Manatee87

I tried a few of my unit serial numbers, and also found that only the nuvis were covered. I sent an e-mail to Garmin customer service and was surprised when they replied that there will be more units included. Here is the reply I got: "The NuMaps are not only compatible with just the Nuvi. Come January 22nd more information will be on the website as to which units are compatible. As of right now what I am able to tell you is that any handheld unit that has the full version City Navigator NT installed on them are compatible with the Numaps. Some restrictions apply, for example the Nuvi 500 is not compatible. However more information will be set on our website come the 22nd of this month." Ok, so what does that mean? I presume it means if you've purchased the full product, and the subscription can be linked to a unit serial number that already has the full product associated with it, then the subscription can be used to update that unit. Again, I presume. I have the full version of City Navigator NT (NA and/or Europe) installed on my Oregon 400t, my Colorado 400t, my 60CSx, and my Edge 705. I would like to get the subscription for the Oregon and the Edge, since these are the ones I use all the time. In some cases I'm using CN downloaded onto my own memory card from a DVD, and in others I'm using the Garmin SD/microSD. I hope the subscription can apply to either. As for why it would not apply to particular models, I don't understand. I guess we'll see next week.

I've always gotten a response from them in about one day. This is on technical and feature questions. The response time may depend on the type of inquiry. Just guessing on that. If it's been 14 days, I'd re-send it. I know they have never kept me waiting anywhere near that long. Maybe it just didn't get to their inbox.

Not bad. You can pick one up for $5K. I was about to click and add it to my cart when I saw... it only supports USB 1.1. That's a deal breaker for me. I see you can also rent one for $950/month.

Does anyone make "professional-grade" hand-held mapping units that (perhaps) _do_ cost thousands of dollars -- and are incrementally more accurate? Or does that sort of hardware only appear in big, bulky units? I've never looked at the GPSr market beyond Garmin/Magellan/Delorme hand-helds.

True, the accuracy of the map is also important, so for the sake of this discussion I'll say let's forget the map. I'm interested in how accurately the unit can possibly mark the real-world path that my feet took -- even if the map shows me walking down the middle of the river.

With the interesting comparisons of different Garmin units -- Colorado vs 60CSx, Oregon vs Colorado, etc., I was wondering if anyone here knows GPS receiver chips well enough to say how much of the differences are due to different hardware, and how much is due to the software that does the calculations? Different units use chips made by different manufacturers. Are certain ones known (quantitatively, not anecdotally) to be more accurate and more reliable than others? Are the chip sets in Garmins newer units unable to create as accurate a track as the older ones, regardless of what Garmin does with the data it gets from those chip sets? Should they (or any other maker) be able to get significantly better accuracy by improving the algorithms in their software? Or have they gotten it "as good as it gets"? I realize the software can only interpolate/extrapolate so much from the data that comes off the sensor, so what I'm really thinkig is, can we expect a more accurate track from the existing chip sets in the future, or are we getting everything we can from this hardware? BTW, what I mean by "accuracy" is, how precisely it puts data points to exactly where I am on a path. That is, if I'm walking at the top of a 300m cliff, and it shows my track at the bottom of the 300m cliff (or on the other side of a river, etc.), then that's not very good. Thanks for any education.

I heard rumors that an upcoming model will record your "state of mind" with each data point in the track log.

My Oregon did well under heavy cover this weekend. I was following a stream bed under heavy canopy and there were no gaps in the track or significant detours from the expected track. I did not have another unit with me to compare, but I was very satisfied with the performance of the Oregon. I was in an area where my old Vista Cx would sometimes lose the signal. When I upgraded to a HCx the performance was dramatically better. All the units I've had with high-sensitivity receivers have performed consistantly well under heavy tree cover, whether they had a patch or quad helix antenna.

Maybe they had shades strategically placed to get that shot, but I think it's more likely manipulated with software. In direct sun, on the Oregon you see the cloudy gray film of the touch screen layer over the LCD screen. Now that I think of it, maybe they removed the touch-screen layer to take that photo. (Not user removable!!!) In any case, that "photo" is not an accurate representation of the Oregon's screen in bright sunlight. It's plenty usable if you shade it with your cupped hand, but there's definitely a tradeoff in visibility for both the high-resolution (less reflective pixels) screen and the touch-screen overlay (less light reaches the screen, and reflected light gets "trapped" between the layers).

I have both, and the most important difference to me is that the HCx holds the signal _much_ better under tree cover.

So I got the Oregon 400t today... I really wanted the touch screen -- mostly for easy text entry. What held me back at first was Scott's report on the brightness/visibility of the screen without backlight. Then I got interested in the upcoming nuvi 500, but I realize that with the nuvi the need for backlight is a sure thing. I use a nuvi in my car, and would never consider using it without the backlight. So... I decided I'd rather have all the features of the Oregon over the simpler nuvi 500, and I would just treat it as if the backlight is always needed. Now some comments after using it a couple of hours. General feel: I like the feeling of the unit in my hand. It's all plastic, but it feels hefty and sturdy. The back comes right off to get to the batteries. Much easier than the CO. I like the lanyard attachment on the bottom, and put a strap on it right away. The OR is a good fit in my pocket, where it will live most of the time. I put one of my microSD copies of City Nav NA in it. It was easy to install the card under the batteries. The clip that locks down the card doesn't cover much, so you'll have to be careful when changing batteries out in the snow. Backlight: The screen is almost invisible without the backlight. In fact, I was playing with it indoors and with the terrain turned on the screen is so dark that I didn't realize the Oregon was on. The screen looked _almost_ like it does when shut off. I'm keeping the backlight set to stay on 1 minute. This is so I can navigate without constantly having to touch the screen to turn on the backlight. Touch-screen: I love it! It's like being let out of jail compared to the Colorado, and even my beloved 60CSx. It works very well. The interface feels complicated because it's so easy to get around that I tend to do more messing with the settings than I would ever do with the CO. I finally set up by different profiles with the settings I like, and now I don't have to touch the settings much. Panning on the screen is slow (mostly the re-drawing), but it's smooth and predictable. I'm very happy with the performance. One thing I'd been concerned about was the precision of setting a waypoint with the fingertip. But I just zoom way in and I get the spot as close as I'd get it with the other models I own. The touch screen is great! GPS Performance: It starts up faster than the CO. It gets a fix quickly, but I found it took longer than the CO to get the precision down to its best. As others have said, it shows accuracy to be about a little less than the CO. In my back yard the OR got to 22 ft, while the CO got to 18 ft. Not a big deal. I walked around a while and didn't see any notable drift. It tracked about as well as my 60CSx, and better than the CO. This was just a brief test though, under open sky. I'm looking forward to doing comparison tests in the woods. I haven't had time to play with most of the features that are important to me: Tracks, altitude measurement, and stuff like that. I don't know about the battery life yet. Considering the amount of time I need backlight (max brightness is generally needed), I'll be happy to get 8 hours on a pair of 2500 mAh batteries. (Need to get some 2700s, but I have so many older ones in the rotation already.) Initial Conclusion: Accepting the need for full-time backlight, I like it better than the Colorado. The biggie is the touch screen. Only time will tell whether it will overtake my 60CSx as my "usual suspect" when grabbing a GPSr. Whatever I end up using most, when I'm out in the wild (relatively speaking), I'll continue to carry my Vista HCx as backup, with it's great battery life and small size.

Thanks for all the great work, Scott. I was just looking at the three units together, and we need to get some Garmin designers and engineers to do the same. The benefit of the black numbers on white background speaks for itself. The other two looks like fashion statements in comparison. As for turning off the shading, I do that with my Colorado -- but then I lose a lot of the benefit that it offers over the 60CSx. And in fact, I find myself using the 60CSx more and more since I've gotten over the novelty of the Colorado and its hi-res screen. They need to figure out how to get the same usability of the old units with the 3-D graphics of the new units. If it takes a bigger battery pack, I could live with that. So far, the one thing I really like about the Oregon is the text entry. It looks great. I like the size of the unit, but I wouldn't trade any satellite reception in exchange for it. The ultimate question/test for a GPSr for me is: If I regain consciousness somewhere in the wilderness in the middle of the night, and need to get to safety, which model do I want to have with me? Anyway, I'm looking forward to more reporting on the Oregon and comparisons with the older models.

Yes, Garmin has an update for the Oregon, available via WebUpdater. http://www8.garmin.com/support/download_details.jsp?id=4051 Take that, everyone (like me) who's waiting for fixes/features to the Colorado. And for those of you having trouble with the AC in your 2007 Golf, VW has a fix -- for the 2010 model.

Due to Garmin/Navteq's licensing, you should always buy the product "bare" and buy the map sets separately -- on DVD, unless you already have another copy of the same map set on DVD. It puzzles me why they sell the products on DVD with the right to use them on the computer and on one GPS device, but when you get them in another form (on a device, on SD/microSD card) the license only allows use on the device. Using Mapsource to create/view routes and tracks is part of the way Garmin's GPS products are used. Without being able to use the maps in Mapsource, it's like you're only getting half the benefit of the product. You can only associate the map set with one device per license anyway, to it's not like you can load the maps onto other GPS devices if they let you use them in Mapsource. I just don't get it. So don't buy the bundle. Buy the maps on DVD separately. Garmin should really make a greater effort to make that clear to customers.

Ok, you got it. I do like yours the best. It's pretty tight between you and that Lambo-beaver.

Will your icon get me there faster? I'll head over to garmin.com and check it out. -Peter

The resources that Scott has documented so well are a tremendous resource to anyone interested in (or already owning) the Colorado. He has made it easy to understand all the issues, and easy to find specific information about the product. His organization of all the input from this forum has made it clear for us, and for Garmin, what the Colorado does do and what it does not do. His clear comparison of Colorado and 60CSx features makes it obvious to all (again, including Garmin) that Garmin falls way short in their own on-line comparison of the two products. Thanks to Scott for establishing a baseline of exactly what the Colorado does, and how it compares to another product in Garmin's line. He has put a lot of time and top-quality work into this resource.

I use my GPS units mostly for wilderness navigation, and bicycling. I'm only an occasional geocacher, but it is nice to be able to keep the details of a bunch of nearby caches in the device in case I want to look for one.

It just failed for me. I got through the entire process of selecting and entering, but when I clicked to send it, I got an error message saying the system is not working now. (Or something like that.) I've learned to always Ctrl-A my text and save it somewhere before I click "Send" on their contact form.

There is no telling which features Garmin will "backfill" into the Colorado. We have to wait and see. From a recent Garmin blog entry, dated April 14: "Before the Colorado 400t came on the scene, the GPSMAP 60CSx set the standard for excellence in outdoor handhelds." (http://garmin.blogs.com/) Does this mean they consider the Colorado 400t to be the new "standard" for outdoor handhelds? Or did the marketing people write this, and the engineers are rolling their eyes? Who knows. I like the feel of the Colorado. I like the screen resolution (but not the color choices). So far I've been frustrated by the text entry method. There are a lot of tracking, waypoint, navigation-related features that weren't carried over from the GPSMAP 60CSx. I'm truly puzzled as to way they didn't carry over essentially _all_ the features into the new model. It's only software. The Coloardo is not incapable of performing all those functions. Like others here, I'm still carrying my 60CSx in the field when I need to rely on the best set of navigation features. (Yes, I carry a map set and compass too!) I hope Garmin will "grow" the Colorado into at least the equivalent of the 60CSx. It's just a matter of when.

Great news! They got one that was on my personal wants list: Repositioning a waypoint. Still waiting for the "Top 2" on my list: 1. Display the name of the upcoming cross street on the map page (my #1 "want" by far -- for bicycle use) 2. Show multiple tracks on the map page at the same time (in different colors) These are both features I use all the time on my 60CSx and Vista HCx, and I also appreciate having the upcoming cross streets displayed on my Nuvi. (in my car, of course)

You could use a screen capture utility, save it in a graphic format like .jpg, and print it. Not ideal, but usable.

Yes, if you purchase on DVD and download maps to the GPS unit, you get twice the utility of the version on SD. With the DVD version you can use it in Mapsource and do all sorts of useful things. But then what would you expect from the company that sells you a license that you can't move over to a new one of their own GPS units if you decide to replace your old one. It's no wonder that there's an active trade in "cracked" Garmin map products. I don't know if that's due to their oppressive licensing contracts or just the usual people who steal everything.

Cuba forbids you to bring GPS receivers into the country (and toasters too), so I guess *they* aren't jamming it. If they were, it wouldn't make any difference it you had a receiver. I wonder why *we* would want to black GPS around there. To send the rafters astray? These days Cuba has about as much military clout as the Grand Dutchy of Fenwick.

Are you saying that you got no bars at all on the satellite page? How long was it before you did get reception again, and how far were you from the point where you lost reception? Did reception return gradually, or suddenly? I'm not certain, but it sounds like Dr. No and his giant ray gun.