What GPSs allow you to load that most geocaches

[+ChileHead]

I believe the Oregon 6xx series can hold a virtually infinite number of geocaches with the ggz file format (from what I can tell, is just a zip of gpx files with an additional XML file containing a subset of all the gpx data for optimized access.)

 

The 550/500/450/etc ... do not support this format, is this correct? How many geocaches can they hold? If I'm reading the specs right, it seems they are limited to 2000 waypoints. Is there a way of loading more than that, like I know people do by making a points-of-interest file for the 60 series?

 

I'm looking for a new device. I currently use a Delorme PN40 which lets me load (virtually) unlimited number of GPX files but I have to switch between the files as I travel (which is really slow on this device.) I normally have about 8000 caches loaded that covers the area I'm normally in, and would to keep that capability either through switching files like I currently do, or more preferably having a device that lets me load all 8000 into the device memory at once.

 

The 6xx would fit my needs, but is more than I want to spend.

 

What GPSs will let you load at least 8000-10000 geocaches? Brand isn't a big factor.

[Moun10Bike]

My Garmin Montana 650 will hold 10,000. (My Oregon 550t holds 5000.)

[+Socal ZukiCachers]

My Garmin Montana 650 will hold 10,000. (My Oregon 550t holds 5000.)

 

All of the units in Magellan's new generation of eXplorist will hold 10,000 caches, except the eX110.

 

David

Magellan Insider

[insig]

My Garmin Montana 650 will hold 10,000. (My Oregon 550t holds 5000.)

 

Montana holds up to 12,000.

 

I think the bigger question is how many caches are you actually going to want to find before all that data gets stale and you have to reload with fresh data?

[+ChileHead]

My Garmin Montana 650 will hold 10,000. (My Oregon 550t holds 5000.)

 

All of the units in Magellan's new generation of eXplorist will hold 10,000 caches, except the eX110.

 

David

Magellan Insider

 

With the explorist can I connect the device to my computer as a USB storage device and copy my PQs over to it? I mostly use linux, so I'd rather not have to boot windows to run an application to transfer the caches/gpx files over.

[+T.D.M.22]

My Garmin Montana 650 will hold 10,000. (My Oregon 550t holds 5000.)

 

Montana holds up to 12,000.

 

I think the bigger question is how many caches are you actually going to want to find before all that data gets stale and you have to reload with fresh data?

 

+1

 

Since I've never loaded 10,000 caches into my GPSr, I have to go with what I've been told; Loading an insane amount of caches and descriptions into a GPS slows it down.

 

I have never had the need for more than 150 caches at one time. Maybe a complete power trail, or all the caches for the annual event here, but other than that I'm not going to find that many in one day. Maybe 500 if you really want to get a lot of caches on a weekend, and organize it well.

 

But ya-even 100 caches, the info will get old within a week. New co-ords, missing containers, archived caches, and so on.

[+Mineral2]

You can load PQ's directly onto any GPS that mounts as a mass-storage device. I download the Zip files directly to my hard drive and I've written a short bash script that will unzip each one into the proper folder on my GPS.

 

By the way, the Garmin Oregon 450-550 holds 5000 geocaches and 2000 waypoints. They are separate categories on the Garmin units. The GPS 62 and eTrex series also hold 5000 geocaches. The Montana series holds 12,000, and the Oregon 600 holds 4 million.

See Here for more information

 

But, as a previous poster mentioned, if you're storing that much data, do you really want to be keeping it all updated on a regular basis? Unless you regularly travel in a way that you need to load more than 5000 caches and keep them with you, 5000 is more than enough for normal use.

[+Gitchee-Gummee]

My Garmin Montana 650 will hold 10,000. (My Oregon 550t holds 5000.)

 

Montana holds up to 12,000.

 

I think the bigger question is how many caches are you actually going to want to find before all that data gets stale and you have to reload with fresh data?

Bingo!

We actually prefer Delorme's ability to choose from multiple PQ loadings. It allows for greater "area loads" while traveling and deleting one (or more) of those files does not remove all of the files. At the same time, it also allows one to keep FRESH data in the unit, rather than something like 10,000 old files.

 

Yes, weekly Pocket Queries can eliminate that problem. Perhaps the difference is that we plan for outings, rather than just keeping the unit loaded up for anytime/anywhere caching.

 

Depending upon the size of the file loading (when switching) it can take a while... but we are talking only 3-4 minutes, perhaps up to six minutes with a huge file.

 

Using that technique, I dare say that we can load well over 50,000 caches onto an SD card -- if we were to choose to do so -- have never envisioned a reason why we should, though. It just goes back to the ol' "Stale data is bad data" scenario.

 

Diff'rnt strokes....

[+Lieblweb]

We have an Oregon 450 & 62s. Great units.....

 

Two years ago when we bought the Oregon...Garmin had advertised on their website that it would hold 5,000 geocaches. Well...after fighting with it for 2 years of crashing & locking up - regardless of what updates or firmware we were running, we've recently dropped our geocaches down to about 3,000 to be 'crash free'.

Same with the 62s.... And now, I've noticed they advertise they can only hold 2,000. The least amount of geocaches you put in them, the better they work.

 

I would love to find a different GPS (not Garmin) that'll hold a heck of a lot more than 5,000. We like to load the GPS's up with local caches (as far out as 30-50 miles) and just grab & go on the weekends and not have to reload it again for a month.... or more.

[+BlackRose67]

Here is the info for the currently available Garmin units.

 

https://support.garmin.com/support/searchSupport/case.faces?caseId=%7B0b02f820-03db-11e0-e050-000000000000%7D

[39_Steps]

Geocachers who are willing to drag along a Windows OS laptop for wide area large database gps geocaching in the US and Canada may wish to consider the Delorme Street Atlas 2013 application.

 

Counter intuitively, the Street Atlas software with E-Z Nav single point routing, is much simpler for automobile Waypoint (Geocache) routing than the Delorme Topo software bundled with the PN-40 and PN-60 devices.

 

The Delorme SA software should be as capable of combining or splitting stored Waypoint files(including Geocache symbolized waypoints as Topo, and combining geocaches is something that the PN-40/60 gps devices cannot do in the field with gpx files.

[+Walts Hunting]

My Garmin Montana 650 will hold 10,000. (My Oregon 550t holds 5000.)

 

I thought my Montana held 12,000

[Moun10Bike]

My Garmin Montana 650 will hold 10,000. (My Oregon 550t holds 5000.)

 

I thought my Montana held 12,000

 

Yes, it looks like I was wrong - the specs I'm seeing now definitely indicate 12,000!

[+Walts Hunting]

They probably changed them when you off doing work to help make the caching world better.

 

I never understood this desire to have all the caches on the planet on a device. If I decide in the morning to go somewhere GSAK API loads all the caches (faster than a PQ procedure) and then sends them to my device. I think the froggie underestimated the HUGE databases people would make when they started this API thing and this is why they have cut off new vendors from it.

Edited September 5, 2013 by Walts Hunting

[+ChileHead]

I have never had the need for more than 150 caches at one time. Maybe a complete power trail, or all the caches for the annual event here, but other than that I'm not going to find that many in one day. Maybe 500 if you really want to get a lot of caches on a weekend, and organize it well.

 

But ya-even 100 caches, the info will get old within a week. New co-ords, missing containers, archived caches, and so on.

 

My data is always up to date within about a week or so. I have no illusions that I will find that many, I just want to have all the caches loaded for the areas I travel to.

[team tisri]

My Garmin Montana 650 will hold 10,000. (My Oregon 550t holds 5000.)

 

Montana holds up to 12,000.

 

I think the bigger question is how many caches are you actually going to want to find before all that data gets stale and you have to reload with fresh data?

 

+1

 

Since I've never loaded 10,000 caches into my GPSr, I have to go with what I've been told; Loading an insane amount of caches and descriptions into a GPS slows it down.

 

I have never had the need for more than 150 caches at one time. Maybe a complete power trail, or all the caches for the annual event here, but other than that I'm not going to find that many in one day. Maybe 500 if you really want to get a lot of caches on a weekend, and organize it well.

 

But ya-even 100 caches, the info will get old within a week. New co-ords, missing containers, archived caches, and so on.

 

When I go cycling with a view to maybe finding some caches around the loop I don't necessarily know where I'm going to end up. I usually create a query of everything within about 30 miles of home and when I exclude unsolved puzzles and a few silly hides 200' up cliff edges and the like I end up with about 6000 caches. There are a couple of rides I do (that I know in advance I'm going to do) where I increase the range because I know I'll be going past the edges of a 30 mile radius.

 

I usually refresh the GPS once or twice a week (I refresh the GPS more often than I go caching a lot of the time). If a cache isn't there it isn't there, but there's nothing to stop a cache disappearing in the couple of hours between this morning's Found log and my attempt to find it this afternoon.