tls11823

I use a VIIx, and it works fine. I concur with the posts so far, and live and die by the Cachemate/GSAK combination. The VIIx was kind of cool in its day, but its defining feature - wireless connectivity - is no longer active. There weren't enough people interested in paying $10 a month, so they disbanded the network. That being said, it still works fine for caching and general PDA use. To address some of your questions specific to the unit: I have never had problems in the field, since the use is for only a few minutes per cache. However, you have to change the batteries every two weeks or so, even if you never use the unit. If you don't it loses all of its programming and needs a full resync. Kind of a pain, but because I use 15-minute rechargables, it's not a big deal as long as I don't forget to change the batteries from time to time. I have had some very large GSAK databases - over 500 waypoints - loaded and have not come close to exhausting all of the memory. There is no way to expand the memory, but I don't see it as a problem unless you chew up the memory some other way.

I was recently told that I may have to travel from my home in the U.S. to France on a business trip. So of course the first thing I did was check out the geocaches in the area. Oh yeah - then I started checking out hotels, etc. I was surprised to find out that almost all of the cache descriptions were written in both French and English, as were many of the logs. It sort of destroyed the prevalent U.S. stereotype of snobby French, since they seemed to be very accommodating of others by putting forth this effort. It turns out that I didn't need to make the trip, but it make me feel just a little bit more welcome in a foreign land.

I feel your pain. I'm on the west side of the pond, but share email with co-workers all over the world. Depending on how things are quoted, it can be a mess to figure out how old a particular message is. Of course, that's not as bad as the time I was in Northern Ireland and happened to glance at the wrapper from the sandwich I had nearly finished. For a few moments I thought the sell-by date was two months in the past. OK - I'm drifting off-topic. I support the request for localised (or is it localized ) settings.

OK - that removes one of my major gripes. Thanks for listening to us. I'll be more interested when I can get Waymarking information into GSAK or something similar via PQs. I know - it's still early, and that is on the drawing board. As somebody who has worked with computers since the punch-card days, I know that these things take time.

I have a pair of sneakers that I had to pull out of the rich, black loam of a Northern Ireland bog and a few months later out of a Louisiana bayou. (I don't take hiking boots on business trips, but maybe I should start.) When I have these adventures I'm cursing and complaining about my luck and stupidity. But by the time I get back to the hotel, shower off the mud, and do my best to clean my shoes and clothes in the bathtub, I realize how funny it all was, and that these will be some of my fondest caching memories. At least you won't forget about this adventure!

I have a Legend, so when I was shopping my choices were basically between Metroguide and Topo. I agonized about it until I checked out the samples on the Garmin web site. You can pick any area and see how it's represented by the different software packages. From there you can see what will suit your needs best I use the Legend for Geocaching and to help me find my way around new areas when I'm on business trips. Metroguide gives me the ability to create routes that I can download to the Legend. That's a very valuable feature. But I was really concerned that I would be missing out on a lot of trails by not going with Topo. So I looked at some areas I've cached on the Metroguide section of the web site. I found many, though certainly not all, of the trails I was looking for. Of course, there was no information on altitude, and many of the natural features were missing. But for my needs, this was a suitable compromise, so I've been using Metroguide I'll probably buy Topo one of these days, for those times that I do some real back trail stuff - especially since I now have a 4WD vehicle. Topo does have some roads, but not many, especially in urban areas. And it won't help you with routing at all. My suggestion is to consider whether your needs require the added detail offered by Topo. If so, get it. If not, get either Metroguide or City Select - whichever is suited to your GPSr.

As Stephen Wright tells us, anyplace is within walking distance as long as you have the time.

Or, like Schrödinger's cat, the act of observation alters its reality. Whoa...

But, as mini pointed out, if you want to list everything, you have to: - Click Places - Click Search Now - Write down or print the interesting information - Click Things - Click Search Now - Write down or print the interesting information - If there would be people listed, do the same for them as well. Why not let me see everything in one place once I've selected an origin? I don't know what I'm interested in without seeing everything that's available. Plus, what about locations that aren't clearly either a place or a thing, such as a house shaped like a shoe? I can see arguing for placing it in either category. (And if there's an old woman living there, it could be under people.) I'm withholding judgement until Pocket Queries are available. Hopefully by then I can filter things myself off-line, and not have to worry about the user interface of the site.

If you're anything like me, it means you ignore the cache and look for another where you can relax.

I'd like to see the source of these statistics, and be somehow assured that they're reliable. There's no way that 3 out of 10 adults I see on a daily basis are molsting children. There are definitely some sick people in our society, but not that many. I'd also like to see their definition of "sexually abused" and "molested".

So you took your original disks - not the backups - on a trip and destroyed one of them. Then you obliterated the serial number. Then you called the vendor with questions about a disk that you claimed was a copy of your valid disk and they didn't want to talk to you. And this is Garmin's fault?

Strange - I can run them both at the same time without any problems. Things available to one program are available to the other. Why do you have to go thrugh all of those steps?

That's what got me hooked. Our first search took us to a place near home that we never would have known about. Plus, it's a great way to explore an area when you're out of town. Enjoy!

I always put in a note for the bug, which means several steps. But I wouldn't be in favor of copying the cache logs notes to the bug log. I would rarely want to say the same thing in both places. I'm really keen on the idea of a separate text box, but there would have to be one for each bug you dropped off.

I just want to clarify the original question, since I'm not sure the replies so far are actually answering it. (Of course, it could just be me ) I interpret the question to be whether to buy a unit that has a built-in battery or one that will take standard batteries. I would say buy one that uses something standard like AAs, but use rechargable ones, such as those mentioned by others. You get the best of both worlds, and if you find yourself with run-down rechargables, you can pick up some regular AAs pretty much anywhere in a pinch.

Some of my most enjoyable - and definitely some of my most adventurous - searches happened to end up without finding the cache. If it's a cool walk with an interesting view, it's all good.

Before they all disappear and become waymarks.

Try this one. However, this is well-mannered and requires clicking a link to get a midi file. You can even download it for later listening. I figured this one out when it was first posted. Actually, I cheated and loadeded the midi file into sequencing software. It was more fun and technical for me. Now I just need to get to that location one of these days to prove I'm right...

I picked up an Oregon Scientific ThinCam at Media Play a couple of months ago for $20 - I wish I would've grabbed a couple more. This is not a one-time camera, you take pictures and load them to a computer, then use it over and over. The resolution isn't great - I think .3 megapix. No flash or preview. But it's literally credit card sized and can be stashed anywhere. I think the one I have is discontinuted, but I just checked their website and they have a 1.3 megapix for $60. You won't use this as your main camera, but it's nice for me on business trips because it takes almost no space in my briefcase, and can easily slide into my pocket when I'm caching or hiking. And because it's so cheap, I don't worry about dropping it, falling on it, or having it stolen. Today on the way back from caching, my son and I saw the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile parked at a hotel, and it was nice to be able to grab the Thincam out of the caching bag and get some quick pics.

I heard a theory that they wanted to slightly change the formula for Coke to use cheaper ingredients, but they knew people would notice the difference. So they pulled the original out of circulation for a while, waited for the anticipated uproar, then "brought back" the "original" formula. After time away, people didn't notice the slight difference. This is the closest thing to a reasonable explanation that I've heard for changing one of the single most successful products in the history of mankind. Oh, and by the way, I don't think you're going to stop this train, so you might as well get off or ride along.

I know what you're saying. My son loves caching, but it's hard to get him out during the summer. Now that it's cooling down, he's getting interested again. I did get to go out for some caching by myself on business trips this summer. Unfortunately my trips were to hot, humid places like New Orleans, Charlotte, and Houston. Of course, it wasn't much better when I went 90 minutes down the PA turnpike to Valley Forge... By the way, the coming of fall means you shouldn't forget to wear plenty of orange. We have orange vests and hats that we carry around in our pack. Fortunately, my son thinks wearing orange is cool - just like he thinks wearing a bike helmet it cool. So he needs no coaxing.

Are you threatening me?!? I need TP...

I encountered the same thing when I first moved to a new laptop that required a USB/Serial adapter. I never figured out a workaround, but never really tried too hard, since I just export everything from GSAK to MapSource, then dump to the Legend from there. I think that maybe GSAK just doesn't deal well with those funky port numbers, but MapSource does. Maybe Clyde can give you an answer. If he does, please post it here.

I didn't say it shouldn't be interesting. I enjoy learning something about the area from the cache page. A recent find taught me about something I would have never known about - that's what caching is all about for me. But you can get your point across with plain text. Cute colors, fonts, and graphics don't do anything for me. It's like watching a PowerPoint presentation that has every slide sweeping and cute little pictures that have nothing to do with the subject at hand. People think that just because they can do something, they should do it, and everybody will think they're uber-geeks. Just give me the information.