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Garmin 60CS
Well since Lance has chimed in about his new toy, might as well talk about mine :) I bought a Garmin 60CS from an ebay discounter for around $400 shipped.
http://www.gpsnow.com/images/gmmap60csg.jpg Why I bought This Over Other Units Rugged construction and ability to use for both the city and outdoors. One day, I'll dust off my backpacking gear and use this unit :) Also, it has a great display, intuitive menu/navigation, easy to use buttons, and its a Garmin! :) Comparision Compared to my old Streetpilot, its like comparing a Commodore VIC 20 to a Pentium III. Its very fast at scrolling through the basemaps (haven't loaded the city map yet) and the topo maps. It scans/scrolls very quickly too. It has a map capacity of 56mb. I was able to load the topo maps of the majority of So Cal, the route to Vegas, the route up Central California on the coast, the SF Bay area, the major national parks in central California (Sequoias), up to Redding, east towards Sacramento, up to Tahoe and of course, Vegas :) All of that is only 29mb. The city maps will probably consume more data, so I'll update this thread and give you all an idea of how much it can cover in 56mb. One thing that it cannot do is to have both the topo and the city map on at the same time. That will suck big time if you are going on a trip (city) and then take your vehicle up to the mtns (where you need the topos) User Interface Very intuitive. Good sized buttons w/ a neat little round, 4 directional button (rocker type) that allows you to choose from menu options quite easily. The Quit (its like the ESC key) and Enter buttons are smartly placed below the 4D button selector which make it easy to choose your options. Menu The menu is much easier to navigate than my old Streetpilot. Its so different from the SP, but Lance, Jason, James and I got together last Saturday to have some lunch and compare GPS units. We all have Garmins (Quest, Etrex, and my 60CS) and the menu/nav is pretty close to identical. No user should have difficultly figuring it out, esp if the user had a previous Garmin unit (except old dinosaurs like the Streetpilot :) ) Display The color and readability in bright sunlight is outstanding. Hardly any "washout" effect. And its not even set at the brightest setting. The colors are very vibrant and now I understand why people say "best to get color". Battery Life Battery life is claimed to be 20 hrs. Haven't actually verified that. I always have mine hooked up to some car or home outlet/power supply. Mounting Options I have it mounted on a genuine Garmin suction mount that is very sturdy, but can only be mounted on the driver's side windshield near the A-pillar b/c it is not very long. You *could* mount it in the middle, but then because of its height, becomes an eye sore and not to mention, kinda screws up your field of vision. I think that a nice RAM Mount holder would be a better option. Oh well. Dislikes The HUGE 4-pin power cord! especially when its used with the garmin suction mount, its obscenely difficult to plug it in and get it out quickly. It would be great if the power outlet would be a plug style that plugged in the bottom of the unit like most mobile phones. Memory slot/card- my old streetpilot had a memory slot for a memory card. it would be great to augment the existing memory with more. more! more! more! Screen orientation- it would be great for vehicle use if it was able to lay lengthwise like the Quest and other car-specific GPS units. It makes the GPS less conspicuous and easier to see over. Thats all i can think of now. I've barely had this for 3 weeks now and haven't fully utilized it. Other Tips and Advice Definitely shop around for accessories. An ebay seller named "GPSGeek" is a great seller of 3rd party and very quality cables and power cords. They sell the only quality, neoprene case that I've seen that has a clear, see through plastic face. Also, I bought a bare wire 12v accessory plug so that I can hardwire it into my 4runner (i'm big into hardwiring stuff as you know :) ), a genuine Garmin home power cord, and a cig lighter adapter for when we take it in my wife's car. Most of this i bought from gpsgeek on ebay, but definitely use Froogle to get other stuff. Bob |
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josh,
does that garmin dash mount work for ya? i like to have it centered, but that darn curvy 3rd gen dash of mine looks like it wouldn't work as nicely as your pics makes yours out to be. can it tilt towards you? Or does it only rotate left and right? bob |
The dash mount works great. The permnanant sticky pad is pretty solid so far. The mount rotates at the base and at the unit itself and can be locked at the base. The mount arm has two points of articulation, so basically it could be mounted on an extremely odd angle and still be put into a level position. You can see how mine is moved forward and down not to limit any visibility. The arm can be removed from the base when not in use.
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Guys,
Think seriously before buying the Topo CD. Myself and several others I've wheeled with find it very lacking. I've been talking to Garmin about creating a map CD geared towards off-roading, with so many of us using their unit for that purpose, but it probably won't happen any time soon. That's the only thing I miss about my old Lowrance GPS, their maps were much better for 4x4's, too bad their units are such poor quality. Maybe see if you can find someone with the topo maps installed to look them over before buying. My 2 cents |
I have the Gramin gps 76cs. It is basically the same unit as the 60cs with more memory.
here is a site that helps with map comparison. Good Stuff Map Pics Forum Most gps topo maps are lacking any real 4x4 detail. |
Originally Posted by Phalanx
What Mount do you have? Model number? I just bought the same Gps the Garmin 60cs. Where you have it is real nice. |
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Yes, thats the one.
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my garmin ique 3200 came with a very similar mount in the box.
mine was 300 bucks shipped, pda features as a bonus to the excellent, easy-to-use gps. |
Update:
I had the opportunity to use this Garmin 60CS quite a bit this past weekend on the road (not off road). But first, I'd like to comment on the mounts. The garmin suction mount's best attribute is it is the most stable platform and is less prone to the up and down "shakes". However, the biggest negative for the suction mount is that the arm is not long enough to mount anywhere else but near the A-pillar. You *could* mount it smack dab in the middle of your windshield, but you'd have to mount that suction mount fairly high in order to accomodate the height of the gps. My sheriff friend said that he'd probably use that as an excuse to pull people over b/c it is a clear obstruction of vision for the driver. I also bought a garmin dash mount like the one that phalanx has and it is superior to the suction mount in two ways: it can be mounted relatively anywhere on the dash and still be rotated to face you (and your passenger) because it can rotate horizontally on its axis, articulate vertically for height adjustment, as well as circularly (is that a word!?!?) to rotate left and right. The biggest negative is that this mount bounces up and down like crazy. Got me dizzy trying to watch this thing. I used it for as long as I could before tossing it in the back. I don't know how you do it, Josh. Please tell me how you mount this thing from not bouncing up and down or else this thing goes on ebay. Now the GPS: this thing rocks like WimpyWade's mullet! The GPS is extremely easy to read, even in daylight conditions thanks to the screen. The most useful feature is the "Find" feature. The City Select map software is great. You can either program the address, store, and then map to it, or you can select from the choices contained in the software. It took a little getting used to and reading the manual (who knew!), but its just like having Yahoo Maps in your car. If you miss a turn, it can rapidly recalculate. In addition, its pretty accurate. I did not get lost, though there were a few times where it took the most direct but longer route. The menu system is great too. Easy to read while driving (icons) and the buttons are easy to work with. It does take some iterations to get used to it, but once you get the hang of it (1 or 2 days max), its easy. I havent used all the features, but I cant wait until this damn bum knee heals up so I can take this backpacking. The compass and the altimeter should be very useful, but I highly doubt I'll turn on the GPS just to use the compass! In retrospect, if you don't do any camping/backpacking, save a few bucks and buy the Garmin 60C which is just like the 60CS, but doesnt have the compass and altimeter. Also, the battery life is nearly double. Speaking of battery life, the purported battery life is around 20 hours. I'd say with the duracells I used, battery life was about 14-15 hours. I have a power cord for the car, but I really wanted to see how long the battery life was. And the great thing about the 60C and 60CS is that it takes AA batteries. Stopped at 7-11 to get a new set along the way. :) Hopefully I'll find situations to use the other features. I'll write more later when I use other features. Bob |
Got to use my 60CS on an early fall dirt bike trip to Colorado and loved it. Used the factory suction mount w no troubles. My 1st unit. Very cool toy. Now if it could just recieve through trees
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good news, bob. glad to hear it.
i love the software provided with my ique 3200 as well. its very clear and bright, so you can see where youre going just fine. i also love that it has a "night mode", so the map switches to a black background, with only the roads illuminated. much easier to see at night and it wont distract you with a crazy yellow bright display! i find i sometimes have to hit the "redirect" button because it takes to long at times for it to realize ive taken the wrong turn. but once it does, it quickly recalculates and gets me going the right way again. im going to be using this come spring a lot, because there is a scenic drive in western mass called the "mohawk trail' that i want to go on. there are a lot of state parks and forests as well as nice little towns to go see. so ill need the gps to help me stay on the right track. |
Bob
You may want to look into getting a set of NiMH rechargeable batteries and a charger if you intend to use the unit away from your vehicle. I got a set of 2300 mA batteries and charger kit from Costco that I like. It even has a 12v cord to charge from your cigarette lighter socket. I have many gadgets that use AA batteries, and I have not bought Duracell or Energizer AA batteries in several years. I use a RAM suction mount for my eTrex Vista. I put it in the middle of the windshield a little to the left of center. It doesn't obscure forward vision too much. |
The auto mount I have does bounce up and down a little but not enough to bug me. If its shaking wildly my focus is usually on the road ahead anyway. On the road its pretty solid. I would just play with the position to try and alleviate the torque/centripital force on the joints.
If youre going to use it for backbacking you might be interested in this... http://sdairsoft.tripod.com/gps7.jpg http://sdairsoft.tripod.com/gps8.jpg http://sdairsoft.tripod.com/gps9.jpg Its a 1000 nylon cordura pouch that can be worn on the belt or backpack chest strap. Its flipped up to glance at the screen. All the buttons can be used through the clear plastic cover. Its not for sale to the public yet but it will be soon when the bugs are worked out. |
Any update, Bob, on how much of California you can load to 56 megs? And to clarify, you can load both topos and city maps at the same time, but just can't use them at the same time?
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Bob -
how's it working out for you? did you get to use it on the DV run this weekend? |
garrett,
one thing i hate about these things is having to relearn everything! this unit is really great. i hve no problem doing the basics, but i have to RTFM to figure out some of the more useful stuff like tracks. one thing i think is annoying but most if not all gps units suffer is marking points. you have to name them to be relevant to anyone else...or you about a year later. i still had some DV points marked,but they were all labeled 01, 02, etc. so with a group moving at 30mpg through the desert, you dont have time to label them. one advice: buy a ram mount. it works best. i tried 2 kinds of garmin mounts. none can compare w/ the ram mount. buy quality first and then you'll only cry once :D bob |
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Originally Posted by Bob_98SR5
One thing that it cannot do is to have both the topo and the city map on at the same time. That will suck big time if you are going on a trip (city) and then take your vehicle up to the mtns (where you need the topos)
I am highly considering the Cx over the Cs. The Cx is $20 more and you gain the SIRF receiver and the SD microcard slot (very important for long trips) but loose 2 hours of battery life and the compass/barometer function. As long as I can store LOTS of maps on the SD card with the ability to toggle between city and topo, this unit should work nicely for me. I appreciate any comments you may have. Ken |
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