Accessories

Not good under tree cover
I bought this unit for Geocaching. I have grown tired and frustrated of losing satellite signal under any sort of tree cover. We are finally decided to sell it for a better unit.

1 Serial Port Cable is a fossil!
It's not about the GPS, or that it only holds 8MB's of memory (not a stick upgradable option but built in#, or it only locks onto a satellite if U R standing still in the middle of a foot-ball field, BUT most computers today come with ONE #9 female pin# serial-port plug/outlet for PC to a major/vital peripheral hook-up or 4 get your printer/scanner or fax and use it for your GPS hook up and buy their map disks at $100+ ea. But don't buy them ALL or your memory would have to be in the GB's range! If U have a PC with any peripherals like a printer that ONLY port is USED so no luck d/l-ing Garmin © software. Most newer PC's come with several USB 2.0 ports, or a cheap hub turns 1 USB outlet into many outlets/inputs, so why is Garmin selling a GPS kit for around $130 with the ONLY way to get Jack from your PC is thru a SP connector? If U want a USB that works to d/l maps think around paying $60 more for this: 'USB to RS232 converter cable' which it should have come with for the price but didn't. So I have a cute hand held GPS that only shows me MAJOR roads has a menu that takes days to figure-out and set-up, then lacks memory, has no way to up that memory with a 1GB card and flogs an ancient SP hook-up with NO CD map disk #teasers# to Joe Public. Clearance time or PP planning? My buddy saw my frustraion and asked me why I had bought a Garbage GPS, he is a pilot!
Spokane, WA.

A basic handheld GPS
I wanted a GPS to note down the lats and longs to the places I visit (places of birding importance). I am in India and the default US maps are of no use to me. I am not bothered about it. The Garmin serves its purpose in recording lats, longs and elevation. It has additional features such as speedometer, odometer, etc, which is not my need. It shows your position with the best accuracy of 11 metres radius (as far as I have tried so far).

I knew that this particular Garmin model does not accept Google Earth Pro. However, I thought there should be other means of uploading maps to it. This is something I am yet to explore. But, the major draw back is the computer connectivity. It comes with a serial port, which my laptop does not accept. I have to now find out some adapter for this.

Other interesting features of the GPS are marking waypoints, tracking your route, and panning the map after you record your track/waypoints. The instrument has a joystick which you can use to pan, or jump menus in the "Main Menu" window. It's been just three weeks I got this GPS, and the joystick has stopped working in one direction. I can not pan the map down. I haven't used it roughly, the poor mechanical thing appears to be too sensitive.

Overall, it serves my purpose of getting the co-ordinates and elevation. If you want something more, like compatibility with Google Earth Pro, good computer connectivity, etc, then this is not the model. You may be interested in Garmin eTrex Legend CX or Vista.

Good old GPS
I bought this used here on Amazon back in Oct 2003 and has worked without problems.
This GPS I use for Geocaching and it works great. I added the MetroGuide Map, I believe, and get nice street level detail unfortunately the 8 Megs of RAM is not enough to hold all of the LA area but it does hold quite a bit.

This is NOT a GPS that you really want to use for driving. There are many other GPS that have Turn-by-Turn, Color diplays, Touchscreen, ect... But it does very well for hiking, walking and bike riding, ect...

works good for my outdoor use
I bought this to take hunting and hiking. The downside is the time it took to learn all the features I wanted to use. This is not a car level gps but isn't intended to be. Others are correct that under trees, if not holding it level, you'll lose signal, but it was quick to pick it back up. Gets me to with in 10 feet of the points I marked. I'll get a lot of use out of it.