n003lb

What is "near-SiRF" reception? This is a new term for me.

This might be because satallite signals bounce off of a vehicle's body more easily than off the ground or a tree. Theoretically, this would cause the GPS to think the satallite is comming from another direction. I don't really know exactly how these work, so I may be way off here. Powerlines might be part of the problem. There is a set of cross country high voltage lines that run within a quater mile of the house. I suppose they might be causing some of the problems. So far, the farthest I have traveled with the unit has been 140 miles last weekend when my brother (another one) and I went to Ottawa to get a pickup. I turned the unit on here and left it on almost the entire distance. Other than that, it has traveled no more than 50 miles from where I initialized it. I noticed also, it takes a lot longer to connect when in a moving vehicle. I would assume this is because it is having to update it's position while trying to connect to the satallites. Also, I just remembered when we took it to Ottawa, it connected a lot faster up there, when we were stopped. Maybe it's just something about my parents' place. Maybe there is some kind of magnetic interference there or something.

I'm another noobi. Just started caching last week. Live in Burrton, smack between Hutch and Newton on Hwy 50, northwest of Wichita about 25 miles. So far, most of my caching has been around northeast Wichita, since that's where the rest of my family lives.

I am researching this for my mother. She wants to get a basic, simple GPS unit for a cheap price locally. I have found Wal-Mart carries both the basic eTrex and the Explorist 100 for $100 each. In the past, I've always thought of Garmin as the brand for GPS. I never gave Magellan much thought. I use a Magellan Meridian Gold and I like it, but it's too much money for her. I have heard some bad things about Garmin units being inaccurate. Is this true? Will there be any noticable difference in the accuracy between these?

Yep, I just looked at ARRL. Looks like it won't be too hard to get the license. Only problem is the radio looks like it'll be a pretty penny. May have to wait until I have a bigger budget.

OK, something strange must have been happening. Do local radio wave or something else interfere with the GPS signals? I just tried it out again and it locks on much faster at my house. 5 tries, and all of them in less then a minute. When I do this at my parent's house, or somewhere in Wichita (where I'm caching right now), it takes a lot longer, though still not as long as those times I got before. I don't have any experience with any other GPS units right now. 2 of my brothers have them, and that's all of the experience I have had with them. One brother bought the Meridian Color about a week before I got my Gold, and the other has been caching with a Garmin IQUE PDA for almost 2 years now. Unfortunatly, I have never had a chance to use his for anything.

OK, I know this doesn't really work for hiking, but what about CBs. My truck has the mountings for a CB radio, and I plan on installing a new one as soon as I can justify it. Does anyone out there use CBs? It may not be helpful for a rescue in the middle of the woods, but it sure would be nice if I get my truck stuck somewhere. Of course, this is all probably moot for me, since I will probably not be caching anywhere out of my cell range for a while. Not many mountains around Wichita, lol. I've always wanted a HAM license. I may look into that option. This might finally give me the reason to get it.

THanks for those links. I'll check them out. Is there any basic requirements for the Palm unit? My mom has a Palm unit, I think it's called a Palm III, but I'm not sure without looking at it again. I haven't done much research into Palms for about 3 years, so I don't remember the names real well. If this is a Palm III, would it work? It is a color model, and has an SD Card slot. BTW, my user name is n003lb, as in: NOVEMBER-ZERO-ZERO-THREE-LIMA-BRAVO It's a registration number for an aircraft for those of you non-aviation nuts out there. Most people think it's some variation of "noobi", but it isn't.

One last question. Is there an external antenna available that will work with the Meridian Gold? I found one from Magellan, but they only list it for the Color. I thought these were identical except for the display. Problem is my truck, being an older truck with lots of heavy steel everywhere, is playing havoc with my reception. I don't like the idea of sticking an ugly black piece of plastic to it, but I figure I can mount it toward the rear and conceal it somewhat in the roof strobes, when I get them installed. I guess if they don't make one, I'll just live with what I have. I was a little off in my last post. It usually takes the unit between 1 and 4 minutes to connect. I guess it just feels longer when I'm waiting on it. I decided to time it a few times. The 5 times I got were: 1:21 1:00 :58 3:12 3:59 Does this seem normal?

I don't know why, but at times, mine takes as much as 5-8 minutes. I'd say maybe 70% of the time, it's done in about a minute, maybe a little longer. It usually doesn't bother me much, as I just make sure to turn the unit on a few minutes before I need it. If I have to turn it off before I get out of the truck, then wait for it to reconnect, then it would be pretty annoying.

Interesting. Mine always seems to default the backlight OFF. Of course, I haven't used the car adaptor yet. The power point in my truck does not work right now. Hopefully, I'll remedy that tomorrow. Thanks for the info.

I am new to GPS; My Meridian is my first venture into this field of technology. As such, I'm a little leary about trying something that may or may not harm it. When I bought it, the first one turned out to be defective and I had to get another. I really love geocaching, so I would prefer not to do anything to damage this one. What I am curious about is if it is safe to disconnect the car power adaptor with the unit on? The manual says not to do this, but does that mean if I am using it in the truck, I have to shut off the GPS before I tuirn off the ignition? Seems like an awful waste of time, considering how long it takes the GPS to get a fix again when I turn it back on. I would much rather simply turn off the truck and unclip the Meridian from it's bracket and go. I am asking this because I am afraid to just try it. When the first one I got failed, it did so immedatly after I took the batteries out without turning it off. I later discovered the problem was a broken battery clip, but it kinda burned into my memory that it happened when I did that. I just want to be safe this time. I doubt I could get another replacement sent to me, and this thing's rather expensive to have to buy another one.

Is there a tutorial or information page somewhere on how to do paperless caching? At this time, I don't have a PDA that would work for it, but I will have one within a few months, maybe sooner. I keep seing stuff about paperless caching, and I know what it is, but I haven't found anything explaining the particulars of exactly how to do it. Sorry if this is a stupid question.

I am a real noobi to caching. I just started last week, and I think I'm up to 6 finds now. I am really enjoying the hunt, and it's proving to be a great way to spend a lot of gas money . The truck I am caching in averages about 10 mpg, 12 on a good day. At least I don't have to worry about getting stuck too much, good 4x4. Anyhow, I just looked over the FAQ again and noticed the part about FRS radio channels. Does anyone actually use this? I was just thinking it might be interesting to actually talk with other cachers while looking for a cache. I know the radios have a deplorable range most of the time, but it still might be interesting. I live just north of Wichita, KS. Most of my cache hunting is happening around the northern half of Wichita. Would it at all be worth the $30 investment in a decent FRS radio, or will I never hear a thing on it? I was also considering the Garmin Rino 110 GPS Radio. Right now, I am using a Magellan Meridian Gold for cache hunting. After I started, I quickly discovered that you really don't need a fancy mapping GPSr for this, and the maps actually detract from the fun a little. It's a lot more challenging to find a cache when all you have is a distance and bearing readout. As such, I think the Rino 110 would work great and it has a built in FRS radio. I can get one on eBay for as little as $30 + s/h, only marginally more than a good dedicated FRS radio.

Well, I just went to Wally World and found another Lexar card for $17 bucks. I might have gotten a better deal at CompUSA or Best Buy, but I wasn't going there for anything else. I needed oil for my truck, and the only place I could get both was Wally's (Wal-Mart). After getting home, I loaded a map of my area onto this new 128mb card and it works. I guess I just got a bad card before.

I did enter my serial number. I just tried reformatting the card to basic FAT format and it changed nothing. I guess that means I'll have to get another card. Any recomendations? I don't want to go buy another one just to find out it does the same thing. Any particular brand that might work better? I am currently trying to use a Lexar card.

What I have is a refurbished unit from eBay. I would rather have gotten a brand new one, but I managed to get this one for a real good price. Firmware version is 5.40, so it should be able to read the cards. If, after reformatting my card to FAT16, and it still doen't work, then how do I know what card to buy? This one was a Lexar Media 256mb SD card. How will I know the next one won't do the same thing? I don't really want to be stuck with the little 64mb cards that Magellan sells. And yes, I have scrolled all the way through the menu. Card Utilities is not there. I will work on it tomorrow. My computer does not have the MapSend software, nor does it have an SD Card reader. I'll have to work on it on my brother's computer, which I'll be able to do tomorrow.

I am having a little bit of a problem here. I just pickup up a Meridian Gold and a 256 MB SD Card. My brother has a Meridian Color Travel Package that included MapSend Topo 3D. I'm trying to load a detailed map from that to my SD card and then onto my GPS. I get the map to load the the SD Card without a problem, but I can't get the GPS to use it. The instructions say to press the Menu key, then select Card Utilities to load the new map. Well, my GPS does not have a "Card Utilities" in the menu. What am I doing wrong?