when I swapped out for a non-radio gps. The second one started turning off by itself. The venture hc has been pretty awesome in spite of that little glitch. Sometimes I cannot get my computer to see my garmin though. I have had to reinstall communicator a few times for some reason. What an emotional rollarcoaster. I hope it's done now. I already know about the rubber band issue, I figure that's what mine was refurbished for.

I have differant track logs saved, from all over the hunting area. I make maps with them and if I leave it running it won't look as good, plus it will eventually be overwritten. I export the data to make the maps, which saves the tracklog on my computer. I have a main file with all the tracks and waypoints, so I have a backup. Plus, anyone with a gps, a garmin one anyway, can get my tracklogs. So if someone wants to find my stand I can give them the tracklog to it.

tag for later

It's not really that it's hard, I'm just having a hard time making my maps look the way I want, and it seems I have to use more than one program to do it. Mapsource seems to be the least useful of all of them, which seems strange to me seeing as how it's garmins software. At least in easy gps I am able to do a little editing of waypoints. That link I had posted earlier, gpsvisualization, seems to be the best way to actually make the maps. I can control the trail width, color, and some other things. I would be willing to spend money on a better map program but it seems like what I already have would do as well as any of the others. I would love to hear from anyone that has used expert gps though.

welp, the only way, it seems, to do that is to select every waypoint individually. Or track. Maybe my maps are as good as they are going to get. Oh well.

Here is the map I was able to make using google earth. I would like to reduce the size of the waypoint font, amongst other things but am unable to. I think I may be able to go into another program to do that, save as a file, then access it in google earth. Kind of a lot of steps but I'm going to try. cover me, I'm going in!

Welp, I can go into google earth, which I downloaded onto my computer, and it will get info directly from my gps, then it makes a pretty good map. I cannot seem to edit the track colors or waypoint symbols but it seems to have solved the problem I had when using google earth via mapsource. When I did that, my tracks were cluttered with big squares of trackpoints. It's just wierd that I was able to veiw my data in google earth while in mapsource before but I cannot now. I think I like doing it through google earth instead though. Ultimately I would like to edit my tracks and waypoints, I would like to be able to delete sections of tracks that are redundant, delete the straight lines that is added when track log is turned off (in an attempt to eliminate multiple lines) and edit my waypoint symbols and lines. I cannot use "help" with mapsource because it is not supported by newer OS and the pdf "manual" that came with mapsource (either from the CD or on line, not sure which since I had to "update") does not have much info on it. For instance, there is a "track divide" tool on mapsource but I have had no luck actually dividing a track. I guess there is a certain sequence of steps that I am not following. I hope my vista comes with a new CD. But if it does I suspect it will screw up everything I have done today to get it to work. I saw in another forum that others are able to access their vistas by simplly plugging it into the usb port on the computer, I do not understand why I am unable to do this. Every other gizmo I have can be accessed this way, my cameras, my kindle, why not my gps?!?!? This is why I am hesitant to purchase yet another unworkable gps product. I actully purchased GSAK thinking that I was missing something not having a full version but it's still practicallly useless for me. I have windows vista but I was using windows xp before and having the same problem. It's not the OS fault garmin does not keep up with their drivers and software. I am still wondering what else is out there though. In addtion to expertgps, I have seen others while searching. I have not seen any reports of these being used in the forums I go to though.

Well, I just tried to do it but I guess when I reinstalled mapsource, it does not think I have google earth on my computer. So now I have google earth on my computer, taking up precious space, and the reason I put it there to begin with no longer works. I just want to make maps. In order to make the one I posted above, I had to use windows snip it to select the part of the map I wanted to see which limits the size of the map I can make, if that makes any sense. I am wondering how expert gps would work.

Wow what a quick response! I have a venture hc, and a vista hcx on the way! I unstalled and reinstalled mapsource because I was getting an error with "trip and waypoint manager". Then I had to jump through a few more hoops to get it to work. I have had to do this before actually. In the past I have had trouble sending a cache to my gps from geocaching.com. But it works now. So I can get into mapsource and extract the data from my gps. I do not actually see a program called "trip and waypoint manager" I am assuming it's part of mapsource, correct? I am trying to make maps. I have seen programs on the web but I'm hesitant to purchase them if they either do not work properly, or do what I want them to do. Right now I use gps visualizer from the web. I can get maps that look like this: This is not what my mapsource maps look like. I had to download google earth to attempt to put my track on a satilite image. The map does not look good. Give me a moment, I'll post an example . . . . .BRB

I have to import the data using easy gps or something. I thought that was the way it was done until I read posts from other people. When I plug my gps in, my computer makes a tone, but when I go to "computer" and try to see it, it's not there. The problem I have with what I am doing now, is when I "import" the data from my gps, I have to import all of it. If I want to make a map using only a few waypoints, I have to delete the others each time.

I use eneloops, plus some higher cap ones. Sanyo 2700's are what I have the most of. I keep the eneloops as spares, since they hold well, and I try to remember to put my 2700's in the charger the night before I need them, so they are all topped off. I have 2 chargers, since I use the batteries in everything, my cameras, gps, headlamps, radio.

I have gone with a factory refurbished vista. I have read about the rubber band problem and some fixes for it so that part doesn't bother me. Time will tell if I have any of the other problems. Surely it will be as good as my venture. At least it was cheap

this site will draw a map for you. It's called GPS visualizer and will let you superimpose your track on a google map. It's what I use to map our hunting lease.

Wierd. I have 2 ventures and the rubber is fine on them. The one venture is an older model and hasn't been used much but my yellow one gets used all the time. I wonder if deet is making some of them fail. I think deet is ruining some of my boots and clothes but the bugs are so bad you really don't have a choice. I saw a refurbished model for way cheaper, and it still has a factory warrenty. I might go that route. This is a vista I am looking at.

I currentlly have a venture hc and use if for a little geocaching and hiking/hunting. I've been making some cool maps of the hunting lease but I can only save 10 tracks with the venture. When I go to the garmin site and compare the two units, there seems to be no differance. Yet I know there is a differance. I am leaning towards the vista, but for 80 or 90 dollars more I could get the 60csx (amazon prices). I don't need it to navigate when driving, I have a nuvi for that, and although I love geocaching, I have done without the other info, I can load those into my kindle. It would be nice, but not worth 90 bucks. It looks like the vista has a slightly larger screen which would be nice. What are the differances between the two models?

If you mean how to make it find one, you go to the "find" menu and put in the coordinates. Make the icon a cache, you do this by making the curser go up to the dot that represents the waypoint. If you have a cable you can download it from the cache website. I'm not sure of the question though. Could you be more specific on what you are trying to do? There are some other fields that you use as you are hunting the cache, or other waypoint. You can use the map page till you get close, then I switch to the navigation page. That will give me the distance to the cache. You can practice by making a waypoint and navigating to it. Walk down you street and push the toggle thingie in. It will "mark" the spot as a waypoint and let you rename it (it will give it a number). Then walk back home and make it "find" the waypoint. This will let you thumb through the screens and learn what each one does. Hope this helps. Give us some updates.

I wish I was able to get to this forum yesterday, I have not been able to pull it up till tonight. I've been messing with maps for a few hours now and am fixin' to quit but I'll try that tommorrow. I tried to delete sections of track but the line just reattaches itself to the next track. It's wierd. I tried to divide it too but it didn't work. I'll try again tommorrow and post some pics of what I am getting. Still though, what I am able to do is pretty useful. A prettier one might be prettier but a trail in the woods is a trail in the woods. I have waypointed usefull info like tracks and deer crossings but too many waypoints clutters the track.

crap. I was messing around with mapsource and thought I was doing great, then I did view in google earth and my tracks were there all right, with a million trackpoints.

Wow!! You're awesome! I didn't have a clue how to do anything useful with that program! I did find a program on the web that will do it, I did this one: I tried to make a clean map by turning the track log off when I was backtracking, but instead I have those long straight lines which I think are connected points when I turned track log back on. I wish I could edit the track. It's still useful though. I am making smaller tracks now, I just save when I am done with that path. I think I can merge them, I can't remember where I saw that ability but one of the programs merges. I tried to do a search on map making software but all I could find was stuff for navigation units. The area I am in is flat and no roads so that was useless for me.

I have an old venture and got a newer model one and the differance is significant. My old one lost signal in the trees a lot, and forget about in a car or building.

The club is not very develped and most of the roads are no more than trails. I saw where someone made a "map" of their huntclub on google earth but for some reason I cannot do it. I have 2 tracts saved and a bunch of waypoints. I just want to superimpose the tract on google earth. Or the waypoints. I used one of my gps programs to kind of make out a map but if I could superimpose it on google earth it would be much better. What would this do that whatever it is I have does not. Could I merge tracts or only select part of them? does anyone know how I can simply add several waypoints on google earth?

In my case I am getting the kindle for doing kindle things, but if it can be uitilized for geocaching I will use it for that as well. I have a gps, a basic one. But cache sheets on the kindle would be pretty useful for me. It could fit in my pack with my other stuff. Or when I am out of town and don't have the interweb. I could store some sheets on the kindle.