If You Have A Garmin C3x0 Or A Tomtom Go 700

[+S&G.Davison]

Background ..

I have been using a Garmin SPIII in the car for years for navigation in the UK running City Navigator 6 .. I loaded up the UK safety camera Database into it a few months ago as a transparent layer, but as you all know the SPIII does not have the ability to audibly warn on approaching a POI .. so the SPIII only provides visual indication of the cameras ... Unfortunatly I still ended up getting flashed for 36mph in a 30 Zone

 

Its made me decide I need a new in Car GPS and therefore am looking for fellow users advice on picking a unit.. I really like the routing and functionality of the SPIII (I have 2 Garmin Vs which are used for geocaching)

 

Requirements

1. Audible warning of Safety cameras and some form of visual indication of what they are ie speed

2. Uk and European mapping with auto routing and turn by turn verbal directions

3. Route to POI, route to Address, route to ZipCode

 

From everything I have been able to gleam, both units will handle the above, however I need a unit that also allows me to manually add a lat/long and route to it .. ie park here co-ordinates for caching

 

I see Garmins C3X0 firmware release 3.7 "Added ability to mark a waypoint. This feature is available from the My Locations page." But as the online manuals never explain the upto date firmware I am not sure if this like the SPIII functioon which is a press button mark my current location, then edit it to set it to the parking co-ordinates, then route to it ...

 

I cant find out if TomTom allows this at all ... I have a feeling not ..

 

Any feedback much appreciated

[+orsetto]

The c3x0 series user interface does not permit you to create a waypoint by typing coordinates on the touch screen. It also never tells you your current coordinates. I believe the more expensive 2720 has both features.

 

You can, however, use Garmin's free POIloader software to upload "custom POIs" from your computer over USB. Custom POIs are not described in the manual so I'll give a short description here.

 

Custom POIs can optionally be assigned proximity or speed alarms. These alarms are audible. The POIloader help file has more details.

 

Your custom POIs are sorted into categories of your choosing. One of my categories is named "geocache".

 

When you search your custom POIs they are presented to you sorted by distance from your current location. You can also spell the name (or partial prefix) on the touch screen. Spell search can be done across all categories or across a single category of your choosing. You can also sort relative to a different location by temporarily going into demo mode and setting your current position, then searching closest to that position.

 

My geocaches POIs are named by the GCxxxx name. I select the geocache custom PIO category then spell the name of the cache I'm setting out for. It takes only a few presses of the touch screen to find it. < 10 seconds.

 

There is a lot of discussion about these units in the gpspassion.com forums. To upload geocache waypoints I export them from gsak to a gpx file, run GPXtoPOI to convert to garmin's screwy csv format, then run POIloader to upload to my c330. The entire work flow is no more than 1/2 minute and I have >1000 custom POIs. For park-heare coordinates I hand-create a waypoint with the parking coordinates and a name like "GCxxxx park here" so that it shows up in spell search right after GCxxxx. GPXtoPOI can be found on gpspassion.com.

[+S&G.Davison]

Thanks orsetto

 

If you are ruuning Firmware 3.7 or above can you tell me how you use the feature garmin added "Added ability to mark a waypoint. This feature is available from the My Locations page."

 

Thanks

[+orsetto]

* From the menu: WhereTo-->MyLocations-->Save.

* Save is a new button (with this firmware) on the bottom of the MyLocations screen next to the Back and SetHome buttons.

* A dialog pops up, "Do you want to save your current location to My Favorite Locations?"

* Press the Yes button.

* A favorite is saved with an automatically generated name.

* Now you can click Go, Edit, ShowMap, or Back.

* Click the Edit button. Now you can change the symbol, change the name, or delete.

 

The following might be more info then you are looking for...

 

Favorite is the Streetpilot name for waypoint. You can upload and download favorites between the unit and your computer using using any software that understands how to xfer waypoints using Garmin's USB protocol, including MapSource.

 

CustomPOIs are different from favorites. CustomPOIs can (optionally) have speed or proximity alarms, but favorites cannot. You can upload customPOIs (only?) with the free POIloader, but I don't think anyone knows how to download them. It doesn't look like Garmin has updated their SDK to describe how to xfer custom POIs, and MapSend does not grok them either.

[+S&G.Davison]

Thanks ... Much appreciate the feedback

 

I was getting all excited as it sounded perfect .. "save current location... Then Go, Edit, ShowMap, or Back. .........Click the Edit button. Now you can change the symbol, change the name, or delete." No edit Lat / Long

 

ah well ...

 

We have every Cache (active, archived, done, not done) in the UK in a home baked database, from which we can extract an area or a group of caches for that day, we currently create a GPX and load it into the Garmin V's and into another home baked application on a Dell Axim Pocket PC as a local database (has all description, logs etc - bit like Cachmate) for the cache hunt, we also have a Proxim bluetooth GPS for teh Dell and run Memory Map on the Dell ..

 

The SPIII lives in the car so does not get any Cache details loaded into it, As we head off to one we will often use the SPIII to manually enter a parking co-ordinate or if its a multi or offset the next bit of the chase ... Hence my wish to still have the ability to add a Lat/Long and route to it on my next Dashboard system ...

 

Now I know I could use one of the Garmin Vs to do this ... I was trying to reduce the number of GPS units I have ...

 

[+orsetto]

The C3x0 series does have an internal battery and USB port. It's easy to detach from the mount in the car. I bring mine into the house once or twice a week and update my geocache custom POI category from GSAK using the procedure I described earlier. It takes less than 1/2 minute.

 

As a result, the cache coordinates have been "pre-loaded" when I head out to find a geocache. For most caches this is fine. For the rare multicache that you drive in the car between stages, a hand-held GPSr usually works well enough. The c330 is not perfect, but it gets the job done for me.

 

{edit 10/29 to clarify ambiguous language}

Edited October 29, 2005 by orsetto