GPS anomilies

[+GS&Dogs]

Hi All. I am trying to determine if my GPSr(GPSmap 60CSX) is faulty or wether there may be some bugs in our SA Streetmaps software. In order to do this I need to ask if anyone else has come accross the following: While driving on the road at S33 59.967 E18 50.721 at more or less this specific point, my GPSr switches off with no warning. At first we thought it was batteries, but on changing the batteries and driving this road again, it switches off again. I tried switching on the GPSr and approaching from the other side but the GPS switched off again. This spot has become known as the twilight zone amongst friends who have no problems with their Garmin 60.

 

I have noticed this anomaly at a few other places in Cape Town and the surrounds. Sunday while driving close to S33 00.742 E18 46.176 my GPSr switched off again.

 

Have any of you had problems with your GPSr switching off for no apparent reason?

Thanks in advance.

[+Noddy]

So its not only the Electricity thats gets switched off in Cape Town.

 

Just another reason to come caching in KZN.

 

[+bear&fox]

I think it's just a dodgy GPSr. Our little yellow units never give a hint of trouble at all. Since we are feeling generous we will swop one of our units fo your 60CSX. Call us now and we'll even throw in some brand new Energizers.

 

Seriously though, doesn't it only happen when auto-routing?

[+GS&Dogs]

Not only when auto-routing. If I am not mistaken the second time I visited "Where sheep drink wine" I was not routing. The fact that it always happens at the same spot kinda points in the direction that it could be map related.

[+colinaly]

If I am not mistaken the second time I visited "Where sheep drink wine" I was not routing.

We were in that area a couple of weeks ago with our 60CS and had no problems with it switching off.

[+GlobalRat]

I have experienced this as well. This predominantly happens in the cape area and the reason seems to be the following:-

 

In the latest version of streetmaps you have trails as well as roads. A buffer is built between these two so that you don't suddenly find yourself autorouting in your car onto the cecilia forest contour path. Yes, the trails are autoroutable once you are on them.

 

Anyway, what seems to happen is that when you have a waypoint where the GPSr has to route across this barrier it is incapable of doing so with the software loaded, and halfway in the route it reverts to the GPSr's basemap and goes a bit gaga. This is why one sometimes gets routed on a 2000km route when you're only 2km from the waypoint. The 60CSX seems to not like this occurrence and while doing a monster calculation shuts down. Try perform the same route in mapsource and you'll find mapsource is also unable to create a route and just draws a straight line. We tested this briefly with Landy's 76csx. It didn't shutdown, but just returned an error that it couldn't route.

 

I've been in contact with Garmin US, UK and more recently Avnic. Garmin US and UK gave me no joy. I owe Avnic a more comprehensive email, but haven't got round to it. I suggest you report the problem to Garmin as well as to Avnic. The more people that complain, the more likely they are to eventually do something about it.

 

As for the problem with the map and being unable to route to waypoints where one has to route across that safety barrier. I've made Garmap aware of this and they were looking into it... time to send off a "what's the latest update" email. IMHO, I think with the advent of GPSr's with Expandable memory, Garmin is going to have to rethink the logic on the way GPSr's "think". The amount of data in maps is going to increase exponentially (and has) yet the units are still designed to work with the old maps which were restricted by memory size.

 

By the way, GARMAP has a forum as well, so throw it on there too. I got a pretty snappy response from them when I posted on the forum, but never heard a peep when I emailed them directly.

[+GS&Dogs]

Thanks for the input GR.

Garmaps forum is actually where this topic stems from as I first asked the question there. I originally tried the support@garmap.co.za route but this was a waste of time for the second time round. The forum seems to be the best bet to get any answers.

They have apparently not come accross anything like this before. I decided to ask this question here as there is a large concentration of us going to the same areas using the same equipment. I have noticed this anomalies quite a few times already so if there is a general unit problem more people here should be noticing it too. So far the response indicates that not many people have experienced this, in which case it could very well be a faulty unit or batch related problem. The guys at garmap are steering me to take the unit back to Avnic for testing and possibly replacement. This is a concern to me as it means I will be sitting without a unit for a while. Now if we were in the states there would definatley be a temporary unit for use while testing.

[+vespax]

As for the problem with the map and being unable to route to waypoints where one has to route across that safety barrier. I've made Garmap aware of this and they were looking into it... time to send off a "what's the latest update" email. IMHO, I think with the advent of GPSr's with Expandable memory, Garmin is going to have to rethink the logic on the way GPSr's "think". The amount of data in maps is going to increase exponentially (and has) yet the units are still designed to work with the old maps which were restricted by memory size.

 

IMHO, Garmin may need to rethink the whole way that they create the maps and come up with a new format. Having made a couple of maps for my 60cs, I can say that the maps in the unit are estentially a picture that has geographic references to it. Thus the file format of .img (.img = image?) This than has two other files associated with it, the 'preview' file that Mapsources uses when zoomed far out and an index file, for all the tiles that you select to tell mapsource which .img files need to be updated in the GPS.

 

It is a good idea to not have this .img file to be larger than 2 megs becouse of unit process time. Now, with more and more data included in on these maps, it will drain the units cpu or couse the map tiles to be ever smaller. So a rethink in the map format would be ideal, however large corporations don't adjust to change easy, so we shall see.

 

I have worked on other GPS units and their map formats, so I have seen how you can load a completely routable map of the entire US on one data card and use it in a PDA. So IMO Garmin needs a rethink as data gets more intense and user demands increase.

 

my .02

[+Seeker Two]

I have experienced similar things. It seems when I ride 180 degrees from where I am supposed to go the unit shuts down. Has happened about 5 time now. GPSMap 60CSx

 

[+GlobalRat]

So far the response indicates that not many people have experienced this, in which case it could very well be a faulty unit or batch related problem. The guys at garmap are steering me to take the unit back to Avnic for testing and possibly replacement.

 

Please keep us updated. If it is indeed a unit problem than Avnic may just be receiving a flurry of units.....and Garmap is going to be issuing a whole bunch of new CD's.

 

I definitely think the units have a problem with complex calculations. I had a legit route from JHB to CPT which the unit routed fine. I was in a cab and the driver was driving me home. The unit successfully recalculated routes about 4 times and then started bombing as per Seeker Two. It seems in other units the GPS gives up and returns a can not route error. The 60CSX seems to shut down. I posted the issue on numerous different forums in the US and Europe and didn't receive much of a response. Most folks were of the opinion that there are errors in the map sets. Based on the fact that we have 3 cachers on this thread with the same problem, we either have to assume that it is a software problem or that Garmin is shipping all their dud units to the "Third World".

 

If anyone knows other users of 60csx's with similar problems, please get them to post on Garmap as well as this forum.

 

Now if we were in the states there would definatley be a temporary unit for use while testing.

 

Based on what I've read on the forums, I wouldn't bank on this thought.

[+GlobalRat]

Thanks for the input GR.

Garmaps forum is actually where this topic stems from as I first asked the question there.

 

Can you post a link to your thread so that we can add our voices there too.

[+GlobalRat]

Here are the two links to the Garmap forums.

 

Autotouting error

 

Shutdown error

 

If you're experiencing these, please add your voice to these threads.

[+Team_Farmers]

'n boer maak a plan,

maar 'n engelsman maak a beter plan: use a compass + map

 

don't worry, chuck norris also seems to have a problem with his GPS blowing up on him, everytime he turns it on

 

if you want, we can get chuck to post a comment on the garmin forums? ha ha