Re: Question: Marine and Auto GPS
- From: Jack Erbes <jackerbes@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 12 Apr 2008 04:56:20 -0500
Maloney's wrote:
Can anyone recommend products I should consider that gives me a portable
chartplotter/GPS and auto navigation all in one device. I can think of the
Garmin 378/478 and the Lowrance Iway 600C. Any thoughts?
The Garmin "x" series are as good as it get for that kind of use. That
would be the 60Cx, 60CSx, 76Cx, and 76CSx. I have the 76Cx and could
not live without it. The 60 and 76 models vary only in shape and button
locations, the displays and features are identical regardless of what
the Garmin specs say. The CSx models have a barometer and compass that
will give stationary bearings and more accurate elevations.
I do seasonal boat deliveries and have to find boats by road or get home
by road and also wanted to have something with me with my previously
used/known to be good marine routes. So the 76Cx is my traveling library
for destinations and has my full library of marine routes. It is a
backup for the equipment on the boats, and also covers the cases where
the boat does not have a chart chip for the waters at both ends of the
delivery route.
The 76Cx has both City Navigator (street and highway) and BlueChart
(marine charts) on it and I can switch from one to the other in a few
seconds.
It will find and get me to just about any street address in the U.S.
The POI databases let me quickly find and get to airports, motels,
rental car agencies. I'm often the only guy in the taxi that knows how
to get to my destination. And it will do all that with full autorouting
and automatic off route recalculation on the highway mapping. When you
use it in the car you're working with a smallish display and no voice
prompts but it will sound a pre-maneuver alarm and it has two pages (the
Active Route and Turn Preview pages) that provide excellent and easily
read at a glance navigation prompts.
I get in discussions verging on arguments all the time about the
suitability of the handhelds for use in a car. Many don't think they
are suitable for that use because of the small display and the lack of
voice prompts but those are people that have never used them in a car
and are jumping to conclusions because of the size if it.
If you're serious about the navigation related features (full multiple
destination routing, full and absolute control of routing, track
recording and storage, user configurable data fields and info,
time/speed/distance info, etc., etc.) these handhelds are way smarter
than any of the Nuvis or other dash mounted models. I can travel for
week or months on end and record tracks for later as long as I have some
free space on the microSD external memory.
I travel with a DC outlet power cable and use my 76Cx on external power
when I can but I can get through a long day on a pair of AA cells. The
60/76 "x" series models are rugged and waterproof. The SiRF III chip
set may have been equaled in performance but I don't know of anything on
the market that surpasses the receiving sensitivity and general accuracy
of these receivers.
In all my travels in cars, boats, and on foot in the woods, I've never
found a need to connect an external antenna to get or maintain a fix.
The fix quality will go down under heavy cover and in some cars and
buildings, and you'll lose fix in metal and heavy reinforced concrete
buildings, but those are places where nothing will work.
The BlueChart marine charts are as good as anything I've used. You just
have to imagine that you are using a good chart plotter but limited to
looking at it through a playing card sized hole. The important details
and soundings in my vicinity are clearly visible. I plan, check, and
double check my routes on a PC, I have a chart book along, and I almost
always have a full sized chart plotter too for the "big picture". And
my eyes and ears are there too. The final arbitrator for where I am
going to place the boat is usually the well tested and previously used
magenta line and waypoints on the handheld. Those tell me that I know
exactly where I am and that, in most cases, I've been in that same spot
before without anything bad things happening.
The Garmin "x" series handhelds are the most versatile GPS receivers on
the market. If I were only going to own a single GPS receiver, my 76Cx
(or maybe a 76CSx) would be it.
--
Jack Erbes in Ellsworth, Maine, USA - jackerbes at adelphia dot net
(also receiving email at jacker at midmaine.com)
.
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