Did I just waste $300 on my GPS ?

[+Howlingmoon]

I just bought a new Garmin Nuvi 260W. I bought it with the intention of using it to find address when I go to pick up things from Freecycle (Freecycle.org for more info) but, a friend recently told me about Geocaching, and I decided to check that out. Since receiving my new GPS Wednesday, I've been reading up on the forums to figure out what to look for, what to take with me, what preparations I should make before I set up, etc. I've yet to see anyone mention using any of the 200, 300, etc series of Garmin Nuvi's. Are they useless for GCing or will they work ? How can I make the most of my 260W for GCing ? I did see a thread about macro's but, know nothing about those, or how to make them work. I'd really appreciate any and all help.

 

Thank you,

[+Packanack]

I claim no authority, but automotive navigators are not normally used for geocaching. As to question of did you waste your money, you have to answer the question: Does it do what I bought it to do ? Do not ask does it do all things. I commonly buy things that I think will have a universal application to the task I wish to perform only to find that yes it works, but does none of the task really well. In other words you may need more than one arrow in your quiver. Welcome to geocaching.

[+joranda]

I'm not sure which one that is. Is it the car unit? I know some people who have used them before but they was mostly park and grab caches where the hiding spots was limited. I have a hand held unit, the 60 csx, it works well for me when I geocache.

[+Howlingmoon]

The 260W is meant to be used in a car but, can be taken out of the car and carried with you.

 

One thing I've already noticed I will probably have problems with for longer hunts tis the fact that it doesn't take batteries. It charges via car cig lighter, usb to computer, or ac adapter.

[+knarf.ca]

I have good new, It can be done. It's not ideal and does have some limitations but you can do it.

 

Take a look at this thread and you will find lots of users who use their Nuvi for Geocaching.

[+briansnat]

Using a Nuvi (or any unit designed for automotive use) is a bit like trying to play tennis with a baseball bat. You can do it, but it's far from the best tool. Lack of a navigation screen, short battery life, durability, lack of waterproofness, and simple ergonomics (it's not designed to be held in the hand) all make it a poor choice for geocaching.

 

It may be sufficient if your geocaching will solely consist of traveling from guardrail to guardrail, but if you want to start hitting the caches a bit off the beaten path it will be seriously flawed.

 

I won't say you wasted your money, because its a great unit for what bought it for - finding addresses. But if you want to get even semi serious about geocaching, you are best off buying an inexpensive hand held unit like a Garmin eTrex H or Venture HC and letting your Nuvi get you to the parking area.

[+Howlingmoon]

Thank you for giving me better ideas on a "geocaching" GPS. I will keep them in mind when I have some extra money. For now, the Nuvi will just have to do. I already planned on staying out of the woods for a while, as I need to get my endurance and such up before I do any hikes (have back and knee complications).

 

Thank you for all the replies!

[+kusojijii]

Thank you for giving me better ideas on a "geocaching" GPS. I will keep them in mind when I have some extra money. For now, the Nuvi will just have to do. I already planned on staying out of the woods for a while, as I need to get my endurance and such up before I do any hikes (have back and knee complications).

 

Thank you for all the replies!

 

I bought a Nuvi200 for a ManToy for myself and then found out about geocaching. I use it for geocaching on an almost daily basis. I love it. I may get another GPS in the future for fear of water damage on the Nuvi but other than that I have no worries about using it.

 

Think of it this way, if the Nuvi can show actual MPH in your vehicle live as your realtime speed changes, it is good enough to get youto the cache. I have had many instances where I was on top of the cache (not literally) and I thought there was no way my GPS was right, but found I wasn't thinking like a Geocacher well enough to find the cache my Nuvi took me directly to.

 

More recently I have started to use the GPS to get me close, then "open my eyes" and actually look at the surroundings from different vantage points and think like someone hiding something you don't want anyone to find.

 

but do use the Paperless Caching for the Nuvi that pilotsnipes did!!

 

have fun!!!

[+Howlingmoon]

Unfortunately, I can't afford to get the premium membership right now. I started putting together a spreadsheet (don' worry, I do this for EVERYTHING!) with all the info I think I might need during a cache hunt (size, difficulty, terrain, hints, parking coord's, etc.). I still have another 100 caches to put into the spreadsheet, then I can sort it by size, difficulty, terrain, etc.; then print out the regular and small caches to start with. lol Maybe in a month or two I can spare the $30 for premium membership if I'm still doing this, which I hope I will be. lol

[+HaLiJuSaPa]

The real important thing is can it navigate you to a latitude/longitude as opposed to just an address. Some "car" units do (ones I know of are my old Lowrance iWay 100M, the Mio Digiwalker series, and the Garmin Quest.....not sure about the Nuvi series), others do not (for example, my current "car unit", a Whistler WGPX-550).

 

If it does this, then 90+% of what you'd use a handheld "hiking" GPS for with Geocaching is there in your unit. The only thing that might be missing is a thing called a "compass rose" which will tell you as you walk how far and it what direction the general area of the cache is. But if your Nuvi can show you a map of where you are vs. the cache area, that will work almost as well.

 

Keep in mind that (especially on eBay as "2nd hand" units) it is not hard to find a GPS that's good for caching that is under $100, sometimes even under $50 if you look hard enough. The Lowrance IFinder GO series even goes for well under $100 new and works quite well for caching (as long as you don't mind manually entering the lat/long waypoints). Good luck!

[+Howlingmoon]

I've already tried finding two caches so far. What I've found out was that it will show the "finish flag" at the coord's (which I can input manually or download from Garmin's website, which links back to Geocaching.com), and I can zoom in far enough that it will show how close I am to the coord's. I was unsuccessful finding those two caches, mainly 'cause I had no clue what I was supposed to be looking for, and didn't realize I'd have to spread my search so far away from the actual location the gps gave me. I did walk around the first cache location for half an hour, looking up in trees, down in drainage areas, and in bushes within quite a distance from the actual flag. lol

 

So I guess my answer tis aye, it will let me input the lat/long, not only give me directions to the addresses.

[+kusojijii]

you should still be able to download the actual waypoints to your garmin from a cache by cache basis, if not from the cache's page, I know you can from through Garmin's site. It will then show you the waypoint as the Taditional Cache green icon and will be titled by the GCXXXX cache name. It will be saved in your favorites.

 

Besides, as a regular member can't you simply DL each individual GPX file for each cache, make a GPX folder to put them in, open them all with the freeware programs from the pilotsnipes tutorial and use paperless caching?

 

I thought the pay membership just added pocket queries.

Edited June 29, 2008 by kusojijii

[+AF Bmet]

I started out geocaching with my wifes nuvi 200W and it is really easy to use. I just bought a 76csx and I have to say I like useing the nuvi and the touch screen alot better than the 76csx. That might change though once I buy sity navigator for the 76csx.

[+Howlingmoon]

you should still be able to download the actual waypoints to your garmin from a cache by cache basis, if not from the cache's page, I know you can from through Garmin's site. It will then show you the waypoint as the Taditional Cache green icon and will be titled by the GCXXXX cache name. It will be saved in your favorites.

 

Besides, as a regular member can't you simply DL each individual GPX file for each cache, make a GPX folder to put them in, open them all with the freeware programs from the pilotsnipes tutorial and use paperless caching?

 

I thought the pay membership just added pocket queries.

I can only download the LOC files from geocaching.com. Paid membership gives you access to the GPX files. I've tried downloading the LOC files, putting them into GSAK, then sending to the GPS but, I received an error. I have no idea why it won't work. I was just fixin' to make a post asking if anyone could help me figure out how to get it to work. I saved the error message I received when trying to do it. I eventually found that I could also download caches from Garmin's website, which links back to the cache pages on geocaching.com but, Garmin doesn't show as much info on the list pages. I have to go into each cache page to see the size, distance, etc.

[+DocDiTTo]

I can only download the LOC files from geocaching.com. Paid membership gives you access to the GPX files.

 

You'll probably need to use the Garmin POI loader program (free download from www.garmin.com) to put the cache information in your Nuvi. GSAK will let you export a GPX file that you can use with POI Loader.

 

BTW, if you have an extra $3 you can become a premium member for a month and download pocket queries. At least you won't have to get all your data one cache at a time. Grab enough data to keep you busy for a while if you can't afford to keep the membership up.

[TillaMurphs]

I don't think you wasted your money at all. We have been using a nuvi 760 for a short time now. FOR US, it works great! By spending $3 month for Premium membership, and also using Pilotsnipes macro, the nuvi works incredible and we can perform paperless geocaching.

When we get close to the cache, we just pull up the satellite screen to get the real-time coordinates and then we walk North-South or East-West as needed to match the real-time coordinates to the cache coordinates.

 

Our original plan was to buy a nuvi first and then a handheld later. However, it has worked out so well that we are going to stay with the nuvi only. For geocaching tasks, your 260W should work just as well as our 760.

 

The geocaching drawbacks to the nuvi that I can see are:

- the lack of a direction pointer when you get close to the cache (although we don't seem to need this)

- lack of battery life if you hike a long distance from the car

- durability (much more delicate than a handheld and not water resistant).

 

Just our opinion.

[+Aye-Ch]

I've been using my nuvi 350 to find 330 caches so far - not many in the long term, but plenty enough for my first 3 months of caching! I recently received a hand held, but I honestly haven't been all that motivated to figure out how to use it, as I am quite happy with the nuvi. I take extra precautions for protecting it in the rain (just put it in a ziplock, doesn't affect accuracy or useability as it has a touch screen) and I am careful not to drop it (alhtough I have dropped it twice and each time it bounced off the concrete, scared the bejeezus out of me but still works fine!), and getting at least three hours of battery life per charge has been sufficient for me so far - although this is a bit of a concern as I don't want it to die while I'm out bushwacking. Feel free to email me if you need any help, I'd be happy to do what I can. There are different settings for street navigation and for caching.

[+NYPaddleCacher]

you should still be able to download the actual waypoints to your garmin from a cache by cache basis, if not from the cache's page, I know you can from through Garmin's site. It will then show you the waypoint as the Taditional Cache green icon and will be titled by the GCXXXX cache name. It will be saved in your favorites.

 

Besides, as a regular member can't you simply DL each individual GPX file for each cache, make a GPX folder to put them in, open them all with the freeware programs from the pilotsnipes tutorial and use paperless caching?

 

I thought the pay membership just added pocket queries.

I can only download the LOC files from geocaching.com. Paid membership gives you access to the GPX files. I've tried downloading the LOC files, putting them into GSAK, then sending to the GPS but, I received an error. I have no idea why it won't work. I was just fixin' to make a post asking if anyone could help me figure out how to get it to work. I saved the error message I received when trying to do it. I eventually found that I could also download caches from Garmin's website, which links back to the cache pages on geocaching.com but, Garmin doesn't show as much info on the list pages. I have to go into each cache page to see the size, distance, etc.

 

First, there is a lot more to premium membership than pocket queries, although it's probably the most useful benefit. You also get to see "premium member only" caches, can create caches along a route, have access to a members only forum, get email notifications of new caches, create bookmark lists, etc. It's worth the $3 a month.

 

GPX files are merely a file format which has more information than LOC files, none of which actually is required to find the cache. You can use a program like EasyGPS (free) or ExpertGPS (for a fee after a trail period, but worth it). Both with read LOC files and either export them as GPX files or can send directly to your GPS.

[knowschad]

Using a Nuvi (or any unit designed for automotive use) is a bit like trying to play tennis with a baseball bat. You can do it, but it's far from the best tool.

 

Very well put, Brian!

 

These people that post that they cache with a Nuvi and think that it works well really should cache for a while with a handheld unit for a while before they insist that its easy to play tennis with a baseball bat. I have a Nuvi, and its great for getting me to the park, and its great for holding information on the caches, but if that were all I had to get me from the parking lot to the cache, I'd probably find another hobby.

[+starscream2]

Using a Nuvi (or any unit designed for automotive use) is a bit like trying to play tennis with a baseball bat. You can do it, but it's far from the best tool.

 

Very well put, Brian!

 

These people that post that they cache with a Nuvi and think that it works well really should cache for a while with a handheld unit for a while before they insist that its easy to play tennis with a baseball bat. I have a Nuvi, and its great for getting me to the park, and its great for holding information on the caches, but if that were all I had to get me from the parking lot to the cache, I'd probably find another hobby.

 

Did it and have to disagree with you. I own and use a Garmin Venture HC and still maintain that using the Nuvi 200 is just as easy and good to use. I concede the point that the battery life is an issue *if* you are out caching all day. Aside from that if you just hit caches that are within two-three hours, the overall ease of use it the same. I see a lot of negativity toward the nuvi's here and everyone encouraged to go get a good handheld. Frankly having gone and got a "good" handheld myself I don't understand what the big deal about them is. The nuvi is easy to use, accurate and in general works great for caching.

 

I think really you have to ask yourself a few questions to see if the handheld is really going to be better for you or not.

 

Are you going to go on cache outings that last longer than 4 hours?

Do you let kids use the GPS that drop it or bang it around?

Do you cache in the rain?

Are you favorite caches extremely rugged and off-trail?

 

If the answers to any of those are "yes" maybe a handheld is not a bad idea. However, if you are an adult urban cacher, which is not at all uncommon, likely I don't think you will see any vast improvement in a handheld.

[+AF Bmet]

Using my wifes 200w is very easy and has gotten me to less than a foot away from the cache.

[+gazzNsam]

i started geocaching with my nuvi 250W, just downloaded one of the excelent nuvi macros for GSAK, got a list of the caches near me and uploaded them to the nuvi, and went out caching.... driving to a spot near the cach site first with voice directions, then switching it to pedestrian mode to make it track off road, then getting it to take me to the cahce.

 

and at any time i could click the cache icon for the info on the cache that you get with the gpx file.

 

The only bit i didnt like is that the nuvi wont show poi's when zoomed out further than 80 meters,

 

my nuvi easily lasted an hour of caching between charges, and it gets re-charged when we get back into the car with the fag lighter adaptor that comes with the nuvi in the box.

 

cheap enough to get an external battery pack to keep it topped up if you want to do long hike caches iwth it.

 

I recently got a pocket PC with built in GPS, it has tomtom on it for sat nav, which is pretty useless for geocaching, but it gets me near the cache by car or bike, and i can zoom right out and see the caches on the map, which i love,

 

once i go walkabout to find the cache, i switch to geoscout, gives me the compas with the pointer showing the cache direction, topo maps if i have downloaded them when i imported the gpx files, photo spoilers, again if downloaded beforehand,

 

But my pocket pc's gps isnt as sensative as the nuvi, they are both sirf 3 recievers, but the nuvi has a very good antenna, in all honnesty, if there was a way to get a compas with destination pointer on the nuvi, and be able to show poi's when zoomed out, i'd get rid of the pocket pc tommorow.

[+Howlingmoon]

I finally broke down and purchased a month of premium membership for now, 'til I can afford a year. After installing several caches with pocket queries, I was impressed by how much info I now had on my nuvi. No more papers for me! Now if only I could actually find some caches. I've looked for over a dozen, without finding a single one yet! I'm getting very frustrated.

[+Team Smksignals]

"If the answers to any of those are "yes" maybe a handheld is not a bad idea. However, if you are an adult urban cacher, which is not at all uncommon, likely I don't think you will see any vast improvement in a handheld."

 

My thoughts exactly !! I love my nuvi (350) for urban caching !! AND for the best of both worlds, I just ordered a serial cable and UBS connector for my Etrex !!! Lovin life !!!

Edited July 1, 2008 by SmkSignals

[+Crow-T-Robot]

My experience with the Nuvi is that if you cannot access the longitude/latitude realtime coordinates, (either via the satellite screen or on my unit (the 360), there is a button for "My Current Location", which gives your long/lat as you walk) you definitely should get a handheld GPS unit. I've found the "checkered flag" screen on my Nuvi to be very inaccurate and it bounces all over the place. I've had instances of when the unit was telling me I was 4 feet from a cache and when I called up the satellite screen, it was off by almost 100 yards. Or if I walked to a spot once and it told me I was five feet away, I'd return to that spot from a different angle and it would tell me I was 30-40 feet away. Very frustrating.

 

Still, while I'm a fan of the Nuvi, I will be purchasing a handheld GPS for the durability and ergonomic factors. I've dropped my unit a few times and I'm not sure how much it will take and I'm a big fan of wrist straps. Add in that it doesn't float (well, not that I know of) and probably doesn't like getting wet in general and I love to go out night caching, when things are damp...it just makes sense.

 

Bruce

[+tands]

My 2 cents worth is that I've seen folks kick my butt finding caches with a car GPS. But if you're worried about the issues folks have raised, you can easily find a Garmin Yellow for under $50 to use if it's raining, long hike, etc.

 

- T of TandS

[+Howlingmoon]

I used my 260W today to find my first three caches without any problems! They were easy finds but, now that I know a little more about the right settings and such for the Nuvi, it made it all that much easier to find. I honestly do not have anymore money to be spending on any other gps right now. Hubby's mad as it is that I bought what I did (the gps and computer upgrades, using rebate check). The Nuvi will do just fine for now! I always keep ziploc baggies with me, so I can put the Nuvi in one of those if it starts raining while I'm out but, I have no intention of caching in the rain, or doing long hikes just yet!

 

Thank you everyone for your input. I do appreciate it.

[knowschad]

I see a lot of negativity toward the nuvi's here and everyone encouraged to go get a good handheld. Frankly having gone and got a "good" handheld myself I don't understand what the big deal about them is. The nuvi is easy to use, accurate and in general works great for caching.

 

On the contrary (in my case) I am a HUGE proponent of a Nuvi for getting around town and to the general vicinity of the cache. I own a 200W and I do keep it loaded with caches using Pilotsnipe's macro. But the interface is terrible for getting any closer than the parking lot. Sure... there are plenty of caches where you can easily spot the geobeacon from 60 feet away and walk right up to it and grab the cache. For these, a Nuvi will work perfectly well. But you'd better choose which ones you're gonna do pretty carefully!

 

(On the other hand, I see that Starscream2 found the "Outdoor Classroom" cache that I and another cacher had such a hard time with this spring. If that was with the Nuvi, then either it works better than I thought, or the lack of precision actually helped in that case!)

Edited July 1, 2008 by knowschad

[+briansnat]

I see a lot of negativity toward the nuvi's here and everyone encouraged to go get a good handheld. Frankly having gone and got a "good" handheld myself I don't understand what the big deal about them is. The nuvi is easy to use, accurate and in general works great for caching.

 

And most of that negativity is from veteran geocachers who have a good deal of experience with GPS. I have a Nuvi. Great unit for the car, but I wouldn't dream of taking it caching though. One sudden thunderstorm or dunk in a stream and it would become an expensive paperweight.

 

No navigation screen is a deal breaker for me. You can find caches by using the map and trying to match coordinates, but it can be a frustrating and time consuming method. Having the navigation screen makes geocaching so much easier. You key in the coords, hit go to and the arrow points to the cache and the distance counts down until you are there. Very simple. Finally, battery life is insufficient unless you are car caching.

 

If all you are doing is going from guardrail cache to guardrail cache, it will do the job. However if you want to get out of the car for a few hours and get to some of the more interesting, or challenging caches you will probably find yourself cursing the thing when the battery runs down and you are few miles from a power source.

[+Aye-Ch]

And most of that negativity is from veteran geocachers who have a good deal of experience with GPS. I have a Nuvi. Great unit for the car, but I wouldn't dream of taking it caching though. One sudden thunderstorm or dunk in a stream and it would become an expensive paperweight.

 

No navigation screen is a deal breaker for me. You can find caches by using the map and trying to match coordinates, but it can be a frustrating and time consuming method. Having the navigation screen makes geocaching so much easier. You key in the coords, hit go to and the arrow points to the cache and the distance counts down until you are there. Very simple. Finally, battery life is insufficient unless you are car caching.

 

If all you are doing is going from guardrail cache to guardrail cache, it will do the job. However if you want to get out of the car for a few hours and get to some of the more interesting, or challenging caches you will probably find yourself cursing the thing when the battery runs down and you are few miles from a power source.

 

I went caching in the rain this past weekend. Put the nuvi350 in a freezer ziplock and off I went with no troubles! True, I have avoided the few caches in my area that require stream crossing, but yesterday I took it out on the boat and stopped to find caches on islands. As for the navigation screen, from what I can tell the nuvi isn't much different from the 200-and-some-dollar handheld that I just got and can't quite figure out how to use efficiently. With the nuvi, I key in the coords, hit go to and the purple hightlighted arrow points to the cache while the distance yet to be covered to reach the cache counts down from miles, to tenths of miles, to feet. Generally the navigation screen gets me to the cache, but if it doesn't then I use the realtime coordinates which once I got the hang of it is pretty efficient. My fully charged battery lasts for four full hours of bright screen navigation which has been enough to cover an entire park full of caches. Sure I plug it in to the cig lighter when driving from park to park, but I'll do the same thing with my handheld if I can ever figure out how to use it as well as the nuvi.

 

I have much respect for the experienced cachers out there. Most of them speak highly of handhelds, so I'm assuming that once I get the eTrex Summit up and going I'll understand the hype over handhelds. Until then, I'm having a hard time convincing myself to take the time to learn it when I have so much fun with the nuvi (good lord I sound like a commericial!) The nuvi is intuitive, the Summit is not (for me)...

Edited July 2, 2008 by Aye-Ch

[+pahasapa]

Testing

[+starscream2]

The part I disagree about is that the nuvi is not as good getting you right to the cache, that is somehow is harder to use or less accruate. That simply is just not true.

 

I will totally concede that it: 1) runs out of battery in 3-4 hours. 2) is not water-proof. Very true and both great reasons to get a handheld *IF* those are issues for you, for many cachers these might be non-issues.

 

What I disagree with is that the nuvi is harder to use, and less accurate, or somehow less capable for getting you right to the cache.

 

I use it side by side and often instead of my Venture HC. It is just as accurate, even in wooded areas I have not had any problems with the nuvi directing me within 20 feet of the cache. I do not see the signal bounce around any more than my Venture HC. I have successfully found several caches of all sizes, and locations with the nuvi and with the Venture HC. The nuvi gets me to the same number of feet away as the Venture consistantly. To state that the nuvi can't get the same accuracy or consistancy as a good handheld in my experience is just not true.

 

The ease of use I guess is a matter of personal preference. Certainly the nuvi "works" differently from handhelds, but I disagree that it is harder. On the Venture HC I pick the cache and follow the arrow. On the nuvi 200 I pick the cache, zoom in and follow the line. The nuvi has a brighter, easier to read map screen, and even my kids can follow the line to the cache. I guess I personally fail to see how the navigation screen on the handheld is that much easier or more convenient to use. In the end on both models I just walk until the number of feet it is showing is 20 feet or less and then start searching.

 

*Tip for nuvi users... find and download 3rd party vehicle icons, I use a small crosshairs vehicle for caching.

 

For me if I am going out all afternoon caching, or have the kids with me I bring the Venture HC. If I hit a few caches after work, or go grab one or two around town solo mostly I just grab the nuvi and go. Being a newbie that kept reading all the psots about how much better the handhelds are, and going out and getting a highly recommended one, I guess I was/am disappointed in the difference. Certainly I appreciate the battery life, but the overall use is well... about the same as the nuvi I already had.

 

(In regards to the Outdoor Classroom cache the knowschad referenced. If I remember correctly I used the Venture HC to find that one, so I can't make any claims for the nuvi regarding that particular cache)

[+twotfd]

I have to add my two cents.... I started caching with a Nuvi200. I did my first 30 caches with it. They were everything from park and grabs to caches on the beach at coast that were a nice little hike. I still use it in conjunction with my 60CSx. When I was using it for caching would change the settings to pedestrian, off road, and track up. You can enter the location coordiates just like on the 60CSx. This made it very easy to use. I now use it to get me close to a location if I don't know my way around. You can enter a location by coordinates and the Nuvi will get you to the nearest street location. I don't drive around is circles as much and waste gas at todays prices. I say happy caching with the Nuvi you have!!