guggie

great * Add support for maps greater than 2 GB. on fat32 ???? if someone manage to put .img file greater than 2GB and have it working, please tell me on which file format because fat32 definitely can't be. The file size limit is 4GB with fat32 and 2GB with fat16.

When you are driving with your GPS and then get out of the car, the compass won't work for a period of time. That period of time is a user setting. Check out your paper manual on page 28. Press menu twice..setup..heading...Switch to compass heading when below...for more than... I bet your Vista has working normally all along. It's not "locking up". It's NORMAL!

Try this. From the map screen, press the lower left button...select setup map...scroll sideways to Map Setup-Information...press lower left button again...Hide/Show City Navigator or any other maps you have. This will apply to all maps of that type and avoid having to select or de-select each individual map.

Are you that much of a pessimist to think version 3.01 won't fix it?

The topic of this thread should be changed to Vista HCx and Legend HCx version 3.00<--Big Problems!

What does this mean? "Modify track log function for steady barometer output at power on."

Your tracks are automatically backed up to the microSD card in a Vista HCx.

But you can't use the unit while in the case, right?

Moreover, if you press the power button once to bring up the brightness level, then press it again to bring it to 50% brightness, then move the brightness to where you want using the click stick and press the click stick to return to regular GPS mode. The next time you press the power button to control the brightness, the preset brightness you chose above will be activated. It saves your brightness even through power down. Jamie Yup. You're correct. That's the way I do it. Just to clarify for the OP...you still have to press the power button twice to get the backlight on, but it will then come on at your newly chosen level.

I use the Garmin neoprene case that has a built in clear window. I also put a clear screen protector on the display that I had lying around from an old palm pilot to help protect it when i use it outside of the case, as on my bicycle. People also recommend a type of hard foam, clam shell style case made by Foarm

The Palm Pre is going to be an exclusive on Verizon. Looks great. Probably worth waiting for.

I've been all through this and now have mounts on my mountain bike and my road bike for my Vista HCx. Here is the scoop (basically the same as others have said). The Vista HCx back plate does not get replaced at all. The clip that came with your GPSr goes on it. The back plate that comes in the first Amazon listing you mention is all plastic anyway, not metal like the one on your GPSr. Get extra clips here http://www.gpscity.com/item-garmin-etrex-c.../etrexcclip.htm . I bought one. The mounting ring for the bar comes in 2 sizes. The one that comes in the kit (with the wrong back plate) fits my mountain bike and I bought the larger one here http://www.gpscity.com/item-garmin-large-b...rbikeladapt.htm for my road bike. One observation with this mount is that the GPSr fits this larger mount with a slight amount of "play" that you can feel if you jiggle it around. It is not enough to affect the readability at all but the regular sized mount that comes with the first item you reference in your posting does not have this "play". That may be a difference that is unique to my particular combination of clip and mount, or perhaps it affects all of them due to molding tolerances. Enjoy your Vista HCx. It's great on both of my bikes. Also, I can highly recommend GPSCity for these items. They shipped same day and I had the items 3 days later on the opposite coast line. I also ordered a RAM mount for my car.

That one is working fine for my Vista HCx!

1. http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/maps/view/21/ 2. yes, saves money in the long run 3. yes, no 4. not printing on paper. use a pda to store the cache info, some gps units will save this info. 5. get a case/screen protector for it. Thanks for the reply. Great information there. When you say cache info, do you mean the coords? or more things like the cache name/description/results? as long as my unit can hold the coors (preferably multiple ones for when i go on a day out), i wont mind having to write down the rest. i plan on using a notebook to record my finds/failures. By paperless, we mean all the info besides the lat/long. Things like description, clues, other persons log entries, etc. You can also look these up with a cell phone while you are caching. Geocaching.com has a nice wap page for mobile use.

Glad to hear that you are up and running. I followed along in your earlier thread about the failure to read the microSD card. I told you it was a hardware failure...

My Vista HCx, when set to a bearing indicator, will re-orient the arrow to straight ahead in your example. As far as I can recall, the map screen won't properly re-orient though and will jump around at random at times.

Agreed. On the HCx series, your compass card tells you which direction your GPSr is facing. It doesn't matter if you are 1 mile from the cache or on top of it with lousy GPS coverage. It will always indicate the direction you are facing, just like a Silva compass. It has nothing to do at all with the GPS satellites. I think we all agree that some people mistake the overlying pointer/needle for the compass. That can vary widely under certain conditions, e.g., close to the cache, poor GPS satellite coverage, etc. The compass in the HCx units is like the compass on the dash of your car, or on your boat, on in an airplane. It is a rotating card/disc, not the pointer.

And I am an internist, essentially a trouble shooting engineer for human beings. Your comments are "right on course". As a side line, I've noted that the bearing pointer bounces very little if I am near the sought after waypoint or cache, as opposed to the course pointer, which clearly bounces around more, often up to 180 degrees. Both are fine when you are still some distance from the final destination. Try it out on your own. Switch back and forth between the 2 pointers when you are tracking to a cache and see what happens as you get real close.

As one other poster said, the arrow you are talking about is NOT the compass arrow. You are talking about a course pointer that is dependent on the GPS signal. There is no way that an electronic compass arrow can "vary widely" when you are near the cache unless the cache area has a magnetic anomaly nearby it. Actually it will. The calculated coordinates are still based on GPS and the compass is going to point where the GPS thinks the coordinates are. Just because you're standing still doesn't mean the coordinates don't bounce around based on the varying geometric position of the satellites. I saw this happen all the time with the MeriPlat and see it happen with the PN-40. When you get close enough the compass does jump around on you, it still is time to put it away. You're within ground zero. The underlying difference is if you lost satellite signal, the compass will point in the direction of the last known location of the coordinates at the time of signal loss. It is, however, up to you to estimate your distance when this happens. Nope. You're confused. You are not describing the behavior of a true electronic compass as in the HCx. Compass don't "go to a point". They point in a direction based on the magnetic pole. The arrow's action may bounce and shift around because of the nature of the GPS signal (drift, multipath, etc.) , but the underlying compass card certainly does not. The compass card is purely sensitive to the surrounding magnetic field when the compass is on. If the compass is turned off, then behavior is totally different, more as you describe. I agree that the bearing arrow points in many different directions when you are close to the cache, but the compass card does not shift more than a few degrees at most. In summary, the Vista HCx displays a screen with a bearing arrow overlying a compass card when navigating to a cache. The arrow moves entirely independent of the compass card. The card behaves like any ordinary magnetic compass. It points north, period (when turned on).

Go with the Vista HCx. It's great!

As one other poster said, the arrow you are talking about is NOT the compass arrow. You are talking about a course pointer that is dependent on the GPS signal. There is no way that an electronic compass arrow can "vary widely" when you are near the cache unless the cache area has a magnetic anomaly nearby it.

The send to GPX button sends only coordinates and the name of the cache to my Vista HCx. No other info is sent such as hints, description, etc.

The cure seems worse than the problem. But it does give me a suggestion though - get some thick foam and stick it around that button. Here you go. Only one color though. http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0000Y3CY2/ref=as...mp;linkCode=asn

$321.49 today for the 200. $389.84 for the 300.

Great GPS. You'll like it, as do I. Don't buy any maps until you've tried the free ones that you can find on-line. Start here http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/maps/ for nice maps of TX and surrounding states. This one in particular: http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/maps/view/102/