Advice needed re Garmin eTrex

[+A_Canadian_eh]

Tried geocaching a few years ago and enjoyed it, but the tedium of entering the data into our Garmin etrex got to us after awhile. We see now that there is "paperless" geocaching available.

 

We don't have a lot of extra cash (no pun intended)so we are looking at either a Garmin eTrex 10 or eTrex 20. The main difference I see is the eTrex 20 can accept a data card.

 

Two questions:

1. For paperless geocaching, what does a person get onto your GPS when you download from geocaching.com? Obviously the co-ordinates, but do you get the description, hints, logs, etc.?

 

2. How much space does this data take? Would a really basic model like the eTrex 10 allow us to download, say, 50 caches and their details for paperless geocaching or does one really need a model with a data/memory card to download significant numbers.

 

Any advice greatly appreciated, eh!

[+ngrrfan]

Tried geocaching a few years ago and enjoyed it, but the tedium of entering the data into our Garmin etrex got to us after awhile. We see now that there is "paperless" geocaching available.

 

We don't have a lot of extra cash (no pun intended)so we are looking at either a Garmin eTrex 10 or eTrex 20. The main difference I see is the eTrex 20 can accept a data card.

 

Two questions:

1. For paperless geocaching, what does a person get onto your GPS when you download from geocaching.com? Obviously the co-ordinates, but do you get the description, hints, logs, etc.?

On the E20 and E30 (and some other Garmin units) you get basically everything you see on the cache listing page. Description, D and T ratings, size, hint and some logs.

2. How much space does this data take? Would a really basic model like the eTrex 10 allow us to download, say, 50 caches and their details for paperless geocaching or does one really need a model with a data/memory card to download significant numbers.

If it were me, I'd go with the E20. It hold more data. You can load extra maps on the SD card. The E20 will hold 2000 caches.

[+MountainWoods]

Tried geocaching a few years ago and enjoyed it, but the tedium of entering the data into our Garmin etrex got to us after awhile. We see now that there is "paperless" geocaching available.

 

We don't have a lot of extra cash (no pun intended)so we are looking at either a Garmin eTrex 10 or eTrex 20. The main difference I see is the eTrex 20 can accept a data card.

 

Two questions:

1. For paperless geocaching, what does a person get onto your GPS when you download from geocaching.com? Obviously the co-ordinates, but do you get the description, hints, logs, etc.?

On the E20 and E30 (and some other Garmin units) you get basically everything you see on the cache listing page. Description, D and T ratings, size, hint and some logs.

2. How much space does this data take? Would a really basic model like the eTrex 10 allow us to download, say, 50 caches and their details for paperless geocaching or does one really need a model with a data/memory card to download significant numbers.

If it were me, I'd go with the E20. It hold more data. You can load extra maps on the SD card. The E20 will hold 2000 caches.

Really? I've never downloaded more than about 20 GCs onto my eTrex 20, because when I downloaded about 37 of them, BaseCamp showed them on my unit, but when I did the Eject and went to the geocache page, it would only show about 30 of them. I thought that it was only showing the closest 30, so I drove to one that wasn't showing and the list remained the same, the same 30 (only ordered different, since sort was set to closest). I plugged the unit back into the PC, and BaseCamp still showed the 37 GCs on the unit!

I've had that happen a few times where BaseCamp shows them still on the unit, but they don't show up in the unit's display. So I always figured there was some internal limit of about 30.

If it can really hold that many, then perhaps some "funny character" in a given geocache description causes the unit to ignore it and all of the GCs following it -- or something like that. I just know I gave up being bold with the number of GCs some time ago when the above happened to me 3 or 4 times.

[Pup Patrol]

The forum has a glitch where "once a PM, always a PM", that doesn't sync up with the realities and changes in membership. This misleads people into giving advice about pocket queries, and other stuff that are Premium Member perks.

 

According to your profile, you are a Basic Member. As a Basic Member, you can only download loc files, which don't include hints.

 

Help Center → Geocaching → Finding Geocaches

2.5. Download Cache Information

http://support.Groundspeak.com/index.php?pg=kb.page&id=236

 

 

B.

[+redwoodkestrel]

Tried geocaching a few years ago and enjoyed it, but the tedium of entering the data into our Garmin etrex got to us after awhile. We see now that there is "paperless" geocaching available.

 

We don't have a lot of extra cash (no pun intended)so we are looking at either a Garmin eTrex 10 or eTrex 20. The main difference I see is the eTrex 20 can accept a data card.

 

Two questions:

1. For paperless geocaching, what does a person get onto your GPS when you download from geocaching.com? Obviously the co-ordinates, but do you get the description, hints, logs, etc.?

On the E20 and E30 (and some other Garmin units) you get basically everything you see on the cache listing page. Description, D and T ratings, size, hint and some logs.

2. How much space does this data take? Would a really basic model like the eTrex 10 allow us to download, say, 50 caches and their details for paperless geocaching or does one really need a model with a data/memory card to download significant numbers.

If it were me, I'd go with the E20. It hold more data. You can load extra maps on the SD card. The E20 will hold 2000 caches.

Really? I've never downloaded more than about 20 GCs onto my eTrex 20, because when I downloaded about 37 of them, BaseCamp showed them on my unit, but when I did the Eject and went to the geocache page, it would only show about 30 of them. I thought that it was only showing the closest 30, so I drove to one that wasn't showing and the list remained the same, the same 30 (only ordered different, since sort was set to closest). I plugged the unit back into the PC, and BaseCamp still showed the 37 GCs on the unit!

I've had that happen a few times where BaseCamp shows them still on the unit, but they don't show up in the unit's display. So I always figured there was some internal limit of about 30.

If it can really hold that many, then perhaps some "funny character" in a given geocache description causes the unit to ignore it and all of the GCs following it -- or something like that. I just know I gave up being bold with the number of GCs some time ago when the above happened to me 3 or 4 times.

 

That's weird, I own an Etrex 20 and regularly load it up with multiple pocket queries, each containing hundreds of geocaches. I don't use Basecamp, but I've never had an issue with putting that many caches on the device. Maybe bypass Basecamp and see if you can get more caches to upload?

[+A_Canadian_eh]

According to your profile, you are a Basic Member. As a Basic Member, you can only download loc files, which don't include hints.

 

Help Center → Geocaching → Finding Geocaches

2.5. Download Cache Information

http://support.Groundspeak.com/index.php?pg=kb.page&id=236

B.

 

Thank you to all who gave responses and especially for this one. Actually, following your link above I see that as a Basic Member I would only get "the cache listing title, GC Code, and coordinates" - apparently no description, difficulty info, size or logs either. So obviously paperless geocaching in style is going to require a premium membership - thanks for the info!

[+MountainWoods]

Tried geocaching a few years ago and enjoyed it, but the tedium of entering the data into our Garmin etrex got to us after awhile. We see now that there is "paperless" geocaching available.

 

We don't have a lot of extra cash (no pun intended)so we are looking at either a Garmin eTrex 10 or eTrex 20. The main difference I see is the eTrex 20 can accept a data card.

 

Two questions:

1. For paperless geocaching, what does a person get onto your GPS when you download from geocaching.com? Obviously the co-ordinates, but do you get the description, hints, logs, etc.?

On the E20 and E30 (and some other Garmin units) you get basically everything you see on the cache listing page. Description, D and T ratings, size, hint and some logs.

2. How much space does this data take? Would a really basic model like the eTrex 10 allow us to download, say, 50 caches and their details for paperless geocaching or does one really need a model with a data/memory card to download significant numbers.

If it were me, I'd go with the E20. It hold more data. You can load extra maps on the SD card. The E20 will hold 2000 caches.

Really? I've never downloaded more than about 20 GCs onto my eTrex 20, because when I downloaded about 37 of them, BaseCamp showed them on my unit, but when I did the Eject and went to the geocache page, it would only show about 30 of them. I thought that it was only showing the closest 30, so I drove to one that wasn't showing and the list remained the same, the same 30 (only ordered different, since sort was set to closest). I plugged the unit back into the PC, and BaseCamp still showed the 37 GCs on the unit!

I've had that happen a few times where BaseCamp shows them still on the unit, but they don't show up in the unit's display. So I always figured there was some internal limit of about 30.

If it can really hold that many, then perhaps some "funny character" in a given geocache description causes the unit to ignore it and all of the GCs following it -- or something like that. I just know I gave up being bold with the number of GCs some time ago when the above happened to me 3 or 4 times.

 

That's weird, I own an Etrex 20 and regularly load it up with multiple pocket queries, each containing hundreds of geocaches. I don't use Basecamp, but I've never had an issue with putting that many caches on the device. Maybe bypass Basecamp and see if you can get more caches to upload?

They do download (as per my quoted reply; and not upload, which is device to host). Most of the time when that happened to me, I used Send to Device directly, so BaseCamp was just seeing them after the fact. I could actually see the GC*.gpx files in the device's Garmin/GPX directory outside of BaseCamp. Really, BaseCamp has nothing to do with this; it is just another way of seeing that the geocache was on the device. I would look at the .gpx files to make sure that they were OK (XML was formed correctly, no missing tags, etc.). I didn't see any thing peculiar there.

 

But unplug the device from the PC and voila, some GCs missing -- but not all. Plug it back in, and there they are -- still nice GC*.gpx files in the Garmin/GPX directory!

 

All I had to do was remove a GC and other GCs would show up. Like I say, it might have been something that the unit's XML parser did not like. In another thread there is discussion about the eTrex 20 choking on certain GCs, so I'm not the only one who has experienced this.

 

I'll give it a try again and see what happens. It's just a matter of figuring out what reproducible condition causes the symptom, so that Garmin can look into their code and find out why it happens.

 

Edit: When you download 100s of geocaches, can you wade through them all from the unit's geocache page? Or does it only show the first so-many?

Edited May 22, 2013 by MountainWoods

[+GeoTrekker26]

Tried geocaching a few years ago and enjoyed it, but the tedium of entering the data into our Garmin etrex got to us after awhile. We see now that there is "paperless" geocaching available.

 

We don't have a lot of extra cash (no pun intended)so we are looking at either a Garmin eTrex 10 or eTrex 20. The main difference I see is the eTrex 20 can accept a data card.

 

Two questions:

1. For paperless geocaching, what does a person get onto your GPS when you download from geocaching.com? Obviously the co-ordinates, but do you get the description, hints, logs, etc.?

On the E20 and E30 (and some other Garmin units) you get basically everything you see on the cache listing page. Description, D and T ratings, size, hint and some logs.

2. How much space does this data take? Would a really basic model like the eTrex 10 allow us to download, say, 50 caches and their details for paperless geocaching or does one really need a model with a data/memory card to download significant numbers.

If it were me, I'd go with the E20. It hold more data. You can load extra maps on the SD card. The E20 will hold 2000 caches.

 

While it is true the eTrex will hold 2000 caches, it is also true it will hold 5000 caches. The max on both the 20 and 30 is 5000 caches.

 

Garmin says the 20 will hold 2000 waypoints/favorites/locations. The number of caches is not stated by Garmin. I have tested it several times to test different behaviors and the max is 5000.

[+redwoodkestrel]

 

They do download (as per my quoted reply; and not upload, which is device to host). Most of the time when that happened to me, I used Send to Device directly, so BaseCamp was just seeing them after the fact. I could actually see the GC*.gpx files in the device's Garmin/GPX directory outside of BaseCamp. Really, BaseCamp has nothing to do with this; it is just another way of seeing that the geocache was on the device. I would look at the .gpx files to make sure that they were OK (XML was formed correctly, no missing tags, etc.). I didn't see any thing peculiar there.

 

But unplug the device from the PC and voila, some GCs missing -- but not all. Plug it back in, and there they are -- still nice GC*.gpx files in the Garmin/GPX directory!

 

All I had to do was remove a GC and other GCs would show up. Like I say, it might have been something that the unit's XML parser did not like. In another thread there is discussion about the eTrex 20 choking on certain GCs, so I'm not the only one who has experienced this.

 

I'll give it a try again and see what happens. It's just a matter of figuring out what reproducible condition causes the symptom, so that Garmin can look into their code and find out why it happens.

 

Edit: When you download 100s of geocaches, can you wade through them all from the unit's geocache page? Or does it only show the first so-many?

 

I usually find the geocaches from the map view - since I'm usually looking for the ones nearest to me at any given point. I usually hike to find caches so it's often just looking at the map for the next one down the trail. I do occasionally use the geocache page as well but since that's also ordered by distance I'm generally only interested in the top few on the list.

 

I keep many geocaches in my Etrex since in any given week I often travel throughout a good amount of the SF Bay Area, so I keep the GPS loaded for the areas I visit most often. It's also really handy for road trips when I might not be at a computer for a few days at a time.

[+MountainWoods]

Ok. But I was actually wondering if, on the eTrex 20's geocaches page, whether you could scroll down through, say, 100 GCs that you'd downloaded, or whether it only shows so many. I'll give it a try. Eventually, though, between all the folks using the 10, 20, or 30 (pretty much the same firmware) we'll find out what causes the occasional "choke" where the unit doesn't display them all, even though they're all there in the unit. It happens; but no one has identified under what conditions yet. (I have a wild theory that it has something to do with a combination of characters in the title or description that the XML parsing is not handling correctly.)

[+redwoodkestrel]

Ah, sorry, I thought you were wondering about the functionality/ability to find a specific cache with so many geocaches loaded on the unit. I just spent a few minutes holding down the joystick to scroll through the geocaches page and yes, all of the geocaches show up (as best I can tell, I wouldn't know if a few were missing) - it doesn't seem to have a limit on how many it lists. I'm guessing I have somewhere around 1000-2000 caches in the unit right now, but I also know the one that's in there that is the farthest from me, and it was the last one on the list.

[+whh0]

Biggest difference is that the Etrex 10 has no map to speak of and you can't download one onto it. The reason we upgraded to an Etrex 20 is that all to often we found ourselves on the wrong side of the railway tracks or the wrong side of the river and having to start all over again......

[+A_Canadian_eh]

Biggest difference is that the Etrex 10 has no map to speak of and you can't download one onto it. The reason we upgraded to an Etrex 20 is that all to often we found ourselves on the wrong side of the railway tracks or the wrong side of the river and having to start all over again......

 

Thank you for that info....that is one of the things I was wondering about! We actually ordered the eTrex 20 with a Canadian map...hope that helps with the sort of problem you mention!

[+whh0]

I think you'll be happy with the etrex 20, there is certainly a steep learning curve and the manual is hopeless but that is the same whether you have the etrex 10/20 or 30. Any other queries and you can always come back on here and ask!

[+MountainWoods]

I'm happy with my eTrex 20, and I'm sure you'll be happy with yours.

 

BTW, I downloaded all 178 of my current finds into my unit and, after panicing and then remembering that I had to turn on Show Finds!, it was able to scroll through all 178. I think that some of the issue that I had with my unit will not apply to you, since you ordered yours with the map you want. I won't go into the technical details here, but I learned a huge lot of limits and things in the forums on the GPSFileDepot.com site. Fantastic site, BTW.

[+CominInHot]

I'm going to pick up the etrex30 tomorrow...wanted Oregon 600t but can't justify the cost for my first GPS. Etrex30 seems like a great unit, and I have 20% off at rei

 

Great YouTube:

Edited May 23, 2013 by CominInHot

[+GeoTrekker26]

I'm going to pick up the etrex30 tomorrow...wanted Oregon 600t but can't justify the cost for my first GPS. Etrex30 seems like a great unit, and I have 20% off at rei

 

Great YouTube:

 

You better read the fine print: From the REI web site

[the member 20% off on one item]

"Offer not valid on any item with GPS technology, avalanche airbag products, avalanche transceivers or personal locator beacons."

[+CominInHot]

 

You better read the fine print: From the REI web site

[the member 20% off on one item]

"Offer not valid on any item with GPS technology, avalanche airbag products, avalanche transceivers or personal locator beacons."

 

Bastards! Can't believe that...I've been a member for years and never run into this.

[+A_Canadian_eh]

Thanks so much for all the advice and pointers....what a great support community!

[+GeoTrekker26]

 

You better read the fine print: From the REI web site

[the member 20% off on one item]

"Offer not valid on any item with GPS technology, avalanche airbag products, avalanche transceivers or personal locator beacons."

 

Bastards! Can't believe that...I've been a member for years and never run into this.

 

It's not a new policy. I knew to warn you because I had the same thing happen to me a year or two ago. :-(

[sddragon]

I have a reply for your first question only. I am a basic member with an etrex10, and I use the "download to my gps" feature for caches. When I pull up the cache details, not only do I get the title and coordinates, I also get the terrain, difficulty, and size. To view the description, hint, and logs, you would need a premium membership.

[+yellow_labrador]

I got the etrex 30 from go outdoors for £139 (Usually £207 there)

 

They had to price match burrows gps price (£154) then knock off another 10%

 

 

Might be useful to someone, as the etrex 20 retails at £134

[+davetherocketguy]

I have the eTrex10 and it is very spartan in features considering today's technology. I can squeeze on maybe 700 caches at once and the data you get is a little limited which for me is annoying because I like to cache randomly sometimes. Just go wherever the next closest happens to be so having a lot of caches to pick from is nice. It is prone to GPS bounce but I have not been able to confirm if that is the result of the unit or the conditions yet. I sorely wish I could put a micro sd card in it. As it is, it only holds 8 MEGABYTES of info. Pretty pathetic IMHO considering where technology is today. If you have the cash go with the 20. If it weren't for the limited data capacity I would absolutely love my little GPSr.

[+JohnCNA]

That's weird, I own an Etrex 20 and regularly load it up with multiple pocket queries, each containing hundreds of geocaches. I don't use Basecamp, but I've never had an issue with putting that many caches on the device. Maybe bypass Basecamp and see if you can get more caches to upload?<br />

<br /><br />

I use - and like - Basecamp, but it has it's quirks. If you use the "Send to device" command in Basecamp, each cache is sent as a separate GPX file. The devices have a limit of how many waypoints, plus a limit on the number of GPX files. You will hit the limit of GPX files really quickly with that methodology. What I do is select a list category or highlight a bunch of caches and then select 'Export' and Basecamp saves the selection to a single GPX file which may have hundreds of caches/waypoints in the file. I can direct the Export to go directly to the handheld/Garmin/GPX folder or save it to desktop and drag and drop to the device/Garmin/GPX folder and I'm done done. This would at least get around the OP's possible problem of having too many GPX files on his device.

[SAVVY18]

Another thing to watch out for if you aren't able to load a large number of caches is that your available memory is being filled up by having your "Tracks" set to on. Also, if you have it save each "Found" cache in your calendar, they never go away and take up memory. I turn the tracks on my eTrex off and then delete the found caches from the calendar after I log them on-line. Also, it's a good idea to use the Basemap to show what you have loaded and compare that to the actual live caches on GC.com because some of them may have been archived and are just taking up space.

[diggerpol]

Another thing to watch out for if you aren't able to load a large number of caches is that your available memory is being filled up by having your "Tracks" set to on. Also, if you have it save each "Found" cache in your calendar, they never go away and take up memory. I turn the tracks on my eTrex off and then delete the found caches from the calendar after I log them on-line. Also, it's a good idea to use the Basemap to show what you have loaded and compare that to the actual live caches on GC.com because some of them may have been archived and are just taking up space.

 

ARGHHH! i'm confused! as far as I know I have 'tracks' turned off.

 

I have some caches showing as 'found' some caches are marked found, but are showing in the main list and I can't find anyway of deleting them! sorry for bugging people, I have asked this question elsewhere this afternoon, but I am getting frustrated at having caches for places i'm not going to again ( and ran out of time to look for ) taking up space. I have an etrex 10 and I have to say, i'm not finding it very user friendly! thank you xx

[+MidwestHunters]

We had our first day out with our eTrex 20(our first GPS) yesterday and loved it. Takes a little learning curve to zero in on your search coordinates, but after one or two, you better understand it. A few questions below that I haven't found answers to despite searching throughout the forum. After my wife repeatedly telling me to download the manual, I finally did (what a useless manual!)

 

1 - Hints - When viewing a cache on my eTrex, I see all details about the cache including a handful of logs(we are premium members). But we don't see the hint if there is one or any pictures. This isn't a big deal, because we can check on our phone if we really want it and it's less tempting when it's not right in front of you.

 

2 - Logging a find - I can't find any way to log my find. (maybe only possible in the eTrex30?) The manual(which is for the 10,20 and30) says to go to "Select Geocaches>menu>Log attempt". When I hit menu on a Geocache, I don't get this as an option.

 

3 - Is there a way to remove a cache from your eTrex20? I've learned how to delete waypoints easily but this doesn't seem to be an option with the GC.

Thanks in advance for any help.

[+Gitchee-Gummee]

1 - Hints - When viewing a cache on my eTrex, I see all details about the cache including a handful of logs(we are premium members). But we don't see the hint if there is one or any pictures. This isn't a big deal, because we can check on our phone if we really want it and it's less tempting when it's not right in front of you.

You need to be "navigating" to a geocache in order to read the hint. You need to have selected "Go".

Simply reading the geocache information will not get you to the hint.

 

2 - Logging a find - I can't find any way to log my find. (maybe only possible in the eTrex30?) The manual(which is for the 10,20 and30) says to go to "Select Geocaches>menu>Log attempt". When I hit menu on a Geocache, I don't get this as an option.

I cannot answer this one... you have it correct, according to the manual. That technique should work for any of the (current) eTrex models.

 

3 - Is there a way to remove a cache from your eTrex20? I've learned how to delete waypoints easily but this doesn't seem to be an option with the GC.

The manual seems to have skipped this... but, no you cannot delete individual caches.

Older models of Garmin units allowed for deletion of individual geocaches, newer units ('10; '20; '30; - up the line) do not allow for individual deletes. The contents of the GPX file must be deleted in its entirety.

 

The best solution for this is to load the unit using Pocket Queries to the GPX file (you didn't say if you use PQs or not)... each time you load a new PQ to the unit, the older file is overwritten, effectively deleting the "Found" caches -- assuming that you do not include already Found caches in the new PQ.

Pocket Queries are cheap and new data (less than 2 weeks/month old) is good data. Old data may well have you hunting for a cache that doesn't even exist anymore while missing the new one right next to where the old one was.

[+MidwestHunters]

Thanks. Read your reply right before starting out for a few today, so made sure I was selecting 'Go' for the Geocache and still don't see the hint when there is one. No big deal.

Your answer to deleting makes complete sense. I've been loading them individually so far, but plan to try a PQ soon.

[+Adventure.AS]

Thanks. Read your reply right before starting out for a few today, so made sure I was selecting 'Go' for the Geocache and still don't see the hint when there is one. No big deal.

Your answer to deleting makes complete sense. I've been loading them individually so far, but plan to try a PQ soon.

 

Once you have selected "Go" to start navigating to the cache, then press the "menu" button on the left side of your Etrex GPSr. "View Geocache" is highlighted by default. Press down on the joystick for "enter" and a menu comes up where you can see a menu choice for "Show Logs" and "Show Hint".

[+MidwestHunters]

Thanks. Read your reply right before starting out for a few today, so made sure I was selecting 'Go' for the Geocache and still don't see the hint when there is one. No big deal.

Your answer to deleting makes complete sense. I've been loading them individually so far, but plan to try a PQ soon.

 

Once you have selected "Go" to start navigating to the cache, then press the "menu" button on the left side of your Etrex GPSr. "View Geocache" is highlighted by default. Press down on the joystick for "enter" and a menu comes up where you can see a menu choice for "Show Logs" and "Show Hint".

Thanks a lot Nonsuch30. Just did it and that works. Solved both of those questions with that one path. I figured there had to be a way, but I just wasn't finding it. Now that I know, it's easy.

[+JohnCNA]

If you download Garmins free Basecamp software you can use it to delete individual caches. You can't delete them on the device itself.