wasted

I think there was that step 2 option in the pocket query search page, if that's what your talking about, not sure if I actually ran it or not, I sent it to myself in an email, tranfered it to a file on my computer then transferred it to easyGPS and loaded to my GPS, that's all I know...

I looked into that but would it make that much of a difference with a summit hc? how much extra data can a summit hc hold besides the basic coordinates? I was basically just looking to get the coordinates on the GPS's so I know where the caches are and the LOC file seemed the best option but if its worth it to do it with a gpx file I'll give that a try

I send my PQ results to my Garmin. I do not have GSAK. I simply unzip the file, then send that .gpx file to the appropriate folder of my gps. I tried that, mine was a LOC file, don't know if that makes a difference, my computer did recognize my GPS, and the file was on my computer I just couldn't get the file to transfer to the GPS no matter what I tried, I downloaded EasyGPS per Bear and Ragged's link and unzipped the file and loaded it on there, theres a send to GPS option there too, its pretty easy to use and the whole procedure is a fairly simple operation once I got through it once to know what all is envolved

got it, lol, pretty easy now that I did it, wasn't so easy figuring out all that needed to be done... thanks guys, I appreciate it, you saved me a lot of work

ok, I'm trying to download multiple caches. I have 6 summit hc's and a vista hcx, so that's 7 GPSR's. my search came up with 330 caches. I can send them to the GPS one at a time through the site but cant figure out how to send them all at once, I did the pocket query, got the email and saved it in a file(I think I did it right), but I cant get anything to drag and drop, or send to the GPS, they just don't except each other. my computer sees the GPS, but as a garmin GPS, not an external storage. seems like Ive got it right to the end but I really have no idea how to do this and I cant get anything to mesh together now, and I really don't want to send 330 caches one at a time to 7 GPSR's. any advise on what I may be doing wrong?

im looking for a "do it all" pda for a christmas present for my girlfriend, she wants one to keep track of personal info, finances and data storage for work, home and a small business, she doesnt want a phone type but the more interactive with an online system the better, i know nothing about them so any information i could get would be cool, i dont want to drop the money on something thats not going to be capable of doing what she wants of it and shes not going to be happy with it

yeah, I dont think I'll upgrade... it didnt sound like a good thing to do when the upgrades first started coming out and it still doesnt sound like a good thing to do now, I think I'll just keep mine the way it is, it works just fine anyway...

I havent updated my vista hcx at all either(or my summit hc for that matter), from what I've heard you cant go back once you do it and I've heard some of the updates along the line where actually a downgrade from the original version, I've noticed some variances between my vista hcx and my summit hc however and I've been wondering also if the upgrades are really worth it or if I'd be better off to just leave well enough alone

I have the vista hcx and a summit hc which is basically the venture hc without the compass/altimeter, I see no real advantange between the two for basic offroad use except memory for map space(hcx takes memory cards)... but even that isnt as big an issue as it would seem unless your planning on loading mulitple maps or planning on traveling any great distance and need the area, I have ibycus's street maps on my summit hc and can fit almost the whole state of wisconsin on it, thats not the whole world worth of maps but plenty for what I need it for, and if I need it only takes my laptop and a few minutes to down load whatever other area I may need onto it and then reload my original map when done, but so far I havent had the need... supposedly there is no performance difference between the two and for the most part I'd agree, however, in my case, I have noticed that on a couple occasions that the summit actually outperformed the vista to a small degree... I bought the summit just for a workhorse/backup to my vista and for an extra unit for the kids or whoever to use but I found that I actually use the summit alot more than vista, partly because the vista hcx is alot more expensive but also because the vista has all the street capabilities and I just dont want to beat it up... the compass and altimeter is a plus and I do use the compass once in a while but to be honest having them really isnt that big a deal... if the map memory isnt an issue or working around it isnt a problem, and if the compass/altimeter isnt a necessity then I wouldnt be afraid at all of getting a venture hc over a vista hcx for general offroad use, performance-wise they're the same... I dont really know what either is going for now but I paid $240 for my vista hcx when I bought it and found summit hc's on sale for $150 when I bought that, $100 difference and for offroad I use the summit hc more... the last I looked you could pick up venture hc's for just over $100, thats $150 difference... thats quite a bit...

Uhhh yeah I had looked at those, but that price sheesh. Looks extremely good though and tough!! I actually made up my mind and went ahead and got the RAM-Mounts this morning. I spent about an hour maximizing what I really needed. By mixing and matching I was able to get a shorter arm then the package deal they had. I then added the Suction cup package for auto, which then gave me 95% of what I needed for both bikes considering I will loosen the ball joint wing nut, remove it and then re-attach again on whatever vehicle I need. So in other words, the handlbar mounts will fit the bars (I keep the short arm on the dirt bike). everything is re-usable between all 3 (street & Dirt Bikes and Car even!). I will post some pics once I get this all done in a couple weeks for anyone else's reference and any problems I hope NOT to have I appreciate the help from all! In case anyone wants to see how I ordered this up for maximum use/savings from expressmounts.com (cheaper than RAM-Mounts themselves): Qty Item Price Amount 2 RAM Mount Zinc Coated Motorcycle U-Bolt Base with 1 inch Ball (Model: RAM-B-231ZU) $11.18 $22.36 1 RAM Mount Short Length Dual 1.0 inch Socket Arm (Model: RAM-B-201U-A) $9.84 $9.84 1 RAM Mount Garmin Oregon Series Cradle (Model: RAM-HOL-GA31U) $9.02 $9.02 1 RAM Mount Locking Suction with Standard Arm Assembly (Model: RAM-B-166U) $27.95 $27.95 Item Total: $69.17 This better work or am I going to be really mad at myself lol cool, looks like your getting something figured out, Ive found alot of times that by just using some ingenuity and imagination you can usually come up with a much better solution for the particular situation at hand than whats available on the market although I havent seen the problem of pro tapers come up on here before theres been a few discussions on this topic, even though the topic seems pretty much over heres one that has a picture of my R1 mount if your interested in looking at it http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/index.php...=195668&hl=

I'm not sure whats out there for handle bar mounts for your gpsr to begin with but pro tapers in general may pose a problem for any standard handlebar mount... what model dirt bike? I have no real need to mount a gpsr on my dirt bike but protecting the gpsr would be a major concern of mine too if I were to mount one on mine, if it were me I'd rig up my own custom mount that was tucked in behind the numberplate/headlight so I could get it tucked in as tight, safe and protected as possible for my particular make/model bike... I made a velco mount for my R1 that mounts the gpsr(vista HCX) on the top triple, IMO it beats anything available that I've found so far

they dont auto route, but then the venture HC doesnt auto route anyway... after you download the maps to mapsource you can choose whatever area you want to load to the gpsr(within memory limitation anyay), one of my units is a summit HC, which has the same memory as the venture HC, I have ibycus's maps on there and can fit almost the entire state of wisconsin on it(the whole state was 28mb)

although I have run into more than a few here and there I'm not too "up" on benchmarks, but I was messing around down by the river here in town and found a benchmark imbedded in a rock near the dam, all it had on it was "Railroad Commission of Wisconsin" written around the top and "Waterpower" written around the bottom, no dates or anything else a little history of this town... most of downtown was washed away in a big flood in 1911, there WAS a railroad that had crossed the river just upstream of where the present dam is now and the original traffic bridge that crossed the river before the flood is just downstream, but regaurdless, what kind of benchmark would this be and how could I find a date?

I agree. The Venture HC is an excellent low cost GPS. I agree too... I'm a fairly big fan of the venture/summit hc's, I have a vista hcx and a summit hc(which is basically a venture hc with compass/altimeter) and for off road use I have yet to see any practical advantage the hcx has over the hc, granted the hc only has 24mb of memory but unless your looking to add the whole world worth of maps on it 24mb is more than enough for most purposes, and unless your interested in the auto routing feature(and have the maps for it) the hc is just as capable of an on road unit as the hcx too, and if the 24mb of maps you have loaded doesnt cover the area your interested in(or are going to be interested in) redownlaoding the new area is a simple and easy process I only have basic street maps on both my units and seldom travel much beyond 150 miles from home so the only difference between the hc and the hcx as far as my personal usage goes is that I paid $240 for the hcx and $155 for the hc, and as was stated, venture hc's can be bought for $111.95 w/free shipping

for some reason I got a double post...

I'm going to kind of go the other direction... I have a vista hcx and with its street navigation abilities and its ability to take external memory cards its a great unit, however if those things have little value to you then I also have a summit hc thats every bit as good and performs just as good as the vista hcx does but doesnt have the on-road auto routing features and doesnt take external memory cards, it does however have 24mb of internal memory which is capable of holding alot more area of maps than it seems, I have ibycus's street maps on my summit and can fit almost the whole state of wisconsin on it, thats not the whole universe worth of maps, but plenty for what I need it for, and if need be it only takes my laptop and a few minutes to down load whatever other area I may need onto it... another plus for the summit hc is that its cheaper than the hcx's, quite a bit if you look around and find a deal, I paid $155 shipped to my door for mine, my vista hcx was $240 when I bought it and I have yet to see them much below $210-$230... if having the electronic compass isnt important to you then the venture hc is basically the summit hc without the compass and altimeter and IMO is every bit as capable as the hcx units too, I've seen them for $115 with free shipping(and they still are), thats $100 less than the hcx's, you could buy a topo map and still have 1/4 of the money you saved left over... I picked up my summit hc just for a spare/workhorse for my vista hcx but for $115/free shipping I'm right on the verge of picking up a venture hc myself, just for a spare/workhorse for my summit hc...

awesome, thats what I was looking for, thanks guys...

this may be impossible or simpler than I think, if it is I have no idea how or where to do it... one of my units is a non routing unit(summit hc) with ibycus's maps, alot of roads and city streets can be quite long and when your looking for a specific place(with an address out of a phone book or whatever) with no auto routing one of the next best things IMO would be to be able to convert the actual address your looking for into coordinates and enter it as a waypoint on the gpsr, is there any way to go about doing this?

I ordered one from them almost 3 weeks ago and havent seen it yet either, or heard anything from them, it was only something like $5 so I'm not too worried about it, but still...

I'm on a regular computer(no mac) and as far as I know you have to download the whole file, which is the entire US, you need mapsource(which you should have gotten by downloading the that disc), and after you download the map file you just select ibycus's maps from the map selector in the top left corner of mapsource so the maps display and then select whichever sections(counties/states) from the map you want to sent to the gpsr with the highlighter(in the toolbar on top), in your case it would be however much of Georgia you can fit in 24mb(I dont know how big georgia is), and then just hit "send to device", its simpler than it probably seems... one of my units is only 24mb also(summit hc), I live in wisconsin and the state of wisconsin was around 28mb(if I remember right) so I couldnt get the whole state on mine but its still enough ibycus's map file is fairly big, I downloaded it on my back-up laptop and it took over 3 hours, if you read through this thread from the beginning it will explain in detail exactly what you need to do, it may seem confusing now but its not hard at all and after you do it you'll be surprised how easy it is(unless you run into a problem anyway)... and after an hour or two of playing around in mapsource you'll have that mastered too...

you need mapsource, you can use the disc that came with the gpsr to get it or you can download it online, its gotten a little long(10 pages) but everything you need to know to get those maps on your gpsr is in this thread... http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?showtopic=189762 it does require a small degree of direction if you've never done before, but its not hard to do at all, and that thread has all the info you'll need...

actually... I was looking at making an arm mount for my etrex's similar to that for hunting... alot of the times hunting I use my gpsr quite often, especially heading to a known point using a path I'm unfamiliar with, and digging the gpsr out of my pocket every few minutes gets old fast... an arm band mounted gpsr would be quite a convience in alot of situations I can think of, especially for hunting where your more than likely going to end up needing both arms free in a hurry...

I'm actually not real big on topo maps unless I actually NEED that data, IMO topo maps get a little too "noisey" alot of times and it takes a little more concentration/studying to figure out whats going on on the map than I like to put into it... for general navigation/direction I like the basic street maps better and unless you want auto routing(which you wont need with the venture hc) then I would recommend pretty highly taking a look at ibycus's maps, I have them on my summit hc and really like them, in fact they're about all I see myself needing on that gpsr, they're very detailed, easy to download and load to the gpsr(theres a whole big thread on it) and dont cost anything but a thank you to ibycus...

I wouldnt be afraid to get a venture hc, in fact I've been seriously thinking of picking one up myself, for $120(with free shipping) its cheap enough, I have a summit hc and a vista hcx and an extra gpsr to keep the kids from fighting over the summit seems like a good idea... I actually found venture hc's for $109(with free shipping) a couple days ago which was enough to talk me into picking one up but when I went to order one the next day they had the price back up to $120... for what its worth I'm going to just copy and repost my opinions of it from another thread(again), just to save myself a bunch of typing...

ibycus's maps work great, I have them loaded on both my vista hcx and my summit hc and am more than happy with them I've seen and heard of a few glitches in and around wisconsin but they seem few and far between, I'm in black river falls, about 30 miles from you, and havent noticed much around this area as far as defects, the biggest I've found so far is that the black river from hatfield to neillsville isnt colored blue, the outlines are blue but the water body isnt colored blue, the rest of the river, including the east fork, seem fine and I have yet to find anything serious enough that it takes away from the quality of these maps Thanks for the reply-I'll have to get on a faster internet to download that bnig file-nice to know it's working well. Will the maps fit on a 2 g micro SD card? Or are the maps set up to just download some maps from the computer to the GPS because of file size? (Wish I had this now-leaving for a harley trip in 2 days!) Tried the GPS for my first geocaching yesterday at Levis Mound, and found 2, but the base maps don't show anything....can't wait for more detailed maps here. Thanks! Thanks-am going to buy a micro Sd card today and try the download maps tomorrow. So can you just pick individual states to download onto the cards on the GPS? yeah, I could only get roughly 2/3 the US on a 2g card... if you cant get the maps to load at your end I have an extra sd card I'd be willing to load whatever area you need for your trip and let you borrow it, taking a trip with the base map thats on these gpsr's is basically a waste of time and I highly doubt it would be any help... having maps will make a world of difference both in driving help and enjoyment of use and your close enough to me that exchanging that card back and forth shouldnt be much of a problem Thanks-am going to buy a micro Sd card today and try the download maps tomorrow. So can you just pick individual states to download onto the cards on the GPS? Yep. I should mention, there is probably a work around for the US maps to allow you to load all of them (I haven't tried it, or spoken to anyone who has tried it, but it should work). Load up 1/2 the maps, then rename the gmapsupp.img file to gmapprom.img, and then upload the second half. Dale thanks for the tip... I'm fairly new to this gpsr mapping world but I'm going to have to give that a try and see if it works, what are the chances of getting a bunch of hang ups and lag doing it that way?