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Garmin 60csx Observations


Didjerrydo

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i ask Garmin if they would add the pressure trend recording to the 60CSx.

 

 

I've found that having garmin tell you "no" means nothing in what they will actually do. It was not 4-5 months ago that I emailed garmin asking if they had any plans to do a memory card based unit in the future, as while I wanted to shift from my 76s to a color unit there was no way I was going to do it until they had memory card ability.

 

I was simply told they had no plans to do anything in the future with memory card ability. This does not really surprize me since they probably are not allowed to release any product changes or even updates until they are offically announced.

 

So just because they tell you no, doesn't mean it won't happen.

 

There's a big difference between giving someone a heads up in future product releases vs. exisiting product firmware enhancements/suggestions. It could very well be that in the trade-off between adding the new SiRF and microSD that they had to change hardware sufficiently so that the sleep mode is no longer possible without the new hardware drawing too much power while it's sleeping. That would make sense since all the applications that use to require sleep mode is now gone. It would also explain why the compass on/off would not affect the power drain all that much.

 

One improvement that Garmin should have made a long time ago was to goto USB2. I mean come on, who still uses USB1 besides them? They've ALWAYS been behind in developing their I/O ports. It took them forever to go to USB1 and now it's taking them forever to go to USB2. With the large miniSD card capacities, it will take more than an hour to load a 512mb card!

 

Since Garmin removed sleep mode, the stopwatch also stops running when you turn the GPS off.

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If you travel enough that you're reloading 512MB regions enough that this is annoying, you can remove the card and mount it in an external high speed reader/writer.

Or buy a second card.

 

Actually, it does take almost an hour to load a 512 card. I just spent 25 minutes loading 300 mb of maps, from beginning to end. It reminded me of the early days when I owned the vista and it took an hour to load 24 mb of maps with that cheapie serial port. It's sad that they would contiune to choose such slow i/o ports.

 

The problem with slow loading times is that if we forget something or need to add a little thing, you would have to start over....

 

I thought that Mapsource will calculate a new map file to download into your gps evrytime you change something so that prevents you from directly doing it yourself.

Edited by jcc123
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It does take nearly an hour to load up say 450 meg of maps, granted you don't have to do it often but lets face it as larger cards come out people are going to want to load 1-2 meg into units and that's going to take 2-4 hours. You may not have to do it very often but it certainly would not be any fun.

 

It does seem that garmin should have stepped up to usb2 by now, however looking at how long it took to get usb in their gps units period we are probably lucky we are still now downloading on the serial cable. However usb2 was introduced 4 years ago, any new usb device should be set up for usb 2.0.

 

Here's another interestin question....does mapquest erase the card everytime you do an upload? I ask this because for giggles I started uploading 450 meg or so to my 76csx for to get an idea of the time it would take. However I already had 300+ meg on a 512 card in the unit, I never got a card full or not enough free space etc. message so does mapsource erase the cards map data everytime you load up new maps?

 

If it doesn't erase the old data, it begs the question which data do you loose, does it delete enough existing data to fit hte new data, or does it leave some of the new data off?

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The transfer of 450meg even with USB 1 only takes about 10min.

The big time consumption is still because of the compression and indexing of the maps, you can put your SDmini memory card in a fast card reader (Mapsource can write to a memory card, just select "send to device" with a card connected to your PC) and you'd still be waiting for the indexing.

When you use a cardreader Mapsource (not mapquest) does not erase the other data on the card (it does erase the maps that were there already but you could give those another name to save them)

I don't know what it does when you transfer it via the GPS itself but I would assume it's the same principal.

Edited by HugoOne
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While it does take mapsource some time to compress and index the maps (about 4 minutes for 450 meg), if I plug that 512 meg card into a usb 2.0 card reader and transfer that 450 meg of maps it takes a total of 10-11 minutes, as compared to 50 some minutes going strait to the gps with usb 1.0.

 

Bottom line, garmin should have made their usb stuff 2.0, again there's no excuse for a usb product in 2006 that is going to be transferring data on these types of total file sizes not to be usb 2.0 aside a failure on the manufacturers part.

 

As for a fast computer, if you want to see a fast windows machine, run 3.11 or 95 on a 3ghz computer with software from 10 years ago. It might not be very stable but it would be fast. I'm not saying companies build in overhead to enourage frequent updating of hardware, that would be wrong.

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That really is too bad, I'm sure garmin will probably change that with time to compete with other units. I'd be willing to bet the only reason we are seeing the "x" series basically 2005 models with memory cards is because garmin was loosing significant sales to memory card capable units, and was in a rush to get something out to make up the market share.

 

The memory card feature is great, however poorly implimented it would seem (not usb 2.0, cannot use card memory for tracks / waypoints / routes, etc) but the biggest and most important feature for a gps it's ability to get and hold satalites is amazing, but everything else pretty much falls short of improvement. The menu is lacking features, there is the wandering problem, cannot access the memory card from the unit, battery life has fallen off, the electronic compass is poor, lack of display options, etc. It would appear to be a product they rushed out the door in many areas.

 

It would be a really nice feature if the unit could access the memory card space to use for tracks, this would allow nearly unlimited track points, which would result in much more accurate track/trail mapping as you could use many more points on a particular track, especially if that track covers significant distance. I know I have done trail mapping on longer mountain bike trails and if you are trying to map out 20-30 miles of twisty singletrack 10,000 points isn't near enough to represent the actual trail, it has to be done in smaller sections. Not to mention then if you had two "x" units all you would need to do is swap cards between the units and you have have all your waypoints, routes, tracks, maps etc. ready to go.

 

However when it comes down to it, the reception alone makes it a worthy upgrade, and I myself was able to not only get the reception advantage but move up to the color screen, usb access, autorouting, and unlimited memory (although poorly implimented) so for me it was worth it, and i'm certainly not unhappy about the purchase. However if I already had a 76cs or even a 60cs that both have reasonable memory capacity, usb, and color screens I would have probably waited for their next generation units.

 

Not having usb 2.0 is really unforgiveable in any usb product in 2006, if you tried to release a digital camera, memory stick, external hard drive, or an ipod or other mp3 player that used usb 1.0 people would laugh at you, or beat you with a stick after they bought it and found out.

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Not having usb 2.0 is really unforgiveable in any usb product in 2006, if you tried to release a digital camera, memory stick, external hard drive, or an ipod or other mp3 player that used usb 1.0 people would laugh at you, or beat you with a stick after they bought it and found out.

 

I agree (except the beating part :-))

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I just ordered a 60Cx and this topic has me a little bummed out. It's my first GPS unit so hopefully I will enjoy it. To be honest I never travel outside of the US west so I doubt I will even use the microSD card. But USB 1.0? Thats very sad. I bought the unit for search and rescue stuff I volunteer for and they said this unit was the way to go for field work. Hopefully that is true.

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I'm not sure if this answers your question, but I am able to plug my transflash/microSD card into the SD adapter, put it in a card reader, and mapsource will recognise it.

 

You just pick out your maps like you normally would and use "transfer to unit" and it will recognize the card and let you send maps to it, but no waypoints, tracks or routes.

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I just ordered a 60Cx and this topic has me a little bummed out. It's my first GPS unit so hopefully I will enjoy it. To be honest I never travel outside of the US west so I doubt I will even use the microSD card. But USB 1.0? Thats very sad. I bought the unit for search and rescue stuff I volunteer for and they said this unit was the way to go for field work. Hopefully that is true.

 

Don't let all the naysayers get you down. It's a great unit. A lot of the ones that are talking smack are die hard Magellen fans who wouldn't say a good thing about Garmin units if they magically put a neon sign over the cache. :P

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I'm not sure if this answers your question, but I am able to plug my transflash/microSD card into the SD adapter, put it in a card reader, and mapsource will recognise it.

 

You just pick out your maps like you normally would and use "transfer to unit" and it will recognize the card and let you send maps to it, but no waypoints, tracks or routes.

 

Cool! I just tired it and it works. I will fill my microSD with maps this way from now on and then download the tracks, waypoints, the old fashion way. That ought to save me a good 45 minutes!!!

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Judging from the concensus of this thread I think I'll be sticking to my 60cs for some time yet - seems the 60csx has a few problems to iron out.

* Wandering Cursor

* Grotty Icons

* Removed Alarm Clock

* A few loaded maps not functioning

* Slower Autorouting responses

* One or two having power outages

Maybe Garmin needs to take a look at these issues!

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I haven't had a single problem with my new Map 60 Csx.

 

I have no idea what the fuss is about a wandering cursor. What exactly is the problem people are seeing?

 

Icons look fine to me. I'm sure, just like any art, it's the eye of the beholder.

 

I have never needed an alarm clock when I'm geocaching, hiking, backpacking. I try to get away from phones and clocks.

 

I have all of Colorado in navigator and a major portion of the Colorado Rockies in TOPO loaded into my unit. I have also loaded 850 Custom POI's (Geocaches) onto the card. For maps and POI's I have used just over half of the 64mb card that came with the unit. It took less than 3 minutes to download. I haven't had a single problem with any of the maps or features. Auto-routing works flawlessly. I have no complaints in this area at all.

 

I have had a blast making my own icons and downloading to my GPSr.

 

Batteries last way longer than I anticapted.

 

I am extremely happy with my 60 CSx and think I made an excellent choice. :D

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I agree with Team Trail Walker. I am extremely happy with my CSx, and haven't had the issues others have expressed.

 

And what is the big deal with the icons? Who cares if the Setup screen has a picture of a wrench, or a Rabbit? It does the same thing.

 

I was shocked at how many people are upset the alarm clock is missing. Who knew 99.9% of all 60 series users used the alarm clock?

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I agree with Team Trail Walker. I am extremely happy with my CSx, and haven't had the issues others have expressed.

 

And what is the big deal with the icons? Who cares if the Setup screen has a picture of a wrench, or a Rabbit? It does the same thing.

 

I was shocked at how many people are upset the alarm clock is missing. Who knew 99.9% of all 60 series users used the alarm clock?

 

These Icons, can be loaded into the GPS at 16x16 pixels each:

2.gif3.gif4.gif

 

CustomuserWaypointSymbols.jpg

Edited by GOT GPS?
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I just got my 60csx today after selling my 60cs. I'm extremely impressed with this new unit. I used the 60cs since they first came out a couple of years ago and am quite familiar with it. The old 60cs would have some trouble under a canopy of leaves, etc. This new unit can establish a reasonable fix while I'm sitting inside my house. This, even though I have extraordinarily dense and thick drywall on the ceiling and walls and a thick cement tile roof. IMPRESSIVE!

 

Here's a screenshot of the satellite tracking page from well inside my house:

 

satellites.jpg

 

I ran down to Best Buy and got a 512Mb microSD card which I loaded from Mapsource by using my USB2.0 Card Reader. I have the entire West from City Select v7 as well as Topo maps for the mountains and deserts of California, Washington and Oregon. With about 70Mb to spare.

 

I have noticed that the more maps I load, the longer the unit takes to start up (but just a few seconds difference). I figure it must be reading the (larger) index files that Mapsource generated and downloaded to the microSD card.

 

I've noticed the wandering cursor situation but I'm sure there'll be a fix for that out soon. I never used the alarm clock on the 60cs, so I don't miss it.

 

I'm very happy with this unit - happier, in fact, than I was with the 60cs - which I liked.

 

TM

Edited by tomm2
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Judging from the concensus of this thread I think I'll be sticking to my 60cs for some time yet - seems the 60csx has a few problems to iron out.

* Wandering Cursor

* Grotty Icons

* Removed Alarm Clock

* A few loaded maps not functioning

* Slower Autorouting responses

* One or two having power outages

Maybe Garmin needs to take a look at these issues!

 

If you have a look at the GarminGPSMAP60C_60CS Yahoo group, you'll also notice a couple of issues on the barometric altimeter results :

 

* Max elevation is said to almost never work. Display set to ------.

* Total ascent figure not reliable, sometimes works sometimes not (would sometimes stop during the journey).

 

Probably related with software and firmware upgrade would also need to apply to this.

 

Garmin presumably is aware of the issue.

 

Referring to the icons shape, I really do not think it's of major importance, this does not impact the GPSr performance, and I would say the same for the alarm clock, but that's my own opinion.

 

Regards.

 

pyt22fr

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Has anyone got the custom POI icons to work yet? (and if so, what are the steps?)

 

I've tried and tried with no success. All POIs show with a blue flag when they are saved.

 

I've had no success, either. I am assuming at this point that there is a bug and that we will see this fixed in an upcoming release of either of POI Loader or the receiver firmware.

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Mine seemed to work.... Sort of. I used a red and white AG as my .bmp named it the same as my .csv file and uploaded. And it did change the icon of my custom poi's but only to a tiny little corner of the A barely visible. but it is a tiny little red and white icon instead.

 

One thought I had on what the difference maybe is, this is a custom icon I uploaded to the gps using ximage. So maybe it has to be a custom icon before you can use it as a custom poi icon.

 

Just a thought....

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I agree with Team Trail Walker. I am extremely happy with my CSx, and haven't had the issues others have expressed.

 

And what is the big deal with the icons? Who cares if the Setup screen has a picture of a wrench, or a Rabbit? It does the same thing.

 

I was shocked at how many people are upset the alarm clock is missing. Who knew 99.9% of all 60 series users used the alarm clock?

 

These Icons, can be loaded into the GPS at 16x16 pixels each:

2.gif3.gif4.gif

 

CustomuserWaypointSymbols.jpg

 

I just got a GPSMap 60CSx (two days ago) and I looked around in the menus but didn't see a way to upload custom icons to the unit.

 

Could you please provide a little more details as to how exactly I can do this.

 

Thanks in advance !!

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Go to this LINK here to get Ximage software for doing waypoint Icons and screen captures

 

When you download, and Install xImage, there will be a help file in the folder where xImage will install in the Start menu listed under GARMIN. The help file will have enough details, to get you started.

 

This is a long list of information on how to use Ximage

 

-

Geoff

 

Thanks very much Geoff ! Using xImage I was able to upload these icons to the GPS.

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I found out that Garmin may have changed the USB protocal on the X-series units to be more like the Street Pilot GPS units,

There's no "may have" about it. They definitely did. http://www.gpsbabel.org/garminx.html
and I'm guessing that this is to make the POI Loader work with the new GPS units?
POI Loader does not use any of the documented Garmin protocols. I approached them about how POI loader works so I could make GPSBabel do it so the Linux and Mac crowd could benefit. I was told they would not be documenting that protocol. (This discussion was before the X series shipped, I think...)

 

So I think POI loader support and waypoint/track/route protocol changes were two different axes in the machine.

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I had a chance to use the 76csx to navigate in minneapolis today crusing around to vertical endevors, REI and some other spots, and coming from the 76s I was impressed, first autorouting and the ability to re-route if you miss a turn is very very nice. Also just the way turns are indicated and listed and how the turn "list" will pop to the map when you get close to a turn. The color screen is much better to navigate with, but it pretty much demands you have the backlight on all the time, day or night, at least in the vehicle, but that's no biggie with a power cable. Just using batteries with the backlight on as high as it would go during the day chewed them up pretty quick.

 

Mostly though I was impressed that the 76csx was able to hold a lock downtown in all the big buildings, normally this is where my 76s would loose signal all together. I think the only two minor issues I had was that if I was on a frontage road it would re-route me as if I was on the interstate next to the frontage road, and that sometimes if you had two quick turns in a row it would not update fast enough to get back to the next turn, but that's just a matter of looking another turn ahead.

 

Overall though, very nice. I'm using metroguide 4.02 as well so I'm sure city select/navigator would be nice.

 

One thing that IMO they must address though is you need to be able to change the route color, the maroon/magenta they use is way too hard to tell from the interstates and it can get confusing. A small issue for a firmware update though.

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Concerning this, #5 item,:

 

5. Add Ability To Load Maps And Wayppoints To Transflash Memory Card

 

I was able to download MapSource City Navigator maps directly to a Sandisk 512 TF card that was placed directly into my computer's SD reader slot (using an adapter). I don't know about the waypoint issue, I assumed those are stored directly in the GPS unit's internal memory only?

 

Just purchased a 60Cx. I first purchased an eXplorist 600...upgrading from a Garmin GPS V. I found the eXplorist cumbersome to work with as compared to the GPS V. I did not like that I could only load maps up to 65mb in size. I could load as many maps as the SD would hold, but I could have one map active at a time. With the 60Cx I can load as large an area as the SD will hold. I use this unit for both work and play, and cover a large mult-state area. The 600 just wouldn't do the trick, so I returned it in favor of the 60Cx.

 

I also found that I like Garmin's City Select better than Magellan's MapSend. MapSend would only route to a range of addresses on a given street, where City Select will route to a specific address.

 

JMHO...no offense intended to anybody favoring the Magellan line.

 

Dave

Edited by Wojo65
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This thread is getting unwieldy! I seem to remember this topic being discussed but now I can't find it, so sorry if this is a repeat!

 

I've had my 60cx for a few weeks now, no problems. Until yesterday! The batteries died so I replaced them (with Kirkland alkalines - the ones from Costco). When I turned the unit back on, after about 10 minutes the screen faded out and then turned off. This happened 3 more times. Then I turned it off for the night, haven't turned it on since. I checked, I have it set to alkaline batteries, and that's what I'm using. Maybe it's a bad batch of batteries? Or is it a problem with the unit? If it keeps happening I'll try another brand, but I was wondering if anyone has any insight...

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This thread is getting unwieldy! I seem to remember this topic being discussed but now I can't find it, so sorry if this is a repeat!

 

I've had my 60cx for a few weeks now, no problems. Until yesterday! The batteries died so I replaced them (with Kirkland alkalines - the ones from Costco). When I turned the unit back on, after about 10 minutes the screen faded out and then turned off. This happened 3 more times. Then I turned it off for the night, haven't turned it on since. I checked, I have it set to alkaline batteries, and that's what I'm using. Maybe it's a bad batch of batteries? Or is it a problem with the unit? If it keeps happening I'll try another brand, but I was wondering if anyone has any insight...

Edited by Didjerrydo
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This thread is getting unwieldy! I seem to remember this topic being discussed but now I can't find it, so sorry if this is a repeat!

 

I've had my 60cx for a few weeks now, no problems. Until yesterday! The batteries died so I replaced them (with Kirkland alkalines - the ones from Costco). When I turned the unit back on, after about 10 minutes the screen faded out and then turned off. This happened 3 more times. Then I turned it off for the night, haven't turned it on since. I checked, I have it set to alkaline batteries, and that's what I'm using. Maybe it's a bad batch of batteries? Or is it a problem with the unit? If it keeps happening I'll try another brand, but I was wondering if anyone has any insight...

 

Sounds like the "Cheap Battery Syndrome" to me. I'd use reputable brands like Copper Tops or Rabbit Batteries. Better yet, use 2500 mHA NiMH rechargables.

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I have been really excited about the release of the new 60csx but after reading many of the different responces from this forum I'm not sure I want to upgrade.

 

I have owned the 60cs for almost two years and have really enjoyed this unit but I like the idea of the new chip set with the expandable memmory.

 

These are some of my concerns: barometer does'nt work when unit is off, no alarm clock, position seems to wander.

 

Now, do you think these things will be changed or improved sometime in the neer future?

 

Also, for those of you that upgraded from a 60cs to a 60csx are you happy you made this change?

 

What about this alarm clock??? I mean, when I am out there somewhere, I always have a mobile phone and a watch with me, and both have alarm clock. Do I need a 3rd alarm clock? By the way, the beeper of the 60CSX has far too low volume to wake up anyone. Anyway, the 60CSX is great!

 

:(

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To calibrate the unit, you have to hold it level (like a waiter holding a tray) and spin around (or spin the unit around) twice. The unit can't do that automatically. Once the unit is calibrated, it doesn't necessarily know when it needs to be re-calibrated.

 

I know! My idea is, that instead of making the user unable to select "sight and go", the GPS should instead go to "calibration mode" (when selecting "sight and go").

 

See?

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I have read one uninformed quote after another:

 

"I've had my xyz GPS down to y feet. My old xyz GPS would get only to z feet." Therefore since the number on this one is smaller it is more accurate.

 

You all are killing me. I probably can't explain this very well because I'm not an engineer and I really don't care about the entire explanation. But for those who will listen here is my attempt to educate.

 

The accuracy indication found on YOUR gpsr is its own "Estimated Positional Error". Estimated - an intelligent guess; Positional - where you are on this Earth; Error - that is an easy one. This is your units best guess about how far off it MAY be from the actual coordinates. The key word is estimated!!! This is not a true measurement of how accurate your GPS is. If the manufacturer was truthful and had enough space on the screen it would say:

 

"I've taken all the measurements I can, calculated using 9 satelites and according to the guy who wrote my program I'm going to tell you how I think I am around this far off the mark. But really, I don't know. It is just a guess. Sincerely, your GPSR"

 

If you had two gpsr's sitting next to each other and one said it had an accuracy of 8 feet and the other one said it had an accurancy of 15 feet which one is more accurate???? What if you the two units were sitting on a survey marker. The unit that said it was 8 feet off could in deed be 25 feet off and the unit that said it was 15 feet off may actually be 6 feet off.

 

Don't judge your GPS by how accurate IT tells you that it thinks it is.

 

Sorry for the long post but we could (and will) pages of this silly comparisions.

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What audio features does the 60cs and 60csx have? The website says that the 60cs has an audio alert when routing? Is this just a beep or is this an actual voice? Is this the same for the 60csx?

 

Thanks,

 

gpseaglescout

I have the 60C and 60CX and they have audio tones (beeps), no voice.

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