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Garmin 60cx, Bought One - Now, Software?


JennyW

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Hi guys!

 

I just bought the Garmin 60cx for my father. He hunts, and, like everyone, drives a car.

 

I had a few questions about it, however.

 

A poster on here, by the name of Iwiski, said that to need the following to have a complete 60cx:

 

1. City Navigator North America V8 NT

 

2. Mapsource Topo

 

I'm wondering if the two above are included with my purchase of the 60cx already?

 

On the back of the box it says:

 

- Includes MapSoruce Trip and Waypoint Manager for transferring waypoint, route and track data between GPS and PC.

- Built-in basemap; automatic routing capability.

- Compatible with MapSource BlueChart and 24K TOPO Software.

 

This may sound silly, but does that mean that the items Iwiski noted are included with my Garmin 60cx?

 

 

Any help would be great!

 

Thanks.

Jenny

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We, too, took the plunge to a 60Cx. Does anyone know what happened to the GPS screen protector guys that used to have an ad on the Geocaching web site? Or who they were? Or if any of the other protectors that come multi in a pad are any good. The protector we have on the 60C is great and they make good gifts at the Christmas events. Just need to find those guys :santa:

Barnabirdy(s) K&A

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For detailed road maps and address to address auto-routing, you will need City Navigator. It comes in two versions, City Navigator and City Navigator NT. The regular City Navigator version would take about 1.7GB to hold the entire country. The NT version can fit the whole country in 1GB. Of course, the NT version costs more. Unless you expect to travel all over the country, the regular version will allow you to put about half of the country on a 1GB chip. You would just reload the chip if you had to travel to an area not currently loaded. Amazon.com always has a very good price for the MapSource software.

 

Barnabirdy(s) - The screen protector you are looking for is the Invisible Shield from ShieldZone. They have one specifically for the 60Cx for about $10.

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Hi guys! Thanks for all the replies!

 

So, are you guys saying that if I get the following:

1. City Navigator North America V8 NT

 

2. Mapsource Topo

 

That the 64 MB card presently with the Garmin 60cx won't be sufficient?

 

Let me know! AHhhhhh x-mas is approaching too soon!! :surprise:

 

Jenny :huh:

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Hi guys! Thanks for all the replies!

So, are you guys saying that if I get the following:

1. City Navigator North America V8 NT

2. Mapsource Topo

That the 64 MB card presently with the Garmin 60cx won't be sufficient?

 

Yep, get #1 if you want to do street routing. Add #2 if you want topographic maps. Try amazon.com for good prices and free shipping.

 

The 64MB card will only hold about one state. Get a 1GB card and you can get the whole US on it with City Navigator North Americal NT. You can go up to 2GB if you want the whole US and also have Topo maps on it. A SanDisk or Kingston should work fine. It must be a micro SD card, not mini or regular SD. Do not get a card listed as being an Ultra II card - they are not compatible with the Garmin units. A 1GB microSD card should cost about $20 on amazon.com. You can sometimes find better deals this time of year. I got one from Office Depot for $10 but that deal has expired.

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Hi guys!

 

A poster on here, by the name of Iwiski, said that to need the following to have a complete 60cx:

 

1. City Navigator North America V8 NT

 

2. Mapsource Topo

 

I'm wondering if the two above are included with my purchase of the 60cx already?

 

 

JennyW,

 

Great purchase you just made for your father. My father and I both have the same thing.

 

I think your dad would enjoy having both the topo and city navigator map sets since he hunts. I agree that geocaching only probably does not justify topo depending where you're geocaching.

 

I recently purchased both software map sets and asked on this forum if I had found the cheapest prices. These are what I came up with.

 

City Navigator North America NT (Version 8) DVD @ planetgps.net OUT OF STOCK 106.95 free shipping

 

Next best price: 108.99 + shipping

 

Mapsource Topo @ Amazon.com 64.99 Free Shipping

 

You can buy Mapsource Topo used because the CDs do not require anything special like an unlock code. The prices used on Ebay are very close to the Amazon.com price.

 

You do not want to buy the City Navigator DVD used because the software requires an unlock code, in which you acquire over the internet, and it is associated with your 60cx unit's serial number. You can only unlock the software for two GPS units, so if your dad unlocked it the first time and then lost his GPS, he would be able to unlock it one more time for the new unit's serial number.

 

I also just bought a screen protector from InvisibleShield---it is supposed to be the best of the best and is 40% off now, so it's 5.97. Go here and type in "Garmin 60" where it says FIND A SHIELD.

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Just my $0.02 - I wouldn't spend the money on the Topo map software. I have it loaded on my 60CSX and haven't found much use for it. If it had the majority of hiking trails or old logging roads on it it would be much more useful, but it doesn't. Your $70 is better spent on something else, IMHO.

 

You definitely want City Navigator 8.0 NT though. And yes, you'll want a larger microSD card than the unit comes with, however a 1GB card should be sufficient. Right now, 2GB cards are very expensive compared to the 1GB cards. Street maps of the entire USA will fit on a 1GB car with room left over, so a 2GB card is overkill for most people. I use a 512 MB car in my GPS because I found that even a 1GB was larger than I needed. And I have street and topo maps loaded from Maine to North Carolina, and west to Kentucky. If I'm traveling outside that area, I'll take 20 minutes and reload the card.

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We, too, took the plunge to a 60Cx. Does anyone know what happened to the GPS screen protector guys that used to have an ad on the Geocaching web site? Or who they were? Or if any of the other protectors that come multi in a pad are any good. The protector we have on the 60C is great and they make good gifts at the Christmas events. Just need to find those guys :(

Barnabirdy(s) K&A

 

http://www.shieldzone.com

 

They're having a sale. I have no connection with them other than being a satisfied customer.

Link to comment

We, too, took the plunge to a 60Cx. Does anyone know what happened to the GPS screen protector guys that used to have an ad on the Geocaching web site? Or who they were? Or if any of the other protectors that come multi in a pad are any good. The protector we have on the 60C is great and they make good gifts at the Christmas events. Just need to find those guys :(

Barnabirdy(s) K&A

 

http://www.shieldzone.com

 

They're having a sale. I have no connection with them other than being a satisfied customer.

 

I have used the clear table cloth plastic material you can buy for little money at a fabric store, I cut to the shape of whatever i am covering then dampen and position, works well!!

Link to comment

We, too, took the plunge to a 60Cx. Does anyone know what happened to the GPS screen protector guys that used to have an ad on the Geocaching web site? Or who they were? Or if any of the other protectors that come multi in a pad are any good. The protector we have on the 60C is great and they make good gifts at the Christmas events. Just need to find those guys :(

Barnabirdy(s) K&A

 

http://www.shieldzone.com

 

They're having a sale. I have no connection with them other than being a satisfied customer.

 

I have used the clear table cloth plastic material you can buy for little money at a fabric store, I cut to the shape of whatever i am covering then dampen and position, works well!!

 

I got a lifetime supply from the Wally-Mart fabric department for about $2.00. :(

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I think your dad would enjoy having both the topo and city navigator map sets since he hunts. I agree that geocaching only probably does not justify topo depending where you're geocaching.

Even if he doesn't use the topo maps on the GPS, he might still find them useful on his PC, for planning purposes. I've been trying to convince my brother, who is also a hunter, that he really "needs" a GPSr, but so far he hasn't "seen the light". My nephew (sister's son) who is also a hunter, uses a Rino so he can communicate with his hunting partner.

 

If your father turns out to really like the topos, then consider getting him the 24K maps for his next birthday (more detail than the 100K for the areas they cover). I would let him get familiar with the 60Cx and the 100K maps, then make a decision on the 24K maps based on whether or not they cover the areas he hunts and whether or not he thinks they would be useful.

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I just received my 60cx and Delorme Topo USA (But Santa won't let me play with them till after Christmas and has wrapped them to make sure :D ). I was wondering what would justify getting the Mapsource topo. It seems, from several comments in this post, that the topos aren't needed for caching. I was wondering why. Wouldn't having topos in a gpsr be valuable for navigation while hiking? The majority of my caching lately has been along hiking trails. My original intent for the Topo USA was to share hike data in a newsletter I produce as well as with other local boy scout leaders.

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