Free GPS Guidance
Archive for the ‘Handheld’ Category
A common question that you hear is “is there a site that one can go to for a profile to fit a GPS to the person and needs?” Generally you can go to any of the major manufacturers’ web sites and find comparison charts on their models. Most manufacturers have comparison functionality on their web sites that could help determine what to look for. It looks pretty basic, and you may have already determined what you are looking for, now you just need to find the right unit. First you must decide what type of unit are you looking for – automotive GPS systems, motorcycle GPS, marine GPS chartplotter or fishfinder, handheld GPS units? I especially like Garmin’s site for doing comparisons of features. There you can pick your interests (basic handhelds, mapping handhelds or on the side there is a link to geocaching). You can learn a lot from their site, and they have a wonderful comparison feature. This would be a terrific place to start. If you like geocaching there are also sites such as geocaching.com which teach you a lot and are a lot of fun. I generally like helping you find answers to your questions, but at the same time a feature which makes great sense to one person will sound like a waste of time and money to someone else, so you really need to do the final homework yourself to be sure you really find the GPS unit which suits your needs and that you will love for some time to come. I hope this helps to simplify things a little for you.
I couldn’t have said it better myself – the Garmin blog states;
Even though we’re sweating through the dog days of summer today, if you’re a hunter, you know the season is right around the corner (30 days by our count, but then, we get kind of giddy about these things). As the days get shorter, savvy hunters start hitting the woods and fields for some preseason scouting. This year they’ve got a new weapon in their arsenal.
The Oregon 550t is Garmin’s top-of-the-line outdoor handheld GPS receiver, and it comes jam-packed with features. Preloaded topo maps can give you the lay of the land, and loading eye-popping detailed BirdsEye Satellite Imagery can help hunters get a real-world perspective of their surroundings.
Even cooler is the onboard 3.2 megapixel waterproof digital camera that marks the precise location that each photo was taken. So instead of having to manually label each waypoint to make sense of things, the picture you took does all the work for you.
The Oregon 550t can help you become more successful and enjoy your time outdoors this fall.
The Oregon 550t For Pre-Season Scouting
Even though we’re sweating through the dog days of summer today, if you’re a hunter, you know the season is right around the corner (30 days by our count, but then, we get kind of giddy about these things). As the days get shorter, savvy hunters start hitting the woods and fields for some pre-season scouting. This year they’ve got a new weapon in their arsenal.
The Oregon 550t is Garmin’s top-of-the-line outdoor handheld, and it comes jam-packed with features. Preloaded topo maps can give you the lay of the land, and loading eye-poppingly detailed BirdsEye Satellite Imagery can help hunters get a real-world perspective of their surroundings.
Even cooler is the onboard 3.2 megapixel waterproof digital camera that marks the precise location that each photo was taken. So instead of having to manually label each waypoint to make sense of things, the picture you took does all the work for you.
The Oregon 550t can help you become more successful and enjoy your time outdoors this fall.
School’s out, the kids are home. I wonder if I can use my GPS unit to get away from the kids and find myself? Well, maybe I should use it to find adventure with the kids, in so doing perhaps to help us find each other? We can grab the handheld GPS device and take off on foot exploring the trails nearby. I like to pack a picnic and head out after work and do just that. Or we could do a day trip and take off exploring in the car using the automotive GPS unit to do that. Actually, now that I think of it I probably really don’t need to leave those kids behind to find myself after all. There are some great spots here in the Adirondacks for hiking and boating or just sightseeing, even to sit beside the lake and read while the kids splash around in the water. See ya later – its a pretty day – time for me to go pack that picnic lunch and get wandering with the kids…
Oh my, we get lots of calls requesting me to make a choice for folks so that they don’t have to decide which GPS unit to buy. Looks good on paper, but how can I know which features might be really useful or totally useless to each individual person. I could just decide which GPS unit I might prefer, but how would that information help a total stranger whose needs and budget may be totally different from mine? I feel like I really disappoint people when I try to point this out, but we are all individuals, which is why there are so many different versions of, for instance, handheld or automotive GPS units out there. Most of the manufacturers, especially Garmin, have really great interactive websites already where you can choose to compare several units to each other so that at a glance you can sort them out by which features you really want, which ones would only be nice perks and which ones are definitely yes or no features for you. Do you want it to be small and thin with a great battery life so you can carry it with you to find your way back to your car? Do you want lifetime traffic? Bluetooth? You get the idea. Anyway, once you have it narrowed down to possibly one or two favorites, it becomes simple to go back to Google or your favorite GPS store and see which one they have to offer, which types of accessories you will need and for what price they are offered. I just think it totally simplifies your shopping experience. I like simple. After all, I would rather be spending time exploring with my GPS unit than sitting in front of a computer trying to figure out all the pros and cons or entrusting my decision to someone who doesn’t even know me. Well, good luck in your search for the best GPS units for your needs and budget, and I hope this helps.
Can money buy you happiness? Someone posed the age-old question. Well, let’s consider. First, money purchased my hiking shoes, not a lot mind you, but money all the same. And it took money to purchase my inexpensive handheld GPS unit for geocaching. I rode my bike down a really pretty country road to where I wanted to look for that geocache which is only a couple miles from my house. My bike originally cost me money, but I have had it for quite a while and gotten quite a bit of use out of it, so cost per use would be pretty low by now. Of course, I could have walked the entire way – that would have been free. It did take some money for that GPS bike mount for my handheld GPS device, but not bad compared to the hands free convenience as I feel the right GPS mounts can make all the difference in using your handheld GPS systems. Hmm, also the sun on my face and the breeze in my hair were free. The sound of the birds in the trees and the rustle of the leaves was not only refreshing, but free. Well, I am thinking money purchased some conveniences and my GPS navigation device, but certainly the happiness of the day was certainly FREE, as was my soaring spirit that day. Now get out there and enjoy your life!
I Just got back from a weekend in Long Lake NY. While there i attended 3 Geocaching events. The 2010 Mid-Winter Meet and Greet Friday evening, Mid-winter Geocaching Get-Together 2010 on Saturday, and the 2010 Mid-Winter Flash Mob Event on Sunday. Along with attending these events i hiked along several trails new to me and cached with many different people. It made for a very adventure filled weekend. With Geocaching there is an adventure always near you with new caches being published daily around the world!!! If you already own a handheld gps and like the outdoors throw on some Snow Shoes and give it a try you won’t be sorry!!! For more information visit Geocaching.com
If you are looking for a serious, yet versatile handheld GPS you might want to consider the DeLorme Earthmate. The DeLorme Earthmate PN-30 or PN-40 GPS systems have a lot to offer. The DeLorme Earthmate GPS are great as handheld GPS systems, but with the right handheld GPS accessories such as the correct GPS mounts they become automotive GPS systems; and, since they are waterproof, can also be used on your motorcycle, bike or ATV as well, and there is no worry if you get caught in the rain on a hike or geocaching expedition.
With compact dimensions of 2.43 x 5.25 x 1.5 they are easy to carry, are equipped with STMicroelectronics GPS 32-channel chipset for reliable satellite acquisition and include dual-core processor for rapid screen re-draws, even with large aerial imagery files and 500 MB of available on-board Flash memory. With both you can download data directly to SD card while in the receiver and display Navionics Charts. While only the PN-40 has a 3-axis electronic compass which performs in any position and sensitive barometric altimeter for accurate altitude readings, both versions have many other great features.
Both the DeLorme Earthmate PN-30 and PN-40 are pre-loaded with US secondary and connector roads , pre-loaded worldwide highway and major road base map and include Topo USA with comprehensive street, road and topographic detail. DeLorme Earthmate GPS even include NOAA nautical charts and are WAAS-enabled and with their rugged rubberized housing they are waterproof to IPX7 for marine use. Both the DeLorme Earthmate PN-30 and PN-40 include support for high capacity SDHC cards , available at up to 32 GB and 65K-color daylight-reading screen for visibility in any light conditions. Include the facts that they hold up to 10 tracks (10,000 points per track), up to 1,000 user-defined waypoints and hold up to 50 routes they are terrific for paperless geocaching. And who would expect them to include an almanac information on tides, sun and moon phases, and hunting/fishing conditions? Since they run on 2 AA batteries (included) or available Lithium-Ion rechargeable you can always carry backup batteries in your pack so you won’t get caught without your GPS before you get home.
What more versatile handheld GPS systems can you imagine? Whether you are interested in automotive GPS systems, geocaching or using GPS on your bike, motorcycle or ATV or for marine use, the DeLorme Earthmate GPS are dynamite handheld GPS systems not to be overlooked.
Oh Christmas Sales, Oh Christmas Sales! How lovely saving money… Oh, sorry… Black Friday shopping – what a frenzy! Oh, the stories I heard – bet you heard ‘em, too. A few friends made it up and out at O’Dark-thirty, joined in the pushin’ and shovin’, hustlin’ and bustlin’, hurryin’ to get a number to stand in line hopin’ to get what they wanted, limited numbers, sizes ran out, rushed and ran and got tired out. Another friend talked about how many folks are catching the flu while out shopping lately. A familiar story, don’t you think? We’ve heard plenty about that. And the gas prices, Oh My! Well, here at home, not down in the city, we just hung our wreaths. Oooh, don’t they look pretty. Now I’m back at my desk, coffee by my side, checking my options, beaming with pride.
Anyway, with Cyber Monday tomorrow I want to decide which handheld GPS systems I like best. There are some great ones to choose from. Let me see, I like geocaching, check. I want it to be handy for hiking, check. Oh, and let’s not forget bike riding, great! It needs to be small enough to grab to take on vacation, yup. Sure have some great handheld GPS units to consider! Delorme Earthmate – there are several, Busnell ONIX GPS, Garmin Colorado and Vista, Dakota and Forerunner. It’s time to grab a snack and settle down to look with this many options!
One day 
some folks stopped at my dad’s house looking for information about their ancestors who are reported to have been buried in this area around the turn of the century. They really got turned around trying to find them in unfamiliar woods. One glorious fall day recently, while enjoying the last of the bright autumn leaves, my daughter and I decided to wander some of the trails near us looking for those specific headstones. There are several really old cemeteries out in the woods and fields in this area off some of those trails, and we thought it would be fun to email them with the coordinates if we found the right spot so they could return with their own GPS receiver. We pulled on our hiking boots, grabbed our Garmin Colorado hand held GPS unit, and set off on foot to scour the area. A couple cemeteries and a picnic lunch later, and we did find their ancestors for them. That felt good to help out that nice family, but better still, the time spent wandering with my daughter was priceless. We need to plan another hike with our handheld GPS units real soon.
I was talking to my friend today, and she suddenly started chuckling. She and her husband had been visiting friends this week. One of her friends started talking about how their neighbor was doing something with her navigation thingy looking for stuff and couldn’t understand what she was doing or why they thought it was so much fun. My friend surprised even her husband by explaining to them that they are using their handheld GPS units looking for a geocache. Geocaching is very a popular activity in which you get the coordinates of the location where someone else hid a special waterproof container containing a log and maybe some little trinkets or geocache coins or such, then you go out and find it with the aid of your portable GPS device. It is something that is fun for the whole family to do together. She was pretty smug that, after having talked about geocaching with me from time to time, she was the only one in their group who understood what was going on. Cute. She has since started talking to them about trying it with her soon with her handheld GPS system. Maybe I can tag along, too!