Geomate.jr Owners Report

June 18, 2010

Sorry guys, been out and about. Back in the game now. Answers coming for all.

Cheers

Waz

I just got a Jr. and turned on. When I press big button it starts with number 1, then little button to see GC code. my problem here is the diaginal parts of letters etc. are very faint and thinner and almost unreadable, the vertical and horizontal lines are fatter and darker. Is this a regular problem with the Jr. or is the display not working properly. Thank You for your help.

June 23, 2010

I ordered one for my daughter. She is used to a regular GPS with maps she didn't like it. I see that you can add your own way points now but only 5 at a time. I put one in that was a 5 in diffuculty and it worked as far as pointing me to it. The thought of putting in a pocket quere would be nice thing. I will have to hold onto it if it is in the future to come out.

JJJFishin

June 23, 2010

We've been caching for 7 years now and have gone through 4 GPS's. I bought a Geomate.jr last week out of curiousity and brought it with us on vacation. What can I say other than GREAT LITTLE DEVICE! It gives you the ability to make unplanned stops along your route and STILL FIND CACHES! Sure it has limits, like no cookie trails, it doesn't give you cache clues, only raw data like size and terrain, but in my opinion that just adds to the adventure! And the accuracy is outstanding, the Geomate.jr had better readings than our Garmin or my parent's Magellan.

http://img.geocaching.com/cache/log/5564fa...985eed896e7.jpg

Before I moved the cache for this photo, Geomate.jr reading was only 4 feet!

June 24, 2010

I am very happy with my Geomate, Jr. I started using it in July of 2009, got one of the first update kits, and made about 250 finds before I added a Garmin Venture HC to my collection. It is a great traveling buddy. Stop at a rest stop or some other point of interest, turn it on a "bang" there may be a hide within 50 feet. Gave my 13 year old grandson one for Christmas and he has about 85 finds todate with his. His neighbor who is the same age as my grandson got a fancy GPS for Christmas and he has not made his first find yet because he doesn't have the experience to program his GPS. Once you get out there using the Geomate, Jr., you will find it is a fun addition to hour outside activities. :anicute:

1.8k · June 25, 2010

Got to love Jr.

A very early adopter here with a review on this thread. I continue to be impressed with Jr., it is an excellent supplement to the big toys.

I actually had to get a second unit because Jr. was always out on loan to someone who was curious.

September 30, 2010

Does it show coords or just the direction? Never used a GPSr.

October 20, 2010

I stayed up quite late last night reading the bulk of this incredibly long and informative thread. Thank you to Warren and all the others for all the great info. I am really excited, I just ordered Jr. and his little friend, the updater, for my almost 9 year old grandson for his birthday. I have a question about his birthday but I'm going to post it as a new thread as it it fairly off topic and this thread is so long. But I did want to thank everyone for sharing thier experiences with this device, it was exceptionally helpful to me, and quite humorous at times too! Happy caching!

UPDATE:

O.k. if anyone is interested, I posted my query about My Grandson's birthday in GEOCACHING ADVENTURES forum in the THE HUNT/THE UNUSUAL category. Thanks to everyone for reading. Happy caching!

Edited October 20, 2010 by cmargo810

1.2k · October 28, 2010

I use my BlackBerry for caching and it works great. The only downfall is the battery life isn't the best.

I'm thinking of getting a geomate jr to go along with my BlackBerry. I don't have a PC so I like the idea of the pre-loaded caches.

Can anyone tell me the cons of the geomate jr? IE why I would want a "regular" GPSr instead?

Thanks!

October 29, 2010

I use my BlackBerry for caching and it works great. The only downfall is the battery life isn't the best.

I'm thinking of getting a geomate jr to go along with my BlackBerry. I don't have a PC so I like the idea of the pre-loaded caches.

Can anyone tell me the cons of the geomate jr? IE why I would want a "regular" GPSr instead?

Thanks!

At some point you are going to want to update the data base so you need to use a PC, perhaps a friends. The Jr is great right out of the box but it shows a limited amt of info. If you print out cache info I guess that would work. The Jr has a very good chip set so there is no problem locking on to the location. You will not be able to load pocket quiries.

If you use the BB to get the name and cache info I think you will do fine with the Jr. but later on I think you will get a GPSer with more bells . HAPPY CACHING!!! PS. Target carries the JR but have not seen the updater there

October 29, 2010

Does it show coords or just the direction? Never used a GPSr.

Just the directions but its very good at getting you there

2.6k · October 29, 2010

The Jr. has no maps. Nor does it have paperless caching details like logs, hints, description, etc.

November 12, 2010

Just a note: The Geomate does give co-ords of your current location.

They are set within the menu pages. You need to be on the 'Navigation Page' represented by a small 'N' in the bottom right corner. Then click through using the larger of the buttons.

The Lat and Long are displayed on two separate pages.

Thanks!

November 12, 2010

I ordered one for my daughter. She is used to a regular GPS with maps she didn't like it. I see that you can add your own way points now but only 5 at a time. I put one in that was a 5 in diffuculty and it worked as far as pointing me to it. The thought of putting in a pocket quere would be nice thing. I will have to hold onto it if it is in the future to come out.

JJJFishin

Hi,

I work for Geomate.

A couple of things i just want to mention. You can add in upto 500 custom caches (waypoints) Not just 5! 5 would be too easy!

Also we are working on bringing out Pocket Query support. So watch this space...

Thanks!

December 27, 2010

I got this for my son for Christmas along with the update kit from Amazon.com for a really good deal. I ran the update software with Windows 7 and IE8 and it worked fine. Has anyone run the device settings update option? I set the device nickname to NIKJR (my son's name is Nikolas). I also turned on the bonus page by using IE's developer tools to unhide some table rows on that page and checking the "show bonus page" option. On that page it shows the current time in UTC and Local as well as a number of other bits of information which I assume it is reading from the GPS. SPD was one as well as something that looked like HDP or HD?.

Sadly, the nearest cache to my mom's house near Dayton was not readily accessible via a short walk in very cold weather so we aborted the hike and went to see True Grit instead.

John

December 28, 2010

I ordered one for my daughter. She is used to a regular GPS with maps she didn't like it. I see that you can add your own way points now but only 5 at a time. I put one in that was a 5 in diffuculty and it worked as far as pointing me to it. The thought of putting in a pocket quere would be nice thing. I will have to hold onto it if it is in the future to come out.

JJJFishin

Hi,

I work for Geomate.

A couple of things i just want to mention. You can add in upto 500 custom caches (waypoints) Not just 5! 5 would be too easy!

Also we are working on bringing out Pocket Query support. So watch this space...

Thanks!

I have been checking your site as I got a email telling me that pocket queries will be avalable in Dec. now I see that the link is there and I have attempted it and I get a IO error when I try I am going to send a email to Warren from earlier in this thread. Hopefully he can help.

JJJFishin

December 28, 2010

I received my Geomate recently, and quite frankly, I am not thrilled with it.

Husband (who has a Garmin) and I have been practicing in our area. Since we've geocached for awhile, we are aware that there are more than 20 caches within 2 miles of our home. We live in Myrtle Beach and it is an area very well liked by Geocachers.

I've been cycling through the 20 closest caches around my home and marked them all as FOUND (since we've found them all). Problem is, once they are found, they stay on the queue of 20. Which means that I am turning in circle, since the little bugger will go back to the 1st cache once you've reached #20.

Also, there was at least 4 of the 20 caches that are noted as ARCHIVED on the Geocache website, so they "steal" space that could be used by other caches.

I e-mailed some questions to Warren from Apisphere about this. Hopefully, I will get answers that will be satisfying, because at this point, I want to return the thing.

My questions:

Is there a way to "delete" the caches, once they are found?

How can I remove (or avoid to download) a cache that is no longer active?

Why is is that the user can cycle only through 20 caches? What happens if there are more that 20 in a small area?

Chantal in Myrtle Beach

Edited December 28, 2010 by jon.hemlock.Chantal

6.7k · May 29, 2011

Are all the Geomate Jr. users still happy with their purchase?

The man with the over sized ego was gonna do it anyway so what the heck?! :laughing:

May 29, 2011

Are all the Geomate Jr. users still happy with their purchase?

The man with the over sized ego was gonna do it anyway so what the heck?!

I sent it back and bought a Garmin 60CSx instead.

Edited May 29, 2011 by jon.hemlock.Chantal

1.8k · May 29, 2011

Are all the Geomate Jr. users still happy with their purchase?

The man with the over sized ego was gonna do it anyway so what the heck?!

Yes indeed. Veeeeeerrrrrrrryyyyyyyyyyyy early adopter and reviewer.

Supplements the 62s fleet and the PN60.

It fills a specific niche.

2.1k · May 29, 2011

Are all the Geomate Jr. users still happy with their purchase?

The man with the over sized ego was gonna do it anyway so what the heck?!

The Magellan Explorist GC fills that niche on the car now, my kids can understand it a lot better and it had wicked paperless ability. Still have the geomate, though.

May 29, 2011

Are all the Geomate Jr. users still happy with their purchase?

The man with the over sized ego was gonna do it anyway so what the heck?!

I used the Geomate for awhile and found it too limited. I think it makes a great GPS for kids...and by kinds I mean under 10. Anyone older will want more features like paperless as well as the ability to input coordinates. For the price it is a very accurate GPS but I feel the update kit is almost a necessity at is point as the unit only comes with 250,000 caches which sounds like a lot but in reality you will want to add more. Once you add the $25 for the update kit you are close to $100. At is point I would very much recommend jumping up to the Magellan GC or the Garmin Dakota 10.

1.8k · May 30, 2011

Having " run out of qerry " from time to time it sure is nice to be able to sniff out just one more before calling it a day.

May 30, 2011

Having " run out of qerry " from time to time it sure is nice to be able to sniff out just one more before calling it a day.

I have the update kit for the one I have. The thing I have figured out is, by turning the unit off when your away from the area that you first turned it on from causes it to load up other ones that the first 20 that I have aready found. I have a yearly membership with Geocaching so I have a pocket query sent to me. With just ones from my area that I have not found. I update them from uploading them to geomate jr website.

The biggest thing is turning it off as far from the place where you first turn it on for the day. That way when you turn it back on it will load the ones closest to your present location.

JJJFishin

May 31, 2011

In the end I am not really happy with it. Most importantly my daughter isn't happy with it. Since we have a full GPS the two-button paging and limited info on the screen is really frustrating. She'd just rather not bring it anywhere. I see the eTrex is newish again. I might try and sell mine to my brother whose kids are smaller and get her something better.

June 1, 2011

Its a great device and their support is amazing

June 3, 2011

We just bought this for our little cacher....but it is for his birthday 7/16....so want to bust it out early!! :laughing:

Will report back on how we like it. We have a Garmin 60c (love it!), just got an Iphone with the geocaching app (haven't used it yet). So with all 3 we should never have a DNF again!!

June 3, 2011

We just bought this for our little cacher....but it is for his birthday 7/16....so want to bust it out early!!

Will report back on how we like it. We have a Garmin 60c (love it!), just got an Iphone with the geocaching app (haven't used it yet). So with all 3 we should never have a DNF again!!

I don't think you will. Surprisingly the Geomate has a very accurate GPS. I have found it is on par with my several hundred dollar Oregon.

June 23, 2013

So how do you charge the geomate junior?

June 23, 2013

Hi gkcin, your other post with this question has been answered.

Regards Bernard

June 25, 2013

I found a battery suitable for geomate duracell stayCharged rechargeable battery value with batteries. <_<

June 27, 2014

Is anyone still using a geomate Jr?

I hadn't used mine for quite a while, but really liked it for the kids and I purchased a second one a few days ago to give as a gift.

I quickly learned about the near death of the whole thing, and how it was saved by Brand44. But now I feel like the update process for it is even more complicated than it used to be.

I'm a mac user. The gift unit is for a PC family. I've figured out how to update with the regional list which I think is a weekly update now. And I can load a single .gpx file to it as well, using the GeomateLoader program available from the current product website.

What I can't figure out yet, and would like to so that I can pass the knowledge on to the new users, is how to make a custom list of multiple caches and get it loaded onto the unit.

I've never played with PQs before, is that the solution?

Edited June 27, 2014 by GoMonky

June 27, 2014

Is anyone still using a geomate Jr?

I hadn't used mine for quite a while, but really liked it for the kids and I purchased a second one a few days ago to give as a gift.

I quickly learned about the near death of the whole thing, and how it was saved by Brand44. But now I feel like the update process for it is even more complicated than it used to be.

I'm a mac user. The gift unit is for a PC family. I've figured out how to update with the regional list which I think is a weekly update now. And I can load a single .gpx file to it as well, using the GeomateLoader program available from the current product website.

What I can't figure out yet, and would like to so that I can pass the knowledge on to the new users, is how to make a custom list of multiple caches and get it loaded onto the unit.

I've never played with PQs before, is that the solution?

Try looking here http://www.brand44co.com/geomatejr/custom-caches/

Seems Brand 44 has created this to do just what you are looking for. I have not tried but hope it works for you.

June 28, 2014

The custom cache list program on the Brand44 site is for PCs. No other Mac support now except for the GeoMate Loader program which is used to flash the regional .gpx files. I did figure out how the Pocket Queries work though, at least basically. While one has to subscribe to the premium membership, the PQs allow for a custom list of caches to be downloaded as a single .gpx file which can then be flashed via the Geomate Loader.

Another program I came across and decided to try out is iCaching. It is not free, but so far I like it. There's quite a bit to it, but for the geomate jr, I can also make a custom list of caches and then export to a single .gpx file.

So now hopefully I can get everything explained decently enough to the family who's receiving the new unit as a gift so that they can continue to use it on their own!

September 27, 2014

I found the Brand 44 site and downloaded the new files. However, I can't get anything to work. I want to enter some custom caches, so I try to open the EasyGPS file. Nope, no can do. All I get is a message that says, "The procedure entry point GetLogicProcessorInformation could not be located in the dynamic link library KERNEL32.dll." So what does that mean? And how do I fix it? Also, I have an older file of custom caches that I want to install to my Geomate so I open the Geomate Loader file, select the custom cache file, and click on Download. Nope, it won't work either. Instead, I get a message that says, "Flash programming failed. Cannot Open Port," and then, "geomate.jr detection failed," "Unknown firmware version, unknown database version." What does it all mean, and how do I fix it? HELP!

February 11, 2015

Is there a place to access anything at all? All the links I hit are going to GoDaddy.com, where they say the site is parked for free and offer to help me set up my own website. I assume all their links are down?

June 10, 2015

The Brand44 website is up and you can download the cache info to the Geomate Jr. but I was wondering if anyone knows if they will be updating these files in the future. I note that the last update to the Canada East data was on February 11, 2015.

June 16, 2015

I note that the Brand 44 Colorado website is still up and running and you can still download the maps but the last map I updated for Canada East was dated February 11, 2015. Does anyone out there know if there is another way to update the Geomate Jr. or whether Brand 44 will be providing updates in the future?

June 17, 2015

Oops. I was wrong folks. I must have been using an old .cry file or something. I managed to download an update for the geomate jr. today that is up to date as far as I can see. Sorry for the confusion.

July 29, 2015

Just updated my grandson's geomate jr., yesterday, July 28, 2015. They really are a great little gps for kids if you don't want to give them a mobile phone.

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