Colorado 300 First impression

[+bdejong]

I thought I would post my impressions having never owned a GPS unit before.

 

I heard about Geocaching a few months ago and finally decided to purchase a GPS unit and start hunting. I went with the Colorado after comparing features and price with the most popular GPS unit the 60HCX.

 

While there is no doubt that people love their 60s and it is a fine unit with a good field repuation I ended up with the Colorado for the following:

 

1. Paperless caching. I like the idea of being able to bring with me the description and the log entries in case I need a little more help. It is nice to not to have to print or carry anything else with me and to have it all on the GPS.

 

2. Price - Found a good price on the Colorado 300 that put it only 100.00 over the 60. Yup, its still a hundred dollars more, but I felt it would be worth it in the end. (Hope I am right)

 

3. Technology - Its the latest offering from Garmin and I am a techno-geek at heat and I like to have the latest

 

OK, now that I have had it for a while and been able to use it on a few cache hunts I would like to share my impressions.

 

So far I like it. I found it very easy to put the cache information in it from this web site. How easy could it be.

 

- Plug it into the computer

- Log in and enter my zip code

- Find a cache I like and click write to GPS.

- BOOM, its there. everything, location, description, stats, and log entries.

- All available at the flick of the funky wheel on the top of the unit

 

Battery -

 

Life has been ok. I put in a fresh set of standard Duracell batteries this morning and turned it on. left it on all day while we went from cache to cache and it worked great. After about 7 hours of being on with intermittent use of the back light the battery indicator finally went to a single bar. I have used a set of Eveready NiMH as well and they last quite a bit longer. I hope to try a set of Lipos if I can find a good set with a good charger. But for now I feel it is acceptable given the display and power requirements of the unit.

 

Display -

 

I love it. Easy to read in the daytime and with a click of the power button I can blast the backlight to make it easily readable in cover or at night (First cache hunt was at night). I chose to modify the caching profile to turn off the back light after 1 Min. This worked ok for me as I dont mind bumping the power button to get it back on when I need it.

 

Accuracy -

 

So far so good, on the first cache we wee right on top of it when it reported about 1 foot. Now this may just be good luck and great placement by the cache owner. For all others we were right in the area when the GPS read that we were under 10 feet away.

 

Paperless -

 

This is the best part. Cache loading is easy and it is all there to read without having to print anything. the list updates itself with the distance to each one from your current location. this was cool, at first I thought the distance was from my home location, but as we traveled I found the distance changed and was in reference to my current location. Here is why this is cool. I can load up a bunch of them for various locations and where ever I am I can browse the list and hit the ones that are showing closest to where I am at that time. this may be standard on other units, if so the great. I thought it was noteworthy.

 

The only thing I dont like is that I can mark it found and cant remove it (at least I dont see any way to remove it from the GPS itself)

 

Trip Computer -

 

Another cool feature, we cleared it before we left and checked it out when we came back home. Wow, we covered quite a bit of area. My son loved reporting my speed and distance as we traveled.

 

Rock and Roll wheel -

 

At first I wasnt sure but now I think this is a cool idea. Very easy to manipulate with a single hand. Did not take long to get used to using it and I think it makes the learning curve shorter since you dont have to remember a bunch of keys. Its all on the wheel and the two soft keys. the flyout menus from the softkeys are easy to read and plenty big. I am glad they did not make them smaller.

 

Misc -

 

I like that I can change the shown data fields on about every screen. For instance when viewing the compass I can change each of the four individual areas that report data. In stock form it displays Speed, eta at dest, dist to next, and time to next. With a click of the softkey I can change each of them to anything I want from the large list of options. I set mine to report air temperature, elevation and GPS strength.

 

I can do this on most every screen. I like this, I can configure it to show what is important to me, I am not stuck with what they want me to see. very cool....

 

Another thing I like is that I can customize the shortcut menus. I removed most of them on the geocaching profile, since I dont care for most of the default menus. I can make it look and work like I want it. I am very self centered you know....

 

So far I like it. These are my opinions and come from my vast one week(s) of GPS experience.