Systems Integration

[+klipsch49er]

So I'm kind of new to geocaching and am having a great time. I purchased my Magellan Explorist 100 to provide accurate location data for use with my computer controlled telescope and found this daytime hobby. Now, however, as is usually the result, I find that I need to seek solutions to integrate my variaous pieces of equipment to make the best of this new hobby.

 

Here is the equipment I can currently take into the field:

 

Magellan Explorist 100

Nokia flip camera phone (WHy don't they list the model number on the outside of those things?)

Handspring Visor PDA (Palm OS 3.??)

Olympus digital camera (old)

Dell laptop (eats batteries for fun)

 

Without purchasing any new equipment I would like to find a way to not carry around the decks of paper printouts of caches I make before I seek session. Does anyone know of a way to get this data onto the old Palm OS or any other creative use of these kinds of hardware setups? Obviously purchasing a upscale Magellan could solve this but first I have my eye on a CCD camera for my telescope first...

 

Any suggestions would, no doubt, be helpful!

[+Miragee]

If you become a Premium Member, you can use pocket queries which you create from a link on your My Account page.

 

From a program like GSAK (Geocaching Swiss Army Knife), you can Export the data to your Handspring after installing Cachemate on the PDA. I've used Cachemate for more than two years on an older Palm M500.

 

You could have more than 1000 caches on your PDA and then using the coordinates of your location, you could do a Distance Search and then enter the coordinates for the nearby caches that interest you.

[+The Leprechauns]

Since you have a battery-eating laptop, why not invest in a power inverter for the car and run the laptop off that? I've been doing this for a bit over a year now. It skips the PDA step. For the vast majority of caches I don't need the cache page after I've left the car. I carry all the cache descriptions around on GSAK, and squirt the appropriate clumps of waypoints onto my GPS as I wander around. I also use the laptop for big-screen real time position mapping and autorouting. It is a lot easier visualizing where the next cache is on a laptop screen instead of a GPS display.

[+Prime Suspect]

I'd leave the laptop at home. You risk getting your car broken into (and the laptop stolen) if you leave it there, or getting it destroyed if you pack it with you. Go with the PDA for storing cache data.

[+schristi69]

GSAK and Cachemate work great for me.

[+schristi69]

GSAK and Cachemate work great for me.

[+schristi69]

GSAK and Cachemate work great for me.

Edited June 13, 2007 by schristi69

[+schristi69]

Wow...triple post. That was odd. Can't find a way to delete them.

[+Driver Carries Cache]

GSAK and Cachemate work great for me.

 

GSAK and Cachemate work great for me.

 

GSAK and Cachemate work great for me.

 

Wow...triple post. That was odd. Can't find a way to delete them.

 

C'mon... tell us how you really feel (sorry, couldn't resist)

 

GSAK and Cachemate work great for me as well!

 

I learned how to implement them using this article from The Florida Geocaching Association.

 

DCC

[+egami]

Wow...triple post. That was odd. Can't find a way to delete them.

 

Hate that...this is the only forum I ever occassionally do that on too. Well, admittedly, I've never accumulated a triple. /bow

[+TheAlabamaRambler]

Here's my solution:

 

Tools

HP Pavilion laptop that I use both as my home and road PC

EarthMate LT-20 GPS for the laptop when in the car.

Laptop stand for mounting the laptop in the car (homebrew, $9 parts from Home Depot).

Delorme Street Atlas, Delorme TOPO and GSAK on the laptop.

Palm Tungsten T5 PDA with CacheMate software.

Garmin GPSMap 60 CSx with MapSource mapping software... both MetroGuide and Topo.

Casio Exilim digital camera.

Digital Voice Recorder.

Cell phone (cell phone can replace camera and DVR if it has those features)

1500 watt DC/AC inverter to run / charge all electronics.

 

Preparation

Groundspeak membership gives me access to PQs and Caches Along A Route (invaluable).

I download a PQ of 500 caches, maybe two PQs totaling 1000 caches if I am traveling, or a PQ of caches along a route.

Once these are received in email I open them in GSAK.

I do any filtering I might want to do in GSAK (I might be on a cache run and don't want to see anything over a 3/3 rated cache and no multis and puzzles, or I might be going to the west of town and don't want to see those north, east and south of the center point).

Once filtered I export the cache data to HTML. This gives me the cache listings on my laptop.

Export to a CacheMate .pdb.

Hotsynch the Palm. This gives me the cache listing on my PDA.

Export from GSAK to Delorme maps on the laptop.

Upload the GSAK data to the GPS.

 

On the streets I have full-screen mapping with all of my cache waypoints and turn-by-turn routing if I choose to use it.

If I want cache data I have all the listings in HTML.

 

On the trail I have maps with my cache waypoints on the GPS, if I want cache data I have all of the listing pages in CacheMate on the Palm.

 

Either way, once I find (or don't find!) the cache I can make notes in either GSAK or CacheMate regarding the hunt, what I traded, what TBs or Geocoins I moved, etc.

 

If I don't want to take the time to write such notes I speak them into the DVR.

 

If I take any pictures I can record the picture number in the DVR for later coordinating pictures with caches.

 

When I get home I download the notes I made in CacheMate to GSAK, connect to geocaching.com and upload all notes to the online cache logs.

 

Sounds like a lot, but it's really simple and fast!

 

Obviously I don't do all that every trip, but when I want to that's how all my gear ties together.

 

Hope that helps.

Edited June 14, 2007 by TheAlabamaRambler