Recommend a GPS?

CianMcLiam Dec 7, 2005 20:50:31

Some folks love em, some folks hate em, but I'm getting weary of standing in a field in the middle of nowhere wondering 'where the folk am I' and more importantly, 'where the folk are those stones...'.

So, I've been looking at the Garmin Etrex or the Gecko 201, anyone used these and which one is better? I know the Etrex has longer battery life but Gecko is more accurate, but apparently this only applies in the US?

Cheers in advance!

sam Dec 7, 2005 20:57:34

Replying to CianMcLiam

apparently (boyfriend works in an outdoor shop) the gecko 201 is WAAS compatible and will give better accuracy than the etrex (its about +/- 3metres as opposed to +/- 15metres).

The iFinder Go is also good for a budget one, about £90, with WAAS.
Might be worth waiting for the GPS phones, coming next year. Or if you have a PDA, then a bluetooth GPS thiingbob could be used with it - works well with memoymap (does that cover your foreign land??)

hope that makes more sense to you than it did me.

Kammer Dec 7, 2005 21:38:47

Replying to CianMcLiam

I use an Etrex, and it's served me well. I've had it a while now though, so there may be newer models on the market that are better.

wolfnighthunter Dec 7, 2005 23:36:45

Replying to CianMcLiam

Hi Ken,

I use a Garmin Etrex Venture, which i have been using for the past 6 months, it has served me very well so far. I even got accuracy of 4ft on a foggy day on Ilkley moor. I am happy with that. I bought my one on ebay, it was only 2 weeks old at the time, got it for 60 quid, it was 150 online. So shop around, check ebay.

http://www.globalpositioningsystems.co.uk/7540

FourWinds Dec 8, 2005 07:45:50

Replying to CianMcLiam

I have a Garmin eTrex and it's ok. Mine is an early one with serial connection, which is a pain, but I believe the new one are USB.

eTrex screen is small and a it's a bit of a pain to use sometimes. Even when mounted on the dashboard it's a bit tricky to see the screen. If I was choosing again I'd definitely choose a WAAS enabled one and go for a colour screen. The eTrex screen does claim to get to 5m, but is usually displaying more like 7m or 8m. Also the pick up in less-than-perfect-conditions is not very good.

Obviously, when working from 6 figure grid refs you're not that accurate anyway and if someone else has read those from a map badly then .... well, basically a GPS won't always lead you to a stone :-(

When looking for a portal tomb this may not be too much of a problem, but when it comes to rock art hunting all a GPS will do is get you into roughly the right part of the field on 6 figures.

Rockrich Dec 8, 2005 12:29:53

Replying to CianMcLiam

Ken, if you do get a Garmin, make sure its 1 that still gives you directions when stood still, as some of em don't. I've got an Etrex Summit which has served me well for nearly 2 years. Due to my map reading skills, I wouldn't have seen 90% of the sites I have, without it!!!

third degree Dec 8, 2005 14:43:44

Replying to CianMcLiam

What level of gps do you want ? i have 4 units,starting from basic up to colour maps..for a good solid basic workhorse i would go for the yellow etrex by garmin...for something with colour mapping i use the garmin vista c,they are releasing topo maps for this unit in the very near future.

CianMcLiam Dec 28, 2005 16:29:51

Replying to CianMcLiam

Thanks for all the respones, after searching around I think the best value was the Magellan eXplorist 210 so I got that one. It has mapping and 22MB of memory but no magnetic compass or colour screen. I think Ireland really must be the lost city of Atlantis because it almost doesn't exist on the Europe map, just a handful of roads in Dublin and the M1/N11 along the east coast. Apart from that nothing, nada! (They are selling this non-existant map for 195 euro in Dublin, be warned!!). I might get Microsoft Autoroute 2006 as I heard it gives OS map co-ords so I could plot a route from village to village and might not get lost as often.

I used it to find the rock art at Rathgeran in Carlow and it got me to the bottom of the hill where I met the farmer who said it was too late in the evening to be trying to get to it as the sun had just set!

bawn79 Jan 5, 2006 12:29:21

Replying to CianMcLiam

I got a Magellan Explorist 300 for xmas, it was bought in england so only seems to have english maps. Does anyone have one? Does anyone know how to update the maps?
It seems to be fine for what I want to use if for, finding that stone in the middle of hilly areas far from roads but it would be nice if you could change the maps and use it as a route-planner as well.