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Magellan Explorist


mullinfo

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Which one? They will do the job, but the 100, 200 and 300 do not have a PC hookup, so should be avoided.

 

The 210 is OK but has limited, fixed map memory. The 400, 500 and 600 are the better models.

 

Also before considering a Magellen you should know that their rep for customer support ranges from lousy to abysmal. If you don't need to deal with customer service, then that isn't an issue, but if you ever do, be prepared for a lot of frustration.

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Very helpful advice. It is a toss up between the 210 and the 400. I am leaning more to the 400 because of the lithium ion battery. Hoping it will go on sale at Canadian Tire. There is about at $ 50.00 difference between the 210 and the 400, but I think that I would save as much in battery costs over a period of time. Have never geocached so am looking forward to the adventure. Thanks for the suggestions.

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On the customer service - I just got my eXplorist 500 back from a warranty repair (quickly, no cost) - the online forms to ask for support seem to be a deadend, but the phone number worked.

 

I thought the learning curve quite steep, but the file management is a great feature, especially if you travel. Unit is small, light and can hang from a lanyard around your neck. I was concerned about the proprietary battery, but have had excellent battery life. I'm loving the topo maps, which are good topos and also have decent road maps.

 

http://www.pc-mobile.net/mex100.htm

 

a cable for downloads is being sold for the lower end Magis. I have no experience with it, and would recommend buying one with download capability out of the box.

Edited by Isonzo Karst
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Very helpful advice. It is a toss up between the 210 and the 400. I am leaning more to the 400 because of the lithium ion battery. Hoping it will go on sale at Canadian Tire. There is about at $ 50.00 difference between the 210 and the 400, but I think that I would save as much in battery costs over a period of time. Have never geocached so am looking forward to the adventure. Thanks for the suggestions.

 

Personally I would avoid any unit with the LI battery. Geocaching can take you far from your charger. If your unit were to go dead while you're 4 miles from your car you are SOL. At least with AA batteries you can just pop in a fresh pair, or even cannibalize a flashligt or camera if you don't have extra with you.

 

If long term expense is a concern you can get 4 rechargable AAs and a charger for under $25.

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Very helpful advice. It is a toss up between the 210 and the 400. I am leaning more to the 400 because of the lithium ion battery. Hoping it will go on sale at Canadian Tire. There is about at $ 50.00 difference between the 210 and the 400, but I think that I would save as much in battery costs over a period of time. Have never geocached so am looking forward to the adventure. Thanks for the suggestions.

 

Personally I would avoid any unit with the LI battery. Geocaching can take you far from your charger. If your unit were to go dead while you're 4 miles from your car you are SOL. At least with AA batteries you can just pop in a fresh pair, or even cannibalize a flashligt or camera if you don't have extra with you.

 

If long term expense is a concern you can get 4 rechargable AAs and a charger for under $25.

Brian, I think it is 6 of one, half a dozen of another. The lithium ion battery's life is decent at about 18 hours. That should be sufficient for a day's trek. If someone wanted to feel more secure, they could purchase a spare battery for about $5 on eBay. No, you cannot cannibalize AAs from your flashlight or camera, but the cost and trouble of carrying a spare Li ion pack is minimal.

 

Keeping the eXplorist charged has often been likened to a cell phone. Nobody minds plugging their cell phone into the wall every few days for charging. It's the same process for the eXplorist. I charge mine through my PC before and after my weekly cache trip.

 

Anyway, I wouldn't be scared of the Li ion battery. I think it's nice not having to change out batteries. I've had my eX400 almost two years and can count the number of times I have opened the battery compartment on one hand.

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I have a 500 and the Lithium Ion battery is great. The easy answer to your concern about being stuck in the forest without a charger is that it comes with a little plastic piece that slips into the battery spot to make AAAs fit!

 

It (was) a great unit, a little tricky at first, but fantasitc for caching and usually a heck of a lot more accurate than my caching partners unit.

 

Their customer support sucks though. Suck barely begins to describe it.

 

Also a couple of weeks ago a minor* problem started for not apparant reason... my unit just decided it doesn't like satellites anymore. I could stand in an open field for an hour restarting the GPS every so often, and it still says "tracking 0 satellites" so it's kind of useless right now. Sigh, I guess I should try calling them again. Last time I almost ripped all of my hair out.

 

*not so minor problem

Edited by ThirstyMick
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Have had the 500 since they first came out and love it. Battery is no issue as you can use AA or rechargable as stated earlier. Best feature for me is the abilty to have multiple files loaded to the SD card and then activate the one you wish to use. Nice size for my hand. Remember to buy screen protection for any gps you carry out into the woods. Will save you a bad day to be sure.

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Keeping the eXplorist charged has often been likened to a cell phone. Nobody minds plugging their cell phone into the wall every few days for charging. It's the same process for the eXplorist. I charge mine through my PC before and after my weekly cache trip.

 

True. And if I had a dollar for every time my cell phone battery ran down when I wasn't near a charger, I could buy a year's supply of AA batteries.

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There is a triple A battery tray available for the model. But the rechargeable battery on full charge goes and goes for a long long time.

 

color is nice, unit works well, but I have lost signal where I though I should hold it and in the infamous Clinton Road area of NJ, it would not pull a signal for hours.

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I have a 400, and it works great for me. I haven't had any problems with the battery life. There's also an auto shut off timer that you can set if you're like me and keep forgetting to turn it off. It turns off if it senses no movement after a period of time (I have mine set for an hour).

 

Just to be extra safe (read: paranoid), I ordered the AAA battery clip from buy.com, in case I do run the battery down while in the woods.

 

It came to twelve bucks total , including the shipping:

 

http://www.buy.com/prod/magellan-explorist.../204225036.html

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for what its worth - I have a 210 and like it (though being new - have nothing to compare it to).

 

That being said - I am learning quickly that geocaching - towards the end of the hunt - is more about figuring out how and where things are hidden - there comes a point where at about 30 feet - your need is about gone for the GPSr. The 210 hasn't let me down yet.

 

Hope that helped and enjoy geocaching - its alot of fun (especially with friends and family along).

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Does anyone have any experience using the explorist? I am thinking of getting one- any suggestions?

I am using the 210, and enjoy it. However, my only complaint is that there is no way to manually enter cords, making puzzle caches practically impossible. Hope this helps!

You can manually enter coordinates as a regular POI. However, as Shakedown.dave says, there is no way to edit a Geocache POI on the GPS receiver.
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Very helpful advice. It is a toss up between the 210 and the 400. I am leaning more to the 400 because of the lithium ion battery. Hoping it will go on sale at Canadian Tire. There is about at $ 50.00 difference between the 210 and the 400, but I think that I would save as much in battery costs over a period of time. Have never geocached so am looking forward to the adventure. Thanks for the suggestions.

 

Personally I would avoid any unit with the LI battery. Geocaching can take you far from your charger. If your unit were to go dead while you're 4 miles from your car you are SOL. At least with AA batteries you can just pop in a fresh pair, or even cannibalize a flashligt or camera if you don't have extra with you.

 

If long term expense is a concern you can get 4 rechargable AAs and a charger for under $25.

 

 

I second that, I chose the 210 precisely because it took double AAs. I purchased an energizer 15 minute quick charger and I have 8 rechargeables that I rotate through. I seem to get close to 24 hours from a set of fully charged batteries so I can theoretically cache for 96 hours straight and not run out of rechargeable battery power. Just in case though, I have a power converter for my car so that I can charge them on the go as well.

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Does anyone have any experience using the explorist? I am thinking of getting one- any suggestions?

I am using the 210, and enjoy it. However, my only complaint is that there is no way to manually enter cords, making puzzle caches practically impossible. Hope this helps!

You can manually enter coordinates as a regular POI. However, as Shakedown.dave says, there is no way to edit a Geocache POI on the GPS receiver.

 

 

There are no issues with manual entry of waypoints on a 210. I've done loads of multis, puzzles, etc. and I've never had an issue. Additionally, with the new firmware you can project waypoints as well. To manually enter coordinates, create a POI and edit it.

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Does anyone have any experience using the explorist? I am thinking of getting one- any suggestions?

I am using the 210, and enjoy it. However, my only complaint is that there is no way to manually enter cords, making puzzle caches practically impossible. Hope this helps!

You can manually enter coordinates as a regular POI. However, as Shakedown.dave says, there is no way to edit a Geocache POI on the GPS receiver.

 

 

There are no issues with manual entry of waypoints on a 210. I've done loads of multis, puzzles, etc. and I've never had an issue. Additionally, with the new firmware you can project waypoints as well. To manually enter coordinates, create a POI and edit it.

 

sweet. I need to go play with this thing some more. Thanks for the tips. Does anyone else notice that the time it takes to acquire signal is quite long?

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I am curious to know how the topography software is for the Magellan is now. A few years ago I had a SportTrack Pro and bought the Magellan Topo Software and found it to be useless. The roads were dead-on but the actual topography for the mountains in Colorado was about as far from accurate as possible. It actually looked like it was produced from someones imagination. Highly popular and heavy traffic trails were somehow omitted also. I switched to Garmin and found their software to be very accurate and included every trail. I really did like Magellan's GPS's and hope they have made drastic changes to their software.

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I have used a 500 for several hundred caches now and I love it. I carry the battery clip but I've never had to use it. Charging the Li is sooo easy. Charge it while it's on in the truck. Charge it in the computer while it's off. Charge it in the AC adapter. I even like the fact that the mapping doesn't do automatic reroute. Sometimes I want to see where my way and the mapping diverge and then come together again. I love the Goecache manager which so many people hate. I hardly ever use GSAK or pda for caching anymore.

If only people would learn not to start their hints with "You will find the cache located in..." or "Starting from the parking lot look for the big..." Curse you, Grammarians!!

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sweet. I need to go play with this thing some more. Thanks for the tips. Does anyone else notice that the time it takes to acquire signal is quite long?

 

 

The firmware update takes care of that issue. Before I updated, it often took a minute or so just to find the first satellite and a few minutes after that to get a lock. After updating the firmware, I get a 3+ satellite lock within a minute.

 

 

There may still not be an "official" firmware update for north america, but you can use the europe version and it works great. The only side effect is that you need to change the default units from meters back to feet.

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sweet. I need to go play with this thing some more. Thanks for the tips. Does anyone else notice that the time it takes to acquire signal is quite long?

 

 

The firmware update takes care of that issue. Before I updated, it often took a minute or so just to find the first satellite and a few minutes after that to get a lock. After updating the firmware, I get a 3+ satellite lock within a minute.

 

 

There may still not be an "official" firmware update for north america, but you can use the europe version and it works great. The only side effect is that you need to change the default units from meters back to feet.

Where do I acquire this update? Thanks so much for your help.

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Oh, another thing... I have called customer support and tech support 4 or 5 times, mostly just with questions which were answered promptly. The other time I had lost my 500 and purchased another one and wanted the unlock for directroute mapping changed from the old one to the new one. They did it right away and walked me through the steps. Yes, they have accents. I guess that's too much for some people to handle...

 

One thing is worth saying again. CALL customer support. DON'T email! The only time I emailed, it was never answered. Many others have noted this in various threads...

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Am I the only one with a 600? Here's my advice. Above all else make sure you get one with PC connectivity. This includes the 210, 400, 500, and 600. There is also an XL model, but it is too big for serious cachers. The 400 and 500 are basically the same unit except the 500 has color. The 400 has an electronic compass but the 500 doesn't. The 600 has color and an electronic compass. I have found the electronic compass to be useless. It has to be calibrated quite often and it doesn't work in or around large metal objects such as cars. I leave it turned off. The user interface for all Explorist models is very easy to learn. I have had no problems with signals. I have had others standing next to me and they couldn't get a signal but I had lots of bars. Even on the airplane to Jamaica it picked up fine. The battery isn't a concern. I have 2 lithium batteries and an adapter that will allow it to take AAA's. I've never used the adapter. I will one day when I am away from power for several days, but how many times does that happen?

 

As far as price.... New 600 on Amazon.com for 355.00 free shipping

New 400 for 180.00 (not color)

 

There is a 500 and a 500LE...the LE comes with the adapter for AAA's

 

FYI-I didn't realize how much difference a color receiver makes until I went to BassPro and saw them for my self. Once you see a color receiver, you will never choose one that has no color.

 

Also make sure you don't "skimp" on a model. There is nothing worse than buying one now that you won't want in 2 months. Take a little extra time and save for what you will be completely satisfied with!!

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The 400 has an electronic compass but the 500 doesn't. The 600 has color and an electronic compass.

Actually, the 600 is the only one with an electronic compass. The 400 and 500's compass page is based on your GPS-calculated movement.

 

Otherwise I agree with your points. I cheaped out and bought a 400 instead of a 500 a couple of years ago. Once I got maps for it I wished I had a color screen. As for the electronic compass, save some money and buy a good compass.

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I've had an explorist 500 for about a year, and couldn't be happier.

 

I recently did the firmware update, and I'm kicking myself for not having done it sooner... the reception is SO much better. I recently used the unit while under a parking garage, and was about 100 feet from any edge of the garage, and I got a usable signal. Maybe 100 feet acuracy, but before the firmware update I never would have gotten a signal there at all.

 

I also loaded the MapSend Topo software onto it. It's a bit pricey, but I got the software for $10 when I purchased a new explorist 400 (to be a backup for my 500). I loaded the software onto my 500. The software requires the serial number of your unit, so it will only work with one unit. In the Mapsend software, you select a region to upload to your unit (regions are limited to a couple hundred megs, so you can't do the entire US at once). The software has topo maps for the entire US except for Alaska. I recently loaded the entire state of Washington in, which was around 55 MB. You'll want a memory stick to do this. Memory sticks are cheap:

Amazon

 

Trails are not included in the Topo. Here's what it looks like on the unit: Topo Screen.

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I have a Magellan 500 and am slowly getting full use of it's features as I learn more. Purchased a Li-on battery and charger that I received. Took out the AAA cradle and put in the Li-on battery. Feel embarrased asking this question: how do I recharge the battery? The adapter plugs into the wall and has a male plug with a yellow rim- smaller than my laptop adapter but looks similar. Where does that plug into my GPS? I see no visible port both on the GPS or the battery itself? Help this goober, please!

 

Second, when connected to the PC- I can put it in file transfer mode or "power by the PC mode". When in the latter, I am not wearing down the battery right? Is it recharging the battery as well?

 

I have been very happy with accuracy- can track satellites quickly (though after reading this thread will upgrade the firmware- thank you). Adding POIs is easy and I am getting the hang of downloading. I like the fact I can download my bookmarks ("Today's Caches", "Caches for my Jersey trip") and then switch to that list.

 

Can I batch delete old POIs selectively- kind of CTRL-click the ones I want to delete but not all of them?

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Yes...when on power mode while hooked to computer, it's charging the battery! Also, you should be able to plug the wall unit right into the computer cable at the weird connection "intersection".

 

I was out in DEEP jungle coverage last night and never lost signal...even had a 10' accuracy with waas while deep in! Never would have had signal with my old etrex!

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I've had an explorist 500 for about a year, and couldn't be happier.

 

The software requires the serial number of your unit, so it will only work with one unit.

 

I have no problem loading the software to my sport track and XP all you have to do is change the serial number.

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We just bought an Explorist 210 and we are very happy with it. You can store 300 caches in it (it has geocaching built in, you just have to get the files from the website). I was thinking of going with the 500 LE because you can put an SD card into it, but it was a little more than I was willing to spend on it. We found the 210 retail at Walmart for $149 CDN. Anything lower than the 210 and you can't hook it up to you computer.

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Well...I have seen the 500 wilderness bundle for as low as $184 (if memory serves me) recently...that comes with the Mapsend US 3D software and whatever other goodies (battery pack and cables I think)...VERY cheap for a mapping unit with the power it boasts! I love mine...paid only slightly more than that almost 6 months ago.

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Am I the only one with a 600? Here's my advice. Above all else make sure you get one with PC connectivity. This includes the 210, 400, 500, and 600. There is also an XL model, but it is too big for serious cachers. The 400 and 500 are basically the same unit except the 500 has color. The 400 has an electronic compass but the 500 doesn't. The 600 has color and an electronic compass. I have found the electronic compass to be useless. It has to be calibrated quite often and it doesn't work in or around large metal objects such as cars. I leave it turned off. The user interface for all Explorist models is very easy to learn. I have had no problems with signals. I have had others standing next to me and they couldn't get a signal but I had lots of bars. Even on the airplane to Jamaica it picked up fine. The battery isn't a concern. I have 2 lithium batteries and an adapter that will allow it to take AAA's. I've never used the adapter. I will one day when I am away from power for several days, but how many times does that happen?

 

As far as price.... New 600 on Amazon.com for 355.00 free shipping

New 400 for 180.00 (not color)

 

There is a 500 and a 500LE...the LE comes with the adapter for AAA's

 

FYI-I didn't realize how much difference a color receiver makes until I went to BassPro and saw them for my self. Once you see a color receiver, you will never choose one that has no color.

 

Also make sure you don't "skimp" on a model. There is nothing worse than buying one now that you won't want in 2 months. Take a little extra time and save for what you will be completely satisfied with!!

I have the XL and have found it to be quite manageable. I really love it, and it's really easy to use. The 1 gig sd card I have has plenty of room for lots of detailed maps, too.

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I own the Explorist 210. It is a great little GPSR. It comes with a computer cable to hook to my PC and I use it with Microsoft Streets and Trips as a reciever. It works great there also. You have to turn it off when you unplug the reciever from the computer as it uses the power of the PC to run while it is connected. If you unplug it while it is running it will shut off. I lost my USB cable to the computer and called up Magellan and they sent me one out. Had it within a week. They didn't charge me a dime for this item and I can't see how you could get better service than this. As far as tech support they are from some other country and are hard sometimes to understand (india I think). Other than that it is a great unit. :)

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