Wildman63

I'm close to buying a new car (Honda Civic). I'd love to have a more sophisticated GPS than my Map 60CS. It works fine, but the voice stuff is really intriguing. The new Honda Civic offers an integrated GPS that also lets the driver control the stereo, but the car also has buttons on the steering wheel that do the same thing. Honda adds Bluetooth and a couple of other features. The navigation system costs about $1500 and a car so equipped is very hard to find. Tomtom just introduced a new model (Go 910) that does most of the same features for half the price. The Tomtom also lets the user to update the GPS with a home computer and has a 20GB hard drive inside. It also has Bluetooth, but needs to be recharged with an included cable to do that. The downside is that the thing is easy to take from the car (stolen). The upside is it can be removed from the car to be used in another car (my other vehicle). The Tomtom solution costs half as much as the Honda solution. The touch screen is 4" while the Honda screen is 6". Any opinions?

I never see the "D's" where I live, but had six or seven showing on a recent trip to the Olympic Peninsula, along the west coast. It seems the situation is strongly dependent on your location. Around here (no "D's") my Map60CS shows +/- 20 ft... on the OP (with lots of "D's) the error showed +/- 12 ft.

I was on a spacecraft (Skylab) recovery on a Navy ship in the mid-70's. NASA temporarily installed two GPS receivers and antennas on the ship. The receiver boxes were each about the size of a small refrigerator (the kind seen in home wet bars). They claimed accuracy on the order of 50 feet. Two receivers were installed for reliability. No telling how much they cost.

Just returned from a three day trip with my new GPSr. I live on Whidbey Island, WA and have owned this device since Christmas. We drove about 500 miles around the Olympic Peninsula in western Washington State. I pre-loaded City Select 7.0 maps and several way-points, based on street addresses and one received from an e-mail from the National Park Service (Hoh River Rain Forest visitors' center). The little guy performed nicely with the exception of twice when it tried to route me along a logging road off the highway. The main highway was really a winding two laner and the logging road might have been shorter, mile-wise, but it was a dirt path. Recalculation took a couple of seconds when I opted to stay on the hardtop road. I saw the WAAS "D" notation on about six satellites of about eight displayed... first time I have ever seen the "D" so far. This was through the windshield without an external antenna. Error displayed was +/- 8 ft, best I've yet seen. This was along highway 101 along the Pacific south of Forks, WA. No WAAS correction is available on this side of Puget Sound, at least I've haven't seen it around here. My first experience with GPS was during a spacecraft recovery (Skylab) in about 1975. NASA loaded two receivers aboard the ship on which I served at the time. Each receiver was the size of a small apartment refrigerator. We alternated useage to assure one of the devices would work when we really needed it. The leap in technology is amazing... especially for an old guy like me :-).

I had the same problem. The first time I called Garmin tech support, the guy told me to order the right update, then hung up... it was, after all, quitting time at Garmin. I sent a couple of e-mails. The next morning I contacted a wonderful help guy. He walked me through deleting some registry entries and re-installing CS-6. Within a day or two I received two copies of the version 7 software by mail. It installed as advertised. Like anybody's tech support, it's only as good as the person you talk to. The sour taste in my mouth went away after the second try. Call them early in the day and SMILE when you talk to them...

I just upgraded from City Select 6.0 to 7.0. In the older version, the background color of saved map sections showed as a pink color. In version 7.0, they aren't pink once the maps are saved. The pink color makes it easy to see the extent of the saved map section. Is there a way to make Version 7.0's maps show as pink?

The last (hopefully) word on this subject: I ended up with an unuseable CS 6 and the beginning of an ulcer. I wrote an e-mail to Garmin and was told CS 7 was being shipped. Early this morning I called Garmin Tech Support in an attempt to get CS 6 running. I was getting a MapSource Registry error. A Garmin representative named Joe, helped me uninstall all the files and, using RegEdit, got the map back up. He was exceptionally patient and professional. He couldn't understand why the wrong upgrade had been sent. He also promised a CS 7 upgrade. Problem solved.

I receved new GPSmap 60CS and City Select 6.0 for Christmas. Garmin promised a free upgrade to Version 7.0. I ordered it and received, guess what... City Navigator (upgrade version 7.0) arrived. I tried upgrading CS6 to CN7 and it didn't work. After hanging on hold for an hour and a half, the tech support guy told me to order CS7 upgrade on their web site. It ain't an option. Worse yet, he hung up on me at closing time (5:00PM CT). I have sent three e-mails to Garmin (two to Tech Support) and one to Sales. Honestly, I didn't notice they had sent the wrong software till after I had spent an hour trying to get this thing to work. Garmin needs to send me the right upgrade City Select software or a stand-alone City Navigator 7.0. Any suggestions as to how I can get this thing unscrewed? Maybe some magic e-mail address or phone number...

Since it's a new year, I've resolved to ramp up my exercise plan. In addition to the exercycle drill that has been going on for a couple of years, I've adopted a thrice weekly walk. The GPS is remarkable... I walked 3.12 miles at an average speed of 3.1 MPH with two seconds at zero speed. The whole trip took an hour and two seconds. The GPS showed an accuracy of 20 feet or so. Amazing. I think this device, coupled with a heart rate monitor, would be a great aid to walkers/runners. I'm the last thing from an exercise freak. I'm a 65 year old diabetic and bet this thing will help me do better on my exercise regime. Who knows, Garmin might help me live longer

Try http/WWW.WAHOO.COM. The site has tons of waypoints from all around the USA. Copy and paste into EasyGPS then load them into your GPS...

I guess it depends on how you plan to use your unit. I have a new Map60CS and can load all the maps from British Columbia to Northern California. I usually stick pretty close to home. If you regularly drive long distances, you might want to wait for a model with more memory capability. I have saved a couple of map areas, so when I fly to the East Coast I can load those that cover the area where I'll travel. One goes from north of DC to south of Richmond and out to West Virginia. Having said this, I think it's a shame Garmin hasn't put a Gigabyte or two of memory in their devices. Memory is pretty inexpensive now. It would be nice to buy a GPSr that would route me around anywhere in North America with pre-loaded maps.

Reading this thread, I thought "Oh no... I have a brand new un-opened 60CS in a box from wife-claus in a not-so-secret cache in a closet. Reading further, I've found that the "X" models aren't really ready yet. I have been chasing technology for years. My Canon EOS-20D digital camera will be replaced in a few months by something even better. When the new model arrives, I'll still get great pictures out of what I have. After looking at what my son's Map60 (oh, no! grayscale) can do with 28 MB of memory, I figger the 56MB of memory in the 60CS will do fine for me. At my age, I have to stop chasing technology I can never catch and take advantage of what's available. I rarely drive more than 200 miles away from home... an advantage you younger whippersnappers might not enjoy.

Nikon's new DSLR has a port that (when attached by a cable to your GPS) writes lat/long information to the EXIF data for the picture. There are ways to do this with software if you sync the camera's clock setting to your GPS. Snap the picture and press the mark button. The software re-writes the EXIF data to include the lat/long. Snoop around and you should be able to find a couple of applications that will do this for you.

Interestly enough, Navy airplanes and helicopters use magnetic headings and bearings, while ships use true. This might look like a source of confusion, but it doesn't... it has been overcome by training. The reason airplanes use magnetic North as a reference is based on the magnetic standby compasses used to back up the primary gyro compasses.

Shipdog.com has it for $369 including ground shipping. I'll be ordering one from them.