Delorme PN-60 series

[+medic161]

I am looking to buy a new gps, and the Delorme PN-60 and 60w have gotten my attention. Does anyone have any advice?

I currently have a 60cx and we used to use a palm for our gpx files. The palm has died and we want a unit that is paperless

and I want access to maps. The Delorme website has a pn-60 for 299 and the 60w for 349. I am really impressed by the map subscription service that delorme offers 29.95 a yr for all the maps you could ever need sounds tempting. Any Delorme users out there??

[+mpilchfamily]

With most Garmin units you have access to just about all the free maps your could ever need. Sites like GPSFileDepot have all sorts of free maps for Garmin units.

 

The PN-60 is a good and affordable choice. But i've only ever owned Garmin. So i'm not sure how much better or worst it would be compared to a comparable Garmin Unit. But when i look at the price and spec sheet of the 60w when compared with Garmin's eTrx 30 i think the 30 comes out ahead. Saving money with free maps.

 

PN-60W

http://shop.delorme.com/OA_HTML/DELibeCCtdItemDetail.jsp?beginIndex=0&item=31807&section=10047

 

eTrex 30

https://buy.garmin.com/shop/shop.do?pID=87774

[+Gitchee-Gummee]

The '60 is an excellent choice.

 

One question that you must ask yourself tho, how often are there enough changes to landscape to warrant a 30/yr subscription?

 

Sure, the maps will be updated -- but 30 - 40 yrs later, I can still find myself getting through an area without too much trouble without the yearly updates.

 

Even with the updates, a cache would be a "X" coordinates, road or no.

 

I use a '40, brother-in-law uses a '60.

 

Though not near to one another, we both live in areas that are not susceptible to high-development. Hence, we have little need for yearly map updates. Just something to think about. Generally, within a >10 year period of time, I plan on having a new GPSr, anyway (presumably, it would already have any mapping updates).

[+Team CowboyPapa]

Please allow me to add some comments regarding maps as discussed above as an attempt to provide some clarification.

 

Essentially, there are two categories of maps that PN-60 owners use, those that come in the box on the DVDs and those downloaded from DeLorme with the $30 annual subscription:

1. In the box: Included in the box with the PN-60s are 5 DVDs containing the DeLorme Topo maps for the USA, Canada and Mexico. Portions of these, as desired, may be easily loaded onto the handheld unit. These topo maps are detailed down to the residential street level and are routable to provide driving directions.

2. Subscription downloadable imagery: For the annual $30 MapPack fee an unlimited amount may be downloaded. This imagery consists of scanned USGS 3DTQ maps, satellite and aerial photo imagery. These are rasterized and as such do not contain the "vector" data needed for routing, turn-by-turn guidance. A trial certificate is included in the box for purchasers to sample.

 

The PN-60 supports SDHC memory cards of up to 32GB in capacity. As such, users may carry 100s of square miles of both the routable, topo maps and the downloaded imagery. Consequently, it is not a question of one or the other, as with a few keystrokes the PN-60 user can switch back and forth between the street maps or the imagery (both photo and 3DTQS). While geocaching in areas where the utility of street maps is limited, such as in the back country, city parks or shopping center parking areas, I find the downloaded photo imagery to be very useful.

[+Hynr]

I use both a 60CSx and a DeLorme PN40 (the 40 is similar to the 60). I find that the paperless aspect to the PN series is better than on any Garmin device in terms of ability to carry data with me. I have had 40,000 cache descriptions, along with as many logs as I ever want to page through, on the PN and I know that that does not hit the limit. Still that does require a bit of technical knowledge (file swapping inside the GPSr) and most novice users might find that a bit tricky to figure out. The screen size is a bit smaller than what you will be used to coming off the 60cx and personally I never really got used to that (I had hoped that I would); the PN60 is a bit prettier and the display may be a bit better, so you would need to be the judge of that. The street routing on the PN40 does not meet my expectations because those expectations were crafted by the way the 60CSx routes. I still have the 60CSx dashmount in the car and use the Garmin to route me close to the cache. When I leave the car, I take the PN with me to find the cache. That system works quite well with me. My wife is then with me with her own 60CSx and having two different units generate "opinions" on where the cache location might be is very nice. The devices very rarely disagree and when they do it is generally a toss-up as to which unit "is right". I did look into getting a 60 or 60W but ended up not doing that for some personal reasons; but one caution I would toss your way is to inspect very close what the "W" does for you and whether you want the extra costs associated with having that. When I was looking at this it meant also ponying up for some sort of satellite subscriptions service and another device that I did not have a use for. My PN40 does not have maps outside of the North America and none are available to me, either hand crafted or official; so if that is an issue, then look carefully to see if that issue has changed with the PN60.

[+user13371]

Having used Magellan, Garmin, Lorwance, and DeLorme -- I keep coming back to Garmin, and can only make carefully qualified recommendations in favor of DeLorme. Good GPS, really -- but not for everybody.

 

The PN-60 is a rugged and accurate GPS for an excellent package price, as it comes with complete road and topographical maps of the United States. But there are no maps available for it other than what DeLorme packages -- unlike Garmin, which has G's own commercial maps offerings plus a wealth of worldwide maps composed by others.

 

Further, DeLorme would be a poor choice if you regularly travel abroad (because DeLorme's mapping focus is U.S.A), or if you use a Macintosh computer (because their primary software is PC-based and Mac compatibility is spotty at best).

 

And going back to the OP -- DeLorme might not be the best for someone with existing investment (in software, accessories, or knowledge) in Garmin or other brands. Sometimes it is best to stick with what you know.

 

And lastly (this could land on the pro or con side): If you do buy a DeLorme and have any "how do I use it?" questions, their peer-to-peer forum at forum.delorme.com is full of knowledgable, dedicated fans who wil be willing to help you. But if you ever have what looks like a genuine problem with the device, you're better off skipping the user forum and contacting DeLorme's technical support directly -- because 1) The tech support staff is terrific and usually has better problem solving resources; 2) The peer group forum can't fix something that's really broken; and 3) Sometimes the more devoted fans get a bit touchy about perceived criticism of the products - so some discussions get derailed before anything useful comes out of them.

[ao318]

I use both a 60CSx and a DeLorme PN40 (the 40 is similar to the 60). I find that the paperless aspect to the PN series is better than on any Garmin device in terms of ability to carry data with me. I have had 40,000 cache descriptions, along with as many logs as I ever want to page through, on the PN and I know that that does not hit the limit. Still that does require a bit of technical knowledge (file swapping inside the GPSr) and most novice users might find that a bit tricky to figure out. The screen size is a bit smaller than what you will be used to coming off the 60cx and personally I never really got used to that (I had hoped that I would); the PN60 is a bit prettier and the display may be a bit better, so you would need to be the judge of that. The street routing on the PN40 does not meet my expectations because those expectations were crafted by the way the 60CSx routes. I still have the 60CSx dashmount in the car and use the Garmin to route me close to the cache. When I leave the car, I take the PN with me to find the cache. That system works quite well with me. My wife is then with me with her own 60CSx and having two different units generate "opinions" on where the cache location might be is very nice. The devices very rarely disagree and when they do it is generally a toss-up as to which unit "is right". I did look into getting a 60 or 60W but ended up not doing that for some personal reasons; but one caution I would toss your way is to inspect very close what the "W" does for you and whether you want the extra costs associated with having that. When I was looking at this it meant also ponying up for some sort of satellite subscriptions service and another device that I did not have a use for. My PN40 does not have maps outside of the North America and none are available to me, either hand crafted or official; so if that is an issue, then look carefully to see if that issue has changed with the PN60.

This is exactly how I do it. I also like the concept of the 60W, especially now that you can buy it without the spot. Seems that they are phasing out that bundle so they can introduce and use their "in Reach" device that cost's another $249.00 which is supposed to be similar but better than the SPOT.

The biggest thing I don't like about my PN-40 is the size of the screen. I wish it were just a bit bigger because I refuse to take my reading glasses out with me. I believe the PN-60's have the same size screen. I also find that both devices are extremely accurate and I like them both very much for very different reasons, similar to those of Hynr.

[39_Steps]

When Delorme released its Portable Navigation (PN) devices 'into the wild' a very few years back, the devices were intended as adjuncts to Delorme's powerful Windows based Topographic and Enterprise level mapping software applications. As such, the early adopters of the Delorme PN devices tended to include technically savvy Windows OS users who had an interest in outdoorsy wilderness type maps.

 

Of course, Delorme also included with the PN device's bundled digitized 3D topographic software some of the best computer based street vector mapping software of the era. The availability of this included (~free) Windows based Topo and routing software in the handheld GPS bundle was downplayed by some users of alternate brands of GPS devices as having too steep a learning curve. Better a steep learning curve than no curve at all, most of the original Delorme software and device users thought.

 

The current Delorme PN-60 and PN-60W (W = wireless connectivity to proprietary devices with satellite transmission capabilities) contain refined paperless geocaching compatibility for Pocket Query (PQ) wired Internet downloading and uploading to this Groundspeak site. This is in addition to the basic street and back country road navigation features. In general, the PN-60 maps will contain a better combination of routable urban and rural (including forest) roads than the competing brands out of the box.