Etrex yellow H GC # limit?

[+Mofino]

Hi,

I use a Garmin Etrex Vista HCx and download the waypoints via serial cable.

 

My nephew has an Etrex yellow H and when we go caching I read him the GC number and coords and he manually enters them. On some caches he says he can not fit the whole GC number in, it only takes so many characters. We tried looking in the manual for something to change so he can enter the whole GC number but can't find anything.

 

Is this just a limit of this unit that it only accepts so many characters for the GC number or are we missing something?

 

Thanks for any help!

[+oisact]

GC IDs are pretty short. When he goes to enter the ID, does he first delete the existing, default waypoint ID? I know the number of characters varies between different GPSr devices, and it is very unlikely that you can configure something like that. It would be hardcoded into the firmware.

 

Dan

[+Sputnik 57]

GC numbers were intentionally set at 6 characters (using a modified base 32 character set), since older GPS receivers only allow 6 characters in their name. The first 2 characters were "GC," and the last four represented the cache identifyer. That was all well and good until the number of caches grew too large. At that point (noting that most newer GPS units allow 10 or 14 characters), the powers that be went to a seven character name set.

 

Since all of the caches start with GC (for GeoCache), I suggest that you just drop the G (call them "caches"), or if you are very brave, drop the GC, and just give your young padawan the last 4 or 5 characters.

 

By the way, software for loading caches to your unit (such as GSAK) will allow you to strip unnecessary characters or use "smart names" which more nearly follow the name (as opposed to the number) of the cache.

Edited September 27, 2007 by Sputnik 57

[+Mofino]

GC numbers were intentionally set at 6 characters (using a modified base 32 character set), since older GPS receivers only allow 6 characters in their name. The first 2 characters were "GC," and the last four represented the cache identifyer. That was all well and good until the number of caches grew too large. At that point (noting that most newer GPS units allow 10 or 14 characters), the powers that be went to a seven character name set.

 

Since all of the caches start with GC (for GeoCache), I suggest that you just drop the G (call them "caches"), or if you are very brave, drop the GC, and just give your young padawan the last 4 or 5 characters.

 

By the way, software for loading caches to your unit (such as GSAK) will allow you to strip unnecessary characters or use "smart names" which more nearly follow the name (as opposed to the number) of the cache.

 

Thanks for the info. I'll have him skip the GC part of the number. I was hoping there was a setting to change that but it doesn't look like it...

Edited September 27, 2007 by Mofino