Explorist 500 Cheap Construction.is Garmin Better?

[psychedelicx]

After reading some of the reviews here, i decided to take the plunge and get my first GPS receiver. It was between a Magellan Explorist 500 and the Garmin GPSMap 60c. The magellan won.

 

While i was amazed at the size(tiny), reception(lock inside my apartment away from the windows!) and features(sd card expandability) i am a little hesitant about the quality of the product. The clickable joystick requires excessive force in the top direction and does not work in the top-right direction. I even ordered a replacement and this unit turned out to be even worse. Clearly Magellan has QC issues here.

 

While i love all it's features, i am not about to spend $300 to get a cheap product and this is what it felt like.

 

Since this is my first unit and have never come in contact with any other units, I would like to get your opinions on what you think of the Garmin GPSMap. I'm willing to look over Garmin's backassed policy not to include expandable memory(main reason i choose magellan) if the unit is solid(i.e. all buttons atleast work properly out of the box.)

 

I'll be mainly using the unit for Geo-caching, hiking and in car for directions.

 

Any information will be appreciated including those from explorist users.

[Team Sidewinder]

If you are having these problems already you would be better off with the Garmin. I have owned 4 and never had any problems like that and the customer support has been fantastic.

[+Miragee]

I also vote for the Garmin. With USB connectivity on the newer color units, I don't know why you need to mess with data cards. You should get all the maps you need on the unit itself. If you are going to travel, you can load new maps in a short period of time and never have to worry about keeping track of data cards.

 

Even in my older Vista, I can get all the maps I need, and more, in its 24MB memory.

 

The Garmin GPSMAP 60CS is a very nice unit, but the smaller Vista C can be had for less than $300.00 now with the $50.00 rebate from Garmin.

[psychedelicx]

Well since this is my first unit, my expectations for quality may be way higher than is standard for all units. I remember reading in a previous post that a user had a mounting clip that was breaking off from a Garmin GPSMap unit as well. One of the review's I read also mentioned a user physically pulling out the usb port from his/her unit.

 

So if anyone has had any experience with both units then i would appreciate it if I could get back some feedback as to the difference in the two units as far as construction goes.

 

It may also be the case that the Explorist's units are just fine too in the long run, it's just that to get two units shipped to me with bad joystick's leads me to suspect that i may have more issues in the future. Either way at this point i am not tied to either unit, until i can find out more.

Edited June 10, 2005 by psychedelicx

[+Rubberhead]

Alll of my Garmin units have been solid. Specifically, my GPSmap 60CS is both smooth and rugged. I've carried it for over a year while hunting and fishing in saltwater. It gets covered in mud when I'm picking up decoys and has been completely drenched in pure saltwater more times than I can care to count but it still looks and works like out-of-the-box new. All I do is wash it in warm soapy water when I get back home.

[psychedelicx]

Oh and slightly off topic, how is it that some of you have so many gps units! What do you do with 5 units ?!!

[+Miragee]

One can never have too many toys . . .

[+GOT GPS?]

Both Manufactures, Garmin and Magellan, have quality problems, like my 60C for instance. The USB port on back of my 60C wiggles around when I try to remove the USB cable from it, so I do know that my 60C is NOT waterproof. The problem with both manufactures' units is the light weight aspect of them, where alot of quality is lost in making any units light in weight. I like my 60C alot though, except that it's been having problems loosing signal lately, even when the signal quality is high, it will crap out for a few seconds then come back to life a few seconds later.

 

Solutions will be to come out with a slightly heavier GPS that is more rugged, that has top notch autorouting and SD memory card ability, but expect to pay alot for a handheld like this, maybe 800 bucks.

 

Edited for speeeeling

Edited June 11, 2005 by GOT GPS?

[+briansnat]

My 60CS has been rock solid so far and I put the thing through a pretty good amount of abuse. Its going on about 7 months old now.

 

As Idiosyncratic said, the USB connection makes makes the lack of a memory card a non issue for most users. If I'm traveling out of my area of map coverage, it takes me less than 5 minutes to load new maps. Memory cards don't do much for me. I already headed out once with a Lowerance with the wrong card inside.

Edited June 11, 2005 by briansnat

[+badlands]

No problems with my Explorist 500 so far. I've dropped it in the mud and on the rocks. Took a lickin' and keeps on tickin'

 

Is it supposed to tick

Edited June 11, 2005 by badlands

[robertlipe]

It's a non-issue for certain uses and users.

 

Right now, my father-in-law, who travels without a laptop or computer access, is on a 3 month road trip that'll cover most of the continental U.S. I handed him a Meridian (his 330 wasn't going to cut it) and a couple of memory cards and he has detail maps for the entire country.

 

Granted, not everyone has that need, but having essentially infinite map memory in your pocket (if a 2GB SD card won't hold the entire continent, it wouldn't take a pockeful to do so) is a handy thing for some people.

[+Jamie Z]

I also vote for the Garmin. With USB connectivity on the newer color units, I don't know why you need to mess with data cards. You should get all the maps you need on the unit itself. If you are going to travel, you can load new maps in a short period of time and never have to worry about keeping track of data cards.

 

Even in my older Vista, I can get all the maps I need, and more, in its 24MB memory.

Like RobertLipe pointed out, there's no "messing" with datacards.

 

I installed a fairly small 64Mb card in my Explorist soon after I bought it, and I haven't yet removed it once. The only messing I've done with it is load up some maps. I've never had to "keep track" of my card. It's in my GPS.

 

Unfortunately, the 64Mb is a little small for me. I've already twice had to delete the current map I have loaded on the card and load a new one. A $40 investment in a 512Mb card and I'd never have to worry about it.

 

For some people 24 megs is probably just fine. For others, like me... I'd really like to try out a Garmin, but the limited memory is too big of an issue.

 

As far as construction... my Magellan Meridian lasted almost four years of abuse through several countries, a couple of cross-country bicycle trips, a cross-country motorcycle trip, a two-month river rafting trip, not to mention several hundred geocaches and other hikes. It still worked fine (except for the backlight) and was still waterproof until the day it was stolen.

 

When I replaced it with an Explorist, I thought the Explorist was better built It felt more solid and the battery cover fit better and attached more securely. In addition, I've only taken the battery cover off once or twice since I bought it, so the rubber seal isn't subject to stress from removal and installation.

 

The only design flaw I can come up with for the Explorist is that the screen is really exposed. On the Meridian, the screen was set back a few millimeters with a protective border around it. On the Explorist, the screen is almost flush with the front of the GPS, which exposes it to more abuse.

 

As far as the Explorist click stick, it feels very much like the stick used on the Garmin Legend, which is a known weak point of the GPS. Time will tell if the Explorist click stick suffers the same issues.

 

Jamie

[+briansnat]

I installed a fairly small 64Mb card in my Explorist soon after I bought it, and I haven't yet removed it once. The only messing I've done with it is load up some maps. I've never had to "keep track" of my card. It's in my GPS.

 

Unfortunately, the 64Mb is a little small for me. I've already twice had to delete the current map I have loaded on the card and load a new one. A $40 investment in a 512Mb card and I'd never have to worry about it.

 

Isn't there a limit as to how much map you can put on each card? I thought I encountered some limitations but I don't recall the details.

[FiddlinFool]

You can put as many maps on a card as you want, but each map can only be 64mB in size, so you have to break them up into 64mB chunks, which is enough for several states worth of street data or BlueNav chartss. That's how I use mine. You just select which chart on the card to make active with a couple of button presses. The card need never come out of the unit.

 

This is the only issue that's preventing my from buying a C60 (that and the fact that I've already invested in the Magellan software). I may do it anyway to get the nice display. Can't use an Explorist since it's practically useless for boating.

[robertlipe]

Isn't there a limit as to how much map you can put on each card? I thought I encountered some limitations but I don't recall the details.

There are some limitations that covered in the Magellan FAQs, but they're usually little more than distractions once you know the rules of the game. The limits depend somewhat on which Mapsend mutant you're working with, but since this is an Explorist thread, we'll limit it to Mapsends that work on explorist.

 

DirectRoute, the individual maps have to be 64MB or smaller.

 

For Topo3D, they have to be 240MB or smaller. (In the absence of firmware enhancements to improve searching 240MB regions, I can't imagine that this would actually be a good idea. I don't _want_ to see every "Main Street' in this time zone...)

 

There are simple, but officially unsupported and thus undocumented ways of exceeding both limit but there are reports of stability and performance degradation when the map size is stretched.

 

In both cases, you're limited only by how many of those maps you can fit on a card. You can't route between maps and the maps have to be rectangles. So you can find some achilles heels but in day-to-day use for the people that need this kind of thing, changing your active map every day or two of driving is better than not having detail maps at all.

 

As Jamie points out, SD memory cards are _cheap_ these days. Make a trip to http://www.pricewatch.com/mn.aspx?i=226&f=1 and look at Secure Digital prices.

[Team Sidewinder]

Oh and slightly off topic, how is it that some of you have so many gps units! What do you do with 5 units ?!!

Well I didn't say I still had the 4 gps units. One I gave to my son when I upgraded, my wife has one and I have two. One of the units I have when I upgraded to color is in my daypack so I am always sure it is packed and one is in the car.

[+briansnat]

You can put as many maps on a card as you want, but each map can only be 64mB in size, so you have to break them up into 64mB chunks, which is enough for several states worth of street data or BlueNav chartss. That's how I use mine. You just select which chart on the card to make active with a couple of button presses. The card need never come out of the unit.

 

This is the only issue that's preventing my from buying a C60 (that and the fact that I've already invested in the Magellan software). I may do it anyway to get the nice display. Can't use an Explorist since it's practically useless for boating.

That was it. They had to be in 64 meg chunks, but I also recall that the Meridian allowed only 4 maps, so even if you had a 500 meg, or a gig card, you couldn't fill it up.

Does the eXplorist allow for more than 4 maps?

[+GOT GPS?]

You can put as many maps on a card as you want, but each map can only be 64mB in size, so you have to break them up into 64mB chunks, which is enough for several states worth of street data or BlueNav chartss.  That's how I use mine.  You just select which chart on the card to make active with a couple of button presses.  The card need never come out of the unit.

 

This is the only issue that's preventing my from buying a C60 (that and the fact that I've already invested in the Magellan software).  I may do it anyway to get the nice display.  Can't use an Explorist since it's practically useless for boating.

That was it. They had to be in 64 meg chunks, but I also recall that the Meridian allowed only 4 maps, so even if you had a 500 meg, or a gig card, you couldn't fill it up.

Does the eXplorist allow for more than 4 maps?

I know that one session of map creation on Mapsend, only allows 4 regions at a time to be uploaded to the GPS, but once you have the maps on the GPS, you can rename them I believe, then try loading 4 more onto the card. Id forgotten, but I believe that I created the regions for the Platinum I had, by not having the GPS connected to the computer, and I saved the Map regions to the hard drive then copy how many maps I wanted to the SD memory card. GPS should be able to handle multiple maps over a quantity of 4.

[freeday]

I know your Joystick problems.

 

My Test-GPS (eplorist 500) was great and i was wondering about different joystick-talks which i had with a big company.

I ordered an explorist 600 and left, right, down klicks with the joystick were no problem.

Put joystick up was a great problem.

Calling Magellan support - they told me to hard reset the system (???).

I WAS THE FIRST WITH THAT PROBLEM.

 

Joystick problem still existed after resetting the system. -

Now i called my dealer an he sent me a new one. - Joystick is now ok.

 

A friend told me that he knows some resellers who check the eXplorist first, and only sell the good ones. (10% have a Joystick problem - he said)

It is a mechanical problem and magellan should check the unit before delivering.

Do not hesitate to replace your eXplorist!!

 

Garmin and Magellan have pros and cons. Best would be a mixture of both - which will be aviable in a few years.

[tttedzeins]

You can put as many maps on a card as you want, but each map can only be 64mB in size, so you have to break them up into 64mB chunks, which is enough for several states worth of street data or BlueNav chartss.  That's how I use mine.  You just select which chart on the card to make active with a couple of button presses.  The card need never come out of the unit.

 

This is the only issue that's preventing my from buying a C60 (that and the fact that I've already invested in the Magellan software).  I may do it anyway to get the nice display.  Can't use an Explorist since it's practically useless for boating.

That was it. They had to be in 64 meg chunks, but I also recall that the Meridian allowed only 4 maps, so even if you had a 500 meg, or a gig card, you couldn't fill it up.

Does the eXplorist allow for more than 4 maps?

I know that one session of map creation on Mapsend, only allows 4 regions at a time to be uploaded to the GPS, but once you have the maps on the GPS, you can rename them I believe, then try loading 4 more onto the card. Id forgotten, but I believe that I created the regions for the Platinum I had, by not having the GPS connected to the computer, and I saved the Map regions to the hard drive then copy how many maps I wanted to the SD memory card. GPS should be able to handle multiple maps over a quantity of 4.

I have the Whole of Aus on 2 128 Meg cards in 48MB chunks. All you need is a card reader to rename them something usefull. I just heard from Magellan that the Meridian Color will read a 1GB card so I can fit the whole country and all the tracks and waypoints I want on it.

[+JohnnyVegas]

The clickable joystick requires excessive force in the top direction and does not work in the top-right direction. I even ordered a replacement and this unit turned out to be even worse. Clearly Magellan has QC issues here.

 

While i love all it's features, i am not about to spend $300 to get a cheap product and this is what it felt like.

 

I'll be mainly using the unit for Geo-caching, hiking and in car for directions.

 

Any information will be appreciated including those from explorist users.

I remember a while back people were complaning about the joy stick on the Garmin e-trekb series.

I have used a garmin legend and vista in the past, I now use a Magellan explorist 500, i have had mine for about 10 or 12 weeks and I have had no problems with it. I also own a Magellan Meridiqn gold and a sport track color and have never had a problem with the quaility. there is not any type of product in the world that has been 100% defect free, in the manufacturing process a bad unit will get by from time to time.

[+embra]

That was it. They had to be in 64 meg chunks, but I also recall that the Meridian allowed only 4 maps, so even if you had a 500 meg, or a gig card, you couldn't fill it up.

Does the eXplorist allow for more than 4 maps?

Your "multicultural" perspective is a particularly valuable one around here, Brian, so I'm happy to expand on Got GPS's response a bit to ensure you are clear on what has been a confusing aspect of MapSend jargon.

 

Confusion comes because MapSend programs require the creation of rectangular regions, which can then be compiled into downloadable detail map files for the GPS. As Got GPS said, the older MapSend programs allowed for up to 4 regions of up to 16 MB each to be combined in a single detail map file. Activating the file on GPS permitted moving from one region to another without changing settings.

 

Newer MapSend programs (DR, T3D) did away with multiple regions, so the distinction has become somewhat moot. The newer programs do allow for larger regions: 64MB for DR, up to 240MB for T3D. So, except for T3D, the 64MB file size has been consistent.

 

Without a card reader, map file usage was limited to one per card because MapSend assigns the same name, overwriting any existing detail map file. Use of a card reader permits changing the name of the detail map file. This opens the door for as many map files as the card can hold.

 

So...your question and assumptions actually are applicable to Meridians with no card reader availability, and the answer would be that yes, explorists can have mutltiple map files--even without a card reader.

[psychedelicx]

Sounds like you get what you pay for and in this case $300 is not much.

 

Well since the high-end explorist unit just came out and i believe the GPSMap 60C/S came out what a year and a half ago, does anyone have an idea when the next round of units (similar to Explorist and GPSMap i.e. small, relatively inexpensive etc) will be out? Do they normally run on a one year or three year cycle?

[+mckirkie]

I have an explorist 600 and the stick was little tough in the up position at first but now it's loosened up a bit and feels about the same as the other directions. I put in a 1gb card and am currently using 1.9mb of storage. Hopefully the extra room will come in useful for when we travel. I like it a lot but I would still also like to try out some other GPS devices and see how they perform as far as accuracy and user interface goes. I expect that they all have about the same features. I test drove a few models at REI and tried to get smart about them in a hurry before buying the explorist. Overall I’d say I’m happy with the device and it seems pretty responsive with regards to loading up maps and geocache files. It also seems to have a pretty tough hide. I can’t imagine using a PDA for geocaching.

 

I’ve already dropped the explorist onto rocks from higher than 6feet and it’s still like new. I put a screen guard cover on it like the one’s here http://www.screenguardz.com/misc/ but I cut some of the one’s I had on hand instead of buying custom ones.

 

I am a little confused about why I can’t get more of the info from my gpx file which contains the notes for the cache onto the explorist. And there seems to be a 50 character limit for the hints. Is that normal? Question 3 of the faq page for the explorist at http://www.magellangps.com/en/support/prod...q_eXplorist.asp makes mention of the 50 character limit.

 

-Tom

[tubemonkey]

Well since the high-end explorist unit just came out and i believe the GPSMap 60C/S came out what a year and a half ago, does anyone have an idea when the next round of units (similar to Explorist and GPSMap i.e. small, relatively inexpensive etc) will be out?

I'm still waiting to see what Magellan will do in response to the 60C/CS and 76C/CS series. The eXplorists are better compared to the eTrex color units (Legend C & Vista C) -- small size, patch antennas, no provision for external antennas, no serial connection, etc.