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UTM instead of lat/lon


Mad-Mac

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Since my magellan 310 only goes to second decimal place I use UTM, which is more accurate and easier to use anyway. Why doesn't this site give you the option of choosing either when posting a new cache site? or if I do, should i post the more accurate UTM co-ord. in the details?

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I wondered the same thing when I was using my 310.

 

Lat/long is easier to enter into the GPS. Maybe that's it.

 

I did everything in UTM and then converted it. There are some good conversion programs available. You can use the one linked on each cache page -- http://www.jeeep.com/details/coord/ There is also an Excel program out there somewhere that will do the work. If you can't find it easily, e-mail me directly and I'll send it to you.

 

Don't be worried about your 310. It is a fine GPS. It will actually make you a better geocacher because it zeros out when you are at 52 feet from the cache. I need you use your skills to find the cache. If you have any problems, please let me know and I'll try to help.

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Wow. That really didn't answer anything.

 

If your GPS can get more precision (not accuracy) using UTM, you could enter those UTM Northings, etc., into the Jeeep Conversion Site and get the DD MM.MMM on WGS84, and then enter them into the site.

 

IIRC, some of the earlier Maggies (310, 315?) came defaulted to displaying only DD MM.MM, but could be changed on the setup to display DD MM.MMM. Be sure to check that out as well.

 

Changing the display to show thousandths of a minute might also be something available in a firmware upgrade.

 

Markwell

Chicago Geocaching

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People keep thinking that the Magellan 310 will be firmware-upgradable to show more precision.

 

It's not possible. The constraint for that particular unit is the hardware of the display, which uses an 11-segment display for numbers and letters, not a dot-matrix like more modern units. So there is no possible upgrade to show more digits.

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quote:
Originally posted by logscaler:

Not sure about the 310 but the 315 and the 330 will allow the display of both wgs84 and utm on the screen at the same time. If that is what you want to use, use it.


 

The datum is the spheroid, not the projection. UTM is a projection. WGS84 is a datum.

 

The 310 and higher can all display UTM and lon/lat coordinates. I don't know about "at the same time" though.

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Well on either my 315 or 330, they have a "Primary" and "Secondary" "Cord System".

 

With the Lat/Long screen showing, I just punch "Menu", Highlight "Cord System", hit "Enter" and a subscreen reading :

"Cord System"

"Primary"

"Secondary"

 

shows up and I can change the "Primary" to :

Lat/Lon

UTM

OSGB

 

and a lot of other items.

 

Then I can do the same with the "Secondary" screen.

 

Therefore, I can run the "Primary" as "WGS84 Lat/Lon" and the "Secondary" as "WGS84 UTM" and I can see both of those items by using the four way center button and scrolling left or right to switch between the "Heading - Distance -trip Odometer" screen and the UTM ( Or whatever I choose) screen.

 

My UTM selection shows two lines, top line has 8 digits plus E and the second line shows 7 digits plus N.

 

Unless this is all information your not looking for and are after something else.

 

logscaler.

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