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pppingme

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Posts posted by pppingme

  1. The Colorado is supported in the latest firmware update, but according to this early review of Chirp, the eTrex line isn't even mentioned.

    The eTrex units don't have the hardware to support the ANT protocol, so they can never be supported directly.

     

    I guess in theory, an ANT dongle could be built that plugs into the eTrex, but I doubt that would ever happen.

  2. You'll find that the accuracy and battery life of the eTrex is way better than your phone. The only thing that is meant by someone saying that its not geocaching friendly is that it doesn't have the memory to store descriptions and logs so you can read them on the unit. All of the eTrex's are very good units and any of the "H" units work better than the non-H units, especially under tree cover, etc.

     

    This is a very good unit for geocaching for the price, if you don't mind not having the descriptions on the unit.

  3. Shoot an email to Groundspeak with the first log info. They will restore it and lock it so the CO can't delete it again.

     

    As far as the coords being so bad, your probably not the first to complain, and I doubt you're the first to have logs deleted based on what you're saying.

  4. The bad part is (at least last time I looked), Groundspeak pulled the data 10 years ago, and does nothing to keep it updated. Many times I've found much more current info (updated descriptions, confirmation of marks that have been destroyed, even though Groundspeak doesn't reflect that, etc) on the .gov site. I think most people, including geocachers, who go after benchmarks are not using groundspeaks data. Since its not maintained, its simply a starting point for newbies that don't know better.

  5. Is it possible he just logged the wrong cache? It does happen, some people don't keep that good of notes, and when they get home, they just eyeball it on the maps or page through the list of caches and pick one with a similar name.

  6. I agree with most of what you said, but...

     

    Food containers as caches, 99% of the time FULL of holes, cracks, and water with a soaked log in a zip lock bag full of pen holes.

    My favorite containers are usually ammo cans, they just seal tight and are always dry, but a lot of parks, etc. have an issue with this one.

     

    I have seen a lot of cheapo throw-away containers that are only designed to be used a couple times then thrown away, these are bad, lock-and-locks are probably one of the better choices.

     

    For areas that have rules on container type, they typically require a clear container so the contents can be seen before opening.

  7. Lets face it. The monopoly won't last forever, its clear that GS is fearing that now (yeah, I know, separate discussion).

     

    So, that raises questions...

     

    How pissed will you be when a yearly membership drops from $30 to $12/year. Would you want your "lifetime membership" to be prorated?

     

    How will you feel when GS is no longer the largest site out there? Would you expect a refund?

     

    What will your reaction be if GS drops geocaching, in favor of Waymarking, Wherigo, or what ever other concepts they think people want? Remember, your "membership" includes all of GS's sites, not just geocaching.

    There isn't anything out there now that threatens the dominance of GS. Nothing is even any where on the horizon. And I don't see anything that shows GS is fearing the end is near.

     

    I can't honestly believe that GS feels threatened from a bunch of people that think they have been persecuted by GS and their forum members.

    Apparently you've never heard of Garmin.

  8. what does scuba have to do with numbers runs?

    Its an attribute that has almost zero chance of showing up in those areas. Since there is no power-trail attribute, despite many people requesting it.

     

    If you want to find true scuba caches, you're probably safe to filter on this attribute and a diff or terr level of >2 or >3. Power trails generally have d/t ratings of <2.

  9. There isn't anything out there now that threatens the dominance of GS. Nothing is even any where on the horizon. And I don't see anything that shows GS is fearing the end is near.

    You haven't noticed the long list of improvements or promises in the past couple months? Such as the promise of an API that for years they have stated that they will never open up except to "trusted partners"? That comes from fear of loosing customers. GS isn't all of a sudden getting more friendly on their own, outside factors are driving that.

     

    If you aren't seeing this, then you have to be as blind as GS has been for 10 years.

    So the API is the sole justification of GS is fearing for its existence? So the closest listing service is at least 1.2 million listings away from GS and GS just wet their pants with fear? If anything it is smartphone apps that scrape the site that they want to eliminate and the best way to do that at this time is release an API so the access is better controlled and less of a server impact. Other things they are doing I feel are somewhat driven by the feedback site. There are more participating over there and voting over there than the ones wildly speculating over here.

     

    Edit: And it may well be that certain contractual limitations expired and were not renewed, or there is a different way of implementing an API that does not impinge on existing contractual agreements.

    API, favorites, maps, virtuals, and I'm sure I could mention many more.

     

    As far as an API being under contractual limitations? Its GS's product, not a 3rd party, so not even likely. GS isn't going to develop something then cut their own throat in the ways they can use it.

     

    You seem to think that GS is too big to fail, its that exact attitude that causes failures. GS has figured it out, or you wouldn't have seen so many developments or promises in the very recent past. NONE of these issues were even a consideration, until someone else came along and showed how easy it was, or showed that the customers do indeed want them, now for the first time, GS is under pressure to develop these enhancements, and they know if they don't, customers go bye-bye.

  10. There isn't anything out there now that threatens the dominance of GS. Nothing is even any where on the horizon. And I don't see anything that shows GS is fearing the end is near.

    You haven't noticed the long list of improvements or promises in the past couple months? Such as the promise of an API that for years they have stated that they will never open up except to "trusted partners"? That comes from fear of loosing customers. GS isn't all of a sudden getting more friendly on their own, outside factors are driving that.

     

    If you aren't seeing this, then you have to be as blind as GS has been for 10 years.

  11. Lets face it. The monopoly won't last forever, its clear that GS is fearing that now (yeah, I know, separate discussion).

     

    So, that raises questions...

     

    How pissed will you be when a yearly membership drops from $30 to $12/year. Would you want your "lifetime membership" to be prorated?

     

    How will you feel when GS is no longer the largest site out there? Would you expect a refund?

     

    What will your reaction be if GS drops geocaching, in favor of Waymarking, Wherigo, or what ever other concepts they think people want? Remember, your "membership" includes all of GS's sites, not just geocaching.

  12. Finally, I was told that the 62s has a stronger antenna. We live in a rural area and do a lot of camping/hiking, plus when we’re in Puerto Rico there are some out of the way caches. I don’t know how significant the strength difference is, however.

    Since no one said anything about this, here's some thoughts...

     

    Nothing on the ground has anything to do with receiving gps signals. The signals come from space, thousands of miles away, being urban vs rural will make no difference.

     

    Actually, I should say its even just the opposite of what you are thinking, in the city, you have taller buildings and such that can interfere with the signals, in rural areas, you generally have a pretty good view of the sky, so a better view of the satellites, overall, you'll probably have an edge in rural areas in terms of reception.

     

    The 62 has whats called a "quad helix" antenna, where the Oregon has a "patch" antenna. In theory, the quad helix will always do better, but chipset and other things can factor in.

     

    I've seen several people that believe that the Oregon will outperform a 60 (which goes against this statement), but the general reason is because it has a much newer and higher tech chipset. I don't know if I've seen any comparisons of a 62 vs an Oregon, but I would think the 62 would have at least a slight edge. Before the recent set of new handhelds (like the Oregons, or even the etrex "h" models), the 60 was considered the king of reception. The 62 and 60 have essentially the same antenna, but (the 62 has) a much newer chipset.

  13. Actually there is one very good reason. Groundspeak doesn't want to be automatically and repeatedly generating PQs for people who are no longer using them. When they just blindly email the PQ to you, they have no idea if you actually used the file, or if it sat in your inbox for eternity, or was summarily deleted. By making you click a link to get it, they can be reasonably content in knowing that you are using the file, and the CPU cycles used to create the file, and the bandwidth used to send the file, were not wasted.

    That doesn't matter, we PAY for PQ's, it doesn't really matter if we use them or not, that's not the issue.

     

    If I go to the gas station and I PAY for 5 gallons of gas, but I only use 4, does that mean they don't have to give me the 5th gallon? Its the exact same thing, you should get what you PAY for.

  14. 3-If I'm understanding you, there is no current way to do this, but it has been suggested to Garmin multiple times. I'm not sure how you're doing this on a legend?

    Too bad Garmin won't do something about this--it would be a nice feature. And, you are right that it can't be done on the Legend. It would seem to be an software change on the 20.

    I keep thinking about this, and don't see how it would even be possible. There is no marker in a .gpx file to indicate DNF status, how would the unit know when a cache is DNF? If you're thinking because you've done a dnf log on the unit, you should be clearing those out every night (or how ever often you upload your logs to gc.com), leaving old field notes on your unit is just asking for trouble. I'm not sure I see an easy technical fix, so no software change possible, without going to some overly complex way of tracking them outside of whats in the .gpx and field notes, something that I doubt most users would wan, when users clear .gpx files and field notes, they expect a clear unit, adding more complex ways of tracking DNF status to the unit will just cause confusion.

     

    If you really want to see DNF status, the easiest way may be to use GSAK and add DNF to the title of the cache, or something along those lines.

  15. One thing should also be noted, we do not PAY for the benefits, there kinda gravy for the money we give to support the site.

    This is an attitude I don't get or understand.

     

    If this were a hobby site, sure that would be a nice attitude, but its not, its clearly a for profit company that generating revenues in the range of over 3 million per year and claims to have 40 employees.

  16. 1-The gps is treaded as a mass storage device (no different than a usb key or something), there's a folder called Garmin, under that is a file called startup.txt, there is a limit to the number of characters, but I don't recall what it is, should be easy to google.

     

    2-Thats one of the differences between "waypoints" and "caches", you can still manually create and delete waypoints on the dakota. Since you can't manually create caches, you have to hook it to the computer anyway to load new caches, thats the perfect time to delete the old caches. I personally just reuse the same file name every time I load it, so old caches on the unit are never a problem.

     

    3-If I'm understanding you, there is no current way to do this, but it has been suggested to Garmin multiple times. I'm not sure how you're doing this on a legend?

     

    4-You can adjust the screen timeout, I don't have my unit in front of me so I'm not recalling where to adjust it, but it is possible.

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