OSUFanInJapan Posted March 26, 2007 Share Posted March 26, 2007 Hi all, First off I am new to caching and thanks to my brother I am wanting to get started and enjoying it as soon as possible. There are some problems tho that I am facing. 1. I live in Japan 2. I own a Macbook 3. No GPS Unit yet My questions are these. Since I live in Japan its virtually impossible to find a GPS that is set up in English. They do have the main brands here (just have to hunt for them and they are double what they are back stateside) Does anyone know if most units have multi language capability? Like switching Japanese to English etc? This might also be part of my 3rd problem. Any ideas on where to get GPS units in Japan? My next problem is that I own a macbook laptop and I have read that most GPS units are not Mac compatiable yet. Is this true? Any ideas on which units might be or are compatible? Thanks for the help and any info!!! Quote Link to comment
+NomadVW Posted March 29, 2007 Share Posted March 29, 2007 Just popping in briefly to fix up a post elsewhere. I'm in Japan south of Hiroshima. None of the Garmin units are multilingual. None of the Garmin Japan units will work with stateside mapping software and vice versa. Nor will Garmin USA units be compatible with any Mapsource software from Japan. Neither side is capable of functioning with multiple fonts required. Quote Link to comment
aneles Posted March 8, 2008 Share Posted March 8, 2008 I'm also a brand new newbie. I would like to start geocaching, but have the same questions as the OP. Any Japan users... what units do you use? Where did you buy? I checked Tokyu Hands, Yodobashi camera, and a bicycle store with no luck. I DID find some units at AutoBacs (the car parts store) but they didn't seem to have anything similar to what I see on ebay. I also have a MacBook. I can read some Japanese but would prefer English. Also, my mobile phone has a navi, but I'm not sure how to use it. Anyone out there successfully using EZ NaviWalk to geocache? Thanks in advance... Quote Link to comment
+coggins Posted March 8, 2008 Share Posted March 8, 2008 Hi all, First off I am new to caching and thanks to my brother I am wanting to get started and enjoying it as soon as possible. There are some problems tho that I am facing. 1. I live in Japan 2. I own a Macbook 3. No GPS Unit yet My questions are these. Since I live in Japan its virtually impossible to find a GPS that is set up in English. They do have the main brands here (just have to hunt for them and they are double what they are back stateside) Does anyone know if most units have multi language capability? Like switching Japanese to English etc? This might also be part of my 3rd problem. Any ideas on where to get GPS units in Japan? My next problem is that I own a macbook laptop and I have read that most GPS units are not Mac compatiable yet. Is this true? Any ideas on which units might be or are compatible? Thanks for the help and any info!!! If I were you, I would order a Gamin unit from the US, most likely from http://www.rei.com and get my maps from http://uud.info/ or http://rwsmaps.griffel.se/ or http://www011.upp.so-net.ne.jp/mametaro/index-e.html and convert these maps to a Mac format with the instructions here. Quote Link to comment
+DonB Posted March 8, 2008 Share Posted March 8, 2008 Hi all, First off I am new to caching and thanks to my brother I am wanting to get started and enjoying it as soon as possible. There are some problems tho that I am facing. 1. I live in Japan 2. I own a Macbook 3. No GPS Unit yet My questions are these. Since I live in Japan its virtually impossible to find a GPS that is set up in English. They do have the main brands here (just have to hunt for them and they are double what they are back stateside) Does anyone know if most units have multi language capability? Like switching Japanese to English etc? This might also be part of my 3rd problem. Any ideas on where to get GPS units in Japan? My next problem is that I own a macbook laptop and I have read that most GPS units are not Mac compatiable yet. Is this true? Any ideas on which units might be or are compatible? Thanks for the help and any info!!! I don't know if you can buy one in Japan or not, and I if you can I don't know how it would be setup over there, but my iFinder Hunt will let you choose between ten different languages for the menus. The lowrance models you do not have hook up to the computer to load waypoints, you use EasyGPS and when you click on send to GPS it writes it out as a .usr file which you copy to the SD card. You can have multiple files on the card so you can load just what you want when you want it. If you macbook can use EasyGPS you might be in business. Quote Link to comment
+J10fly Posted March 8, 2008 Share Posted March 8, 2008 Interesting...I just checked my Magellan Explorist 500 and it has a ton of languages but no Japanese. Wow there are ones on here I never heard of....Suomi, Svenska, and Norsk. Very weird. I would recommend goind onto Magellan or Garmin's web site directly and asking their techs what you should do. They will know! Quote Link to comment
+coggins Posted March 8, 2008 Share Posted March 8, 2008 Hi all, First off I am new to caching and thanks to my brother I am wanting to get started and enjoying it as soon as possible. There are some problems tho that I am facing. 1. I live in Japan 2. I own a Macbook 3. No GPS Unit yet My questions are these. Since I live in Japan its virtually impossible to find a GPS that is set up in English. They do have the main brands here (just have to hunt for them and they are double what they are back stateside) Does anyone know if most units have multi language capability? Like switching Japanese to English etc? This might also be part of my 3rd problem. Any ideas on where to get GPS units in Japan? My next problem is that I own a macbook laptop and I have read that most GPS units are not Mac compatiable yet. Is this true? Any ideas on which units might be or are compatible? Thanks for the help and any info!!! I don't know if you can buy one in Japan or not, and I if you can I don't know how it would be setup over there, but my iFinder Hunt will let you choose between ten different languages for the menus. The lowrance models you do not have hook up to the computer to load waypoints, you use EasyGPS and when you click on send to GPS it writes it out as a .usr file which you copy to the SD card. You can have multiple files on the card so you can load just what you want when you want it. If you macbook can use EasyGPS you might be in business. Nice, how about mapping software? Is it all Windows only? Quote Link to comment
+Starruby Posted March 13, 2008 Share Posted March 13, 2008 ... Wow there are ones on here I never heard of....Suomi, Svenska, and Norsk. Very weird. You would speak these languages if you came from Finland, Sweden and Norway Quote Link to comment
OSUFanInJapan Posted April 10, 2008 Author Share Posted April 10, 2008 Well, I just got a Garmin Etrex (basic model) I guess there is no real need for a mapping one at this point and no need to worry about Macbook Compatibility. I hope it works for my needs and once I get more comfortable with it all and gain some knowledge, I move on to a mapping device. Quote Link to comment
aneles Posted April 10, 2008 Share Posted April 10, 2008 Thanks to everyone who responded! I picked up a simple little Magellan on ebay. I've been able to input coordinates and managed to find 14 caches while on Guam last week. I haven't figured out mapping capabilities or interconnectivity yet, but caching has been pretty fun so far! I appreciate your help~~ Quote Link to comment
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