Garmin X Vs Magellan Explorist

[+bones10]

I found this link:

http://www.mtgc.org/robertlipe/showdown/.

 

That article is pretty interesting, so it seems that the SiRF III is more accurate than what's used in the Magellan units.

 

But, how much better? It's hard from that article to quantify how the two receivers will compare in real world situations. In, say, tree cover, will they both perform about the same, or will there be quite a few more lost locks on the magellan than the garmin?

 

I'm just trying to get a feel. Will they be not noticeably different, noticeably different, or annoyingly different?

 

My guess is there would be infrequent cases where the garmin would keep a lock while the magellan would not, but I'm wondering if anyone has any real experience or comparisons of reception between these units?

 

- bones

[richard371]

I have the GPSmap60 csx and like it alot. There are a couple software bugs that they will fix with fw upgrades. My understanding is that Garminis very good about firmware updates.

[+bones10]

I'm not looking to see who likes their unit. I'm specifically wanting a comparison of the receiver reception between the new Garmins with the SiRF III chip and the Magellan eXplorists.

 

- bones

[+JohnnyVegas]

Well I have used my Magellan explorist 500 next to my Meridian gold in the field and both have always maintained an excellent lock under tree cover. As far as Garmin I have not had a chance to use the 60CX, 60CSX, 76CX or the 76CSX so those I cannot comment on.

As far as the number of sattelites tracked while on a desk, well I test in the field in real world conditions would be a lot more accurate. My guess the accuracy in the garmins that have the SIRF III chipset will be about the same as the Magellan products.

Also just what would be the differance in accuracy at finding a given point, this cannot be determind on a desk in a brick house. Add in the ablitiy of the person placing to cache to get a good lock and not knowing what type of GPS was used in the placement of the cache adds to the problem of knowing how accurate a GPS is in the real word of finding a cache.

[+bones10]

Also just what would be the differance in accuracy at finding a given point, this cannot be determind on a desk in a brick house. Add in the ablitiy of the person placing to cache to get a good lock and not knowing what type of GPS was used in the placement of the cache adds to the problem of knowing how accurate a GPS is in the real word of finding a cache.

 

Yeah I'm not too worried about accuracy. Accuracy would depend on the number a sattelites tracked. After a point, the accuracy would be a matter of dimishing returns. Either unit will have sufficient accuracy.

 

I'm mostly wondering about lost signals/lock and if one would be much better than the other at tracking signals, or if in real world use, they'd be about the same.

 

Like, say, the gps is used while hiking in a forrest. Would either or both of these units keep a lock? Would it matter how dense the forrest is populated? Would both units pretty much loose it's lock under the same conditions, or would one outperform the other in any way that matters?

 

I too already have an eXplorist 500. Maybe if someone nearby has a new Garmin with the SiRF chip we can attempt a test.

 

- bones

[+Cache Heads]

Please let me preface by stating that I am no expert.....

 

With that said, I returned my eXplorist 600 for various reasons and finally got a 60csx a couple of weeks ago. In my personal experience, lock time is absurdly faster with the X series than with the eXplorist. My eXplorist used to take minutes to get a lock, the csx takes seconds. The eXplorist needed to have a view of the sky to get a lock, but the csx will get a lock from the middle of my living room, in restaurants and in my office. Also, the eXplorist would lose its lock if I threw it in my pocket, my backpack or my glove compartment-- not the case with my csx. Now, as far as reception and accuracy once they've got a good lock, the eXplorist is pretty comprable to the x series-- even under tree cover, as Johnny V stated.

 

All in all, the eXplorist was a great unit but I'm much happier with my csx .

[+EScout]

I just turned on my eX 500 here in the house and it took 50 seconds to get a 3d lock. Once it gets a lock it never lets go, inside or out, in car, under trees, in my pocket.

 

Regarding the original post and the test by Robertlipe, it is a good test with real numbers. He has not concluded that one is more accurate than the other. The best way I know to test accuracy is to take your GPSr to a super-accurate benchmark and see how close you get. I have done this with the 500 as I have with other GPSrs many times. I do not have statistics, but have complete confidence in its accuracy. Try this and you may be amazed on how accurate it is.

[+Renegade Knight]

It's interesting to see that the C series now does what I didn't like Magellan doing. Lying about it's lock when it doesn't have one. I was hoping to find the link to Peters article on magellan averaging. Over time I've realized it's advantages and its' disadvantages. It would be nice if Garmin had an "average like a magellan button" and Magellan had a "knock the stupid averaging off" button so each could the do best job for the situation at hand.

Edited February 23, 2006 by Renegade Knight

[+Jamie Z]

Bones,

 

One of the local experts did a side-by-side comparison of the units and presents a pretty interesting graph.

 

The link is here (I think), although I couldn't get it to open. Maybe later today the site will be back up.

 

http://www.mtgc.org/robertlipe/showdown

 

Jamie

[+embra]

The link to Robert's site is the only side-by-side data analysis I have seen so far.

[+JohnnyVegas]

In my personal experience, lock time is absurdly faster with the X series than with the eXplorist. My eXplorist used to take minutes to get a lock, the csx takes seconds.

But a fast locking speed has nothing to do with accuracy, it just means the GPS on locks faster.

 

In the early days of GPS technology it would take a GPS 15-30 minutes to get a lock, I remeber selling those early units from Magellan, Garmin and Lowrance. I did not mind the long wait while showing the GPS to a customer, I just looked at it as a paid break I kind of missed those long locking times when the new 12 channel units first hit the market.

[Dr_Dajom]

I found this link:

http://www.mtgc.org/robertlipe/showdown/.

 

That article is pretty interesting, so it seems that the SiRF III is more accurate than what's used in the Magellan units.

 

- bones

 

 

It does???!??

The way I see it it's less accurate but tracks a satellite or two more.

Edited February 24, 2006 by Dr_Dajom

[robertlipe]

It seems to me that the author of that comparison (who happens to be an engineer and knows about distinctions like those between "precision" and "accuracy" and has some non-trivial amount of geocaching experience with many units) tried fairlly hard to avoid decreeing one was more _accurate_ than the other. There's lots of weasel words by the author disclaiming that the reception is better and this could, in some cases, lead to better accuracy, but it's not categorically so.

 

Bones10, almost everything you're fussing about is addressed in the article in question.

 

Renegade Knight, you keep grumbling about hte Magellans lying about their lock, but I'm not all seeing that with > 2000 finds on each brand. The C series lies about its lock when it doesn't have one; it will eventually give it up, but that blue halo showing you've overshot an intersection by a block or more or the 200ft epe while you're in the woods just isn't funny. The key difference between it and the Magellans of the era (and those that preceeded it by even a couple of years) is that it probably actually doesn't have one. Yeah, the older Magellans had the annoying "overshoot" thing - but that didn't have anything to do with losing lock. My 60CS will wait for a crazy long time before reporting that it's lost lock while I'm hunting - in the woods or in a parking lot.. My Magellans will report they've lost lock when they really have lost lock but that just plain happens less than on any of the Garmins I've cached with before the 60CSX.

 

RK, look carefully at the http://www.mtgc.org/tmp/distance.png and related 'when in roam' section - the C series just plain didn't even pretend to have lock for the majority of the experiment. That's why the red squiggly lines are so far apart.

 

Johnny Vegas, let me emphasis the punchline a little clearer. (Perhaps the author of the review is due to state this on the page now that he's racked up 100+ finds on it...) It's not about whether an Explorist with 10 sats vs. an X series with 11 sats is better. It's whether having a lock -as you're more likley to have with either a Magellan or an X series - is better than not having a lock.

[+Jamie Z]

Bones,

 

One of the local experts did a side-by-side comparison of the units and presents a pretty interesting graph.

 

The link is here (I think), although I couldn't get it to open. Maybe later today the site will be back up.

 

http://www.mtgc.org/robertlipe/showdown

 

Jamie

 

So.. I made this post and never saw that the OP had this very link as the first line in his post. Perhaps I need to get some glasses. Sheesh. I'll crawl back into my hole. Sorry...

 

Jamie

[+bones10]

robertlipe,

 

Ok I see my mistake now. I didn't word that initial statement very well. I kept asking, "Why is everyone talking about accuracy? I didn't ask about accuracy." lol. Now I know why.

 

From your article it seems that the garmin had better reception (saw about 1 additional satellite more than the magellan), and that it may be better at keeping a lock.

 

My question was if the better reception would be noticeably different in many situations, or if it would be noticeably different only rarely/occasionally, or if perhaps one would be hard pressed to find a situation when the garmin would lock and the magellan wouldn't.

 

I'm trying to help pick out a unit that will be a gift for someone else. This person (whom the gift is for) would like to have a unit that works well under tree cover while hiking or offroading.

 

To draw a silly example, would they both keep a lock from Lucy's wardrobe all the way to Mr Tumnus's cave?

 

Jamie Z,

 

lol No sweat, man.

[robertlipe]

I have never found reception on Explorist (or its predecessors) to be a problem. In fact, that has always been one of the claims to fame of that product lineage. I've used them in a variety of environments. Of all the Magellan complaining in these very forums, reception just isn't a common theme.

 

I have found the reception of the Sirf-less Garmins to be very much a problem in the real world. This, too, is supported by many posts by others.

 

If you're hunting for tupperware in the woods, the difference between two satellites and four in sight matters much more than the difference between six and eight. (Hint: you need three satellites for a position fix...)

 

I probably won't weigh in with an "official" opinion on the X model until I have at least 1000 finds with it. But a practical "off the cuff" answer is that reception IS a matter to choose a 60CSX over a 60CS. It's probably not a reason to pick a 60CSX over an Explorist.

[+Renegade Knight]

...Renegade Knight, you keep grumbling about hte Magellans lying about their lock, but I'm not all seeing that with > 2000 finds on each brand. The C series lies about its lock when it doesn't have one; it will eventually give it up, but that blue halo showing you've overshot an intersection by a block or more or the 200ft epe while you're in the woods just isn't ...

 

That gripe came from a cache trip where Night Stalker and I were on a twisty mountain road in tree cover with several side roads. The GPSs were a GPS V and the Sport Track Pro. We both did a goto for the next cache and then ended up in an argument as to the right direction and road to take. My V was beeping and buzzing about losing it's lock. However when it had it, it would indicate one direction. Meanwhile The Sport Track Pro pointed the way confidently but in another direction. Night Stalker won the ensuing debate (being the navigator) and off we went down the wrong road. When his GPS got a lock (it wasn't reporting it didn't have one) it switched directions. So back we went following the way the GPS V told is when it had a lock.

 

My best guess and it's a guess is that the Sport Track Pro was using a method of dead reconing. Great if you are going more or less in a straight line. Bad when you make a turn on a twisty road. From your other data it looks like the loss of lock reporting has changed from the defaults on the V.

 

As for precision and accuracy. When shooting I like telling people "Man am I accurate, on average I hit the target!, ". They usually don't get it.

Edited February 24, 2006 by Renegade Knight

[robertlipe]

There will be lone incidents where any one given unit will win. My impressions are based on lots of hunts. (I've received several messages questioning if my GPS opinions are really based on how well they perform at my desk. I actually do have some geocaching experience, too...)

 

IIRC, the Magellans of that era do default to having the 'lost fix' alarm turned off. If he didn't have that turned on and didn't have EPE on the screen there may have been some delay before it reported losing a fix. It's not impossible for them to lose fix, but it's my experience that it's much more rare.

 

So my guess is that there was no "dead rekoning" involved in this case. [1] The unit had lost a lock and Night Stalker didn't recognize the symptoms and didn't have the unit configured to alarm him. Since it didn't have a fix, if he didn't double check the direction the arrow pointed against a compass and/or map, it would have "lied" to him. In fairness, the defaults for this unit do lead to that conclusion.

 

A little practice with a 60CS will give you up to a minute's advance notice when it loses lock before it finally gives up and displays the dreaded red box. If the speed is constant and the compass quits working, the unit has actually lost lock. The red box is inevitable.

 

The next time I get bored, perhaps I'll put a ST, a 60CS, and a 60CSX in the oven with the light on and time how long until each gives the lost fix alarm.

 

[1] This case is different than the motion averaging that gives the 330/ST/Meridian family their "slingshot" effect.