duncanhoyle

Do you mind if I ask what it is you're trying to do? Perhaps there are other utilities available which would help

Head torches are great and, obviously, keep your hands free for searching/holding back plants etc. Petzel usually make good ones but I've had to send back 2 Myo XPs (single LED) when they developped faulty wire connections - both replaced free even after guarantee had run out. I also have a 3W Cree LED hand torch that was £18. It's brighter than the headtorch and has a zoom beam focussing mechanism. Powered by 3AAAs. It's very compact and easily fits into a pocket. Yesterday I was in Aldi and bought one of these for only £10.99. It's the same size as the previous one but is 5W Cree and impressively bright. It comes with a 3 year guarantee. I'm tempted to buy another. It's possible to get headbands to hold these small torches but I've never used one. One thing which I noticed doing some night caches in the Lakes recently was that reflectors are a lot more visible when the torch is shining from close to your eyes - either mount the torch on your head or just hold the torch up there (gaffer tape can also be used but can be painful when removed - a friend tried this once!).

My Etrex30 has now been sent back to Garmin :-( Turn around should be less than 10 days...

No sound at all. I tried it previously, but I just set an alarm again and told it to turn off. It turned itself on as expected and showed the alarm screen but with no sound. At least I have something definite to tell the support guy tomorrow. Thanks for your help

Thanks. That enabled me to reset but I still don't get any sounds.

No joy. Unit just starts normally

Garmin UK tech. support responded yesterday with :- > I am happy to help with your query. You will need to do a master reset > (this will take 45 minutes, and may delete your favourite or saved > locations), this can be done by following these instructions. > > 1. Turn off the unit. > 2. Hold down the Menu and Enter buttons, then press and release the > Power button. > 3. Keep the buttons held down for about 10 seconds > 4. A message will appear, Select to clear all user data > 5. Select yes, and fill in the relevant data. > 6. Now leave the unit in clear view of the sky, outside is better, but a > window sill or glass roofed conservatory will do. > 7. Do not move the unit for 30 minutes, this is to allow it re-register > its data with the satellites. > 8. Then turn it off and on, and it should be working. I tried this but it does not work. When I queried I was told to make sure that the I was pressing the Enter button (the Thumbstick), which of course I was. The unit just starts up as normal after a short delay. If I press the Power button with just the enter button pressed the unit (after a while) goes to what looks like a setup screen but it's not the screen described by tech. support to do a Master Reset. At the moment I'm receiving one email per day from Garmin and have to wait another 24 hours before a response, which is frustrating. Anyone know how to correctly do a Master Reset on an Etrex 30? Thanks Duncan

2450 mAh rechargeable NiMH fully charged before the walk and if I press the light button they show as still fully charged. Interesting, I'm using the exact same batteries (among others) and I've never seen that problem on my Oregon 450. I would've thought that the new eTrexes have at least a very similar (if not the same) compass chip in them. Anyway, unless you carry a magnet somewhere on you, there shouldn't be anything that throws the compass off that much and that often. Maybe somebody else can provide more insight. Problem solved I think. Whilst out I also had a bum-bag around my waist with the compartment towards the front. In that bag I had my phone it's a case and my pda it's case. I use both of these devices for caching and have used them both together since last year. Both cases contain a magnet to hold them closed but neither appears strong enough to affect the other. They are strong enough though to affect the magent inside the Etrex in the tests which I've just done. Thanks for the magnet suggestion

2450 mAh rechargeable NiMH fully charged before the walk and if I press the light button they show as still fully charged.

Whilst on a caching trip over the weekend I was having issues with the compass calibration and was wondering if anyone else has similar problems Over the course of a 15 miles walk looking for 6 caches I had to calibrate the compass over 10 times. I had accidently left the case at home so whilst walking the device was carried in my right trouser pocket. When I first noticed the need to repeatedly calibrate I wondered if it was because my keys (with electronic fob) were stored in the zip pocket behind the GPS. However, the problem continued after I moved the keys to my left side. Is the compass in the Etrex30 so sensitive that it can't be subjected to the movement caused by walking? In some instances it was pointing me in the opposite direction to where I needed to go (which I could confirm on a map). This was happening whether I held the device vertically or horizontally and was incredibly frustrating. Luckily I was out in good visibility. I've contacted technically support asking for a comment but have heard nothing yet. Thanks Duncan

Since updating the firmware to 2.4 I've noticed that the tones are no longer audible. If I go to the Tones screen in Setup it says that Tones are on and that there's a tone assigned to Message Beep and Key Beep. In the Proximity Alarms sub-menu it shows as Tones on with a tone assigned to each alarm. Before the firmware upgrade from 2.3 to 2.4 I was hearing a tone when approaching a cache but I no longer do. I also don't hear a tone when pressing any of the keys. Does anyone else experience this issue? Thanks Duncan

Another report of success with firmware 2.40 from me. I successfully dragged across 3 files (8.4mb, 4.6mb,5.1mb) and the unit loaded them and displayed their contents as expected. I was also able to list them and choose random ones to navigate to. I like the way in which it now displays cache information. I'm away for a few days and hope to give it a thorough testing in the field... Duncan

I generally make some comment in the log but leave it at that. I actually found a cache recently in County Durham where the farmer had build a hole in the wall to specifically hide the cache. This was mentioned in the hint. It's been commented on recently that the guidelines are just that - guidelines and not rules that have to be strictly followed like those laid down by GS. Is this wall guideline an exception that should be treated as a rule?

So it would appear that my apparent success was not that much of a success. Whilst away for 3 days I had to reset the unit on numerous occasions by resorting to removing a battery. On one short walk of 3 miles with 3 caches the GPS froze at least 5 times. This occurred either trying to click 'Go', read a description or read a hint. The problem had occurred the previous day and continued the following day and I had to resort to manually entering waypoints with coordinates read from my phone. This is my first dedicated GPS unit and it's a joke. Below is a response which I got from Garmin reporting the issue on loading files. I've yet to try it but will devote some time to it tomorrow... > Thank you for contacting Garmin Europe. > > I will be happy to assist you with your enquiry. Whilst it appears that some users have reported similar issues, there are no definite faults that we are aware of so it is possible that one of these files included may be corrupted but there are some things you are able to try > > First can you connect the unit to the computer to access mass storage mode, which will allow you to access this on your computer as a separate drive. Please can you access this and enter the Garmin folder, where you will find a folder for GPX. Please can you remove the files from here entirely, then remove the device and allow this to start up fully before reconnecting and trying the download again? Once complete you should be able to load this correctly. > > If this still fails are you able to try other files of this size or load the files manually if containing multiple geocache files as it is possible that part of the data is corrupted in someway

Thanks for the reply. I appear to have had some success last night and today. My Etrex30 now has several GPX files on it and they all load. The largest is 8.3mb and there are others of 5.1mb, 3.4mb and 2.1mb. There are also several less than 2mb. These gpx files are inside the Garmin/GPX folder on the device. Most of them were copied across using Basecamp but the largest 4 were just dragged and dropped in Windows Explorer. The only thing that I can see that I've done that is different from previously is that I installed 3 routes on the device. This was done by importing 3 route gpx files (from a mountain walking website) into Basecamp and them exporting them from basecamp to the device. Since having routes on the device I've been able to export several gpx files of caches. After exporting each file from Basecamp I closed Basecamp and then did a 'Safely remove hardware' in Windows. The export worked every time. With the files that I dragged and dropped I usually did a SRH between each one. In two instance I dragged and dropped 2 files - the time with small files both copied across and worked as expected but the the time with 2 large files the GPS hang as previously. I've been able to copy across over 10 files now with a successful one at over 7mb. It would be interesting to know if creating routes on the device works for others as well. Duncan

The problem is that I'm going away for 3-5 days to 2 different areas and I want some flexibility whilst away to enable do several different walks if I wish. I exported a GPX file for each area but the smallest was over 4mb and the largest approached 9mb (it included area1 and some of the journey between the 2 areas). As far as I can see the only way to take all this data with me would be to split it into <2mb files and have each split file on a different SD card. Am I wrong about this? I find it hard to believe that there's no facility in the software to select the GPX file that gets loaded at startup - it seems like an obvious piece of functionality. So what your saying is that if you have more than 2.1 mb of data on it it won't load at all ? I have loaded several PQ's on to my 20 totaling close to 2500 caches, just in steps. I believe, and I am sure someone will correct me if I am wrong, That GSAK with split the files down to size needed. My 20 claims that it has 1.7 gig of internal storage, plus a 2gig micro sd card. Could you please give me a run-down on how you're loading the PQ's. Are you copying them across using the device just as storage in Windows/MacOS or are you using Basecamp? Are you copying to the device or the card? What names do the files have (possibly not relevant, but just to be clear)? Did you disconnect the GPS from USB and switch on between each file upload? I can't see any option for GSAK to split GPX files (and I have the latest version). I've just done some work in GSAK and I now have 15 separate files which are all less than 2mb. now I just need to work out the steps to put the on the GPS. Thanks for your time and sorry for all the questions Duncan

The problem is that I'm going away for 3-5 days to 2 different areas and I want some flexibility whilst away to enable do several different walks if I wish. I exported a GPX file for each area but the smallest was over 4mb and the largest approached 9mb (it included area1 and some of the journey between the 2 areas). As far as I can see the only way to take all this data with me would be to split it into <2mb files and have each split file on a different SD card. Am I wrong about this? I find it hard to believe that there's no facility in the software to select the GPX file that gets loaded at startup - it seems like an obvious piece of functionality.

Well this if frustrating. I previously had over 2000 caches on my Etrex30 that had been installed using Basecamp. These were working fine. Now I cannot install new caches either through Basecamp or by hand - I tried deleting the Waypoints.gpx file and copying another large one across but it just hangs on the loading screen. If I switch off (by removing a battery - it seems the only way to do it) and connect the USB cable I can look in the AllData folder in Basecamp and it shows all the caches which I copied across. If I copy across a smaller file (2.06mb) then the unit works as I would expect it. I've done the firmware upgrade to the latest version somewhere along the way and it would appear to be the only cause of the problem. There doesn't appear to be a way to download and install the original firmware. I'm about to go on a 3 day trip and a solution would be really useful!

A blog post on Geocaching.com and a link on the Geocaching Facebook page recently highlighted a fun looking cache underground in Prague. Whilst it looks like an adventurous cache to set and to search for surely something similar would never happen in this country if the cache owner had to get permission from the landowner/manager. I can't imagine any authority would ever give permission for people to roam around underground without safety gear, training, risk assessment, insurance etc. I considered setting a cache in a tunnel close to my house (500+m long with a change of level, complete darkness, possible cracks above sewers) but in the end decided against it as I was pretty certain never to have been given permission, cachers would be advised to use gas detectors which few (or more likely none) would have. I did wonder if it was actually too dangerous even for a 5*T (I can't believe the Prague one is only 3.5*T). When I discussed it with a local cacher I found that he'd already thought about it and decided against it for the same reasons. Whilst walking in the Coniston area over the weekend I noticed at least one cache that involved going into old mine workings and I'm aware of some (in Cornwall I think) that do the same. Were these set up before land owner permission was required or is that 'Fundamental Placement Guidelines' (see point 2) generally ignored - I'm assuming that the land owner doesn't know about them but perhaps they do?

I too have a Samsung Galaxy Apollo and gave up trying to use the internal GPS as it was too slow and often inaccurate. Instead I bought this external bluetooth GPS receiver It's much faster to get a lock (especially if you use the software to keep it up to date with satellite positions) and usually pretty accurate even under lots of tree cover. It has great battery life and saves the phone battery. You'll need the app mentioned by DrDick&Vick or a similar one (I think there are others).

Congrats to me on my 1000th find last week. Took a while deciding which one it should be and then had a few weeks without caching to make sure it was this one - Britain's Highest Geocache on top of Ben Nevis. Awful conditions with strong wind and almost horizontal rain but a straightforward walk up the easiest route (due to the wind ). Even managed some CITO with all rucksack pockets filled and more in the waterproof. Very memorable

Apologies if this is the wrong section... Whilst out yesterday on a 100 cache circuit I was happily using the official app on my Android phone and logging as I went along (with more than just basic TFTC logs) when the app stopped giving me the option to create anything other than create logs of type 'Write Note'. This occurred when I was on cache 29 and continued up to cache 70 where I gave up because it was dark. There was one exception when I was allowed to create a found log. I submitted the finds as I went but kept the notes just on the phone. All the time I was able to get a good enough signal to download nearby caches as I went. Can anyone suggest what happened? I'm now at home and wondering how best to submit all the notes as finds... Thanks Duncan

Two photos from the same trip as I can't decide between the 2. Last Thursday we decided to tackle Hestan Island Hop and had a fantastic time. Getting to the headland was an enjoyable walk through some old woods followed by a walk along the sand. Once there we had to remove walking boots and wade across to the start of the causeway. We had timed the trip for low tide so it was less than 30cm deep. Worried about the incoming tide we rushed our time on the island which was a shame as we only managed to visit the cache location. The cache has only been found 13 times since 2005 and is now my favourite Duncan

I've replied in the support forum, but will post again here. My install was working fine but has started exhibitting the same problem (possibly following an attempt to abort an import). I've found that if I set the app to have it's database location on the phone rather than the sd card the offline lists work. Is there anyway in the app to clear an offline list? I've just discovered a way to apparently fix the problem. Here's what I did... 1)kill the geocaching app, 2)go in to a file manager (I use ES File Explorer by EStrongs), 3)go to the geocaching folder on the sdcard - for me this is /sdcard/Geocaching 4)remove any .db file(s) - for me there were 2, one called 'long string of hexidecimal'.db and 'same long string of hex'.db-journal. I moved these 2 files into a new folder called 'old', just in case... 5)run the app and import a gps file from sd - this should create a new .db file with the same name as before. Try using the offlinf list and hopefully everything should work. It now does for me. I have a rooted phone with FROYO (but I don't know if this makes a difference, I doubt it) Good luck, Duncan

There's a macro at http://gsak.net/board/index.php?showtopic=2450&view=findpost&p=14459 which works out what it thinks are archived caches, then opens the url for each one in a window and asks you to confirm if it truly archived. It works well but takes a while.