GPS expert advice needed

[woodrow823]

I can't take credit, and wouldn't want to incase this doesn't work out. I saw a guy on Youtube recommending the discontinued Garmin Quest. First off, it's waterproof. Secondly, and most important, you can pick up a refurb or used one for $80. I just got one for $87, including shipping. Hey,what do you have to lose?
The downfalls are that it has no SD card slot for planning a lot of routes. BUT, you can use the USB, and it will store enough for a planned route trip. Also, no touchscreen, but the buttons are easily managed with a glove.

Oh yeah, did I mention $80 bucks? Pass up on the trip to Ruth's Chris and head to the Outback this wknd.

[hlothery]

I have been unable to transfer from googlemaps, etc to my Zumo. I can, however, send it to my wife's Mercedes via the satellite link (Mercedes version of Onstar). Wish they all did that!

[gblawler]

I can't take credit, and wouldn't want to incase this doesn't work out. I saw a guy on Youtube recommending the discontinued Garmin Quest. First off, it's waterproof. Secondly, and most important, you can pick up a refurb or used one for $80. I just got one for $87, including shipping. Hey,what do you have to lose?
The downfalls are that it has no SD card slot for planning a lot of routes. BUT, you can use the USB, and it will store enough for a planned route trip. Also, no touchscreen, but the buttons are easily managed with a glove.

Oh yeah, did I mention $80 bucks? Pass up on the trip to Ruth's Chris and head to the Outback this wknd.

Before buying my nuvi 550, I originally bought a Garmin Quest because I talked to a guy at a rally with one and he said he was very happy with it. I returned it immediately, unopened, when I found out that Garmin made a Quest and a Quest 2. The original Quest (the one I ordered), does not have enough memory to hold maps for the entire United States all at once. With that model, you need to be able to load different states on a cross country trip. I take long trips, so this was a deal killer for me. Fortunately, I had checked my vendor's return policy before buying, so I was only out a small amount for shipping. When I returned it, it was to exchange for a Quest 2, but the end of the story was the vendor could not supply the Quest 2, so I got a refund and bought the nuvi 550.

If you only travel in a 3 or 4 state area, the original Quest could be a real bargain, but be sure to get the Quest 2 if you want the entire US on the GPS. The nuvi 550 has all of the US, Canada, and Alaska, while the nuvi 500 is identical but with maps of the US only.

[jamesbpeterson1]

Your suggestions are absolutly the greatest. It has links to sites with 100's of routes in google and transferable to gps devices. I knew this existed somewhere!!!!

[criminaldesign]

what happened to reading maps? it's a reason to stop for a smoke.

[lyman50]

What many of us Garmin users do is use MicroSoft Streets and Trips on the computer to set up the route using waypoints. You oftentimes will have to put in a bunch of waypoints to ensure you follow the roads you want. Then use GPS Utility (a user-supported program) to transfer the waypoints to your GPS using the appropriate USB cable. Then you have to have the GPS recalculate the route.
.

Streets & Rides doesn't recognize my Zumo 550 after plotting a route... S&R says it wants NMES 2.0 (whatever that is) and indicates "No GPS found" after hitting the Scan button with the USB cord plugged in. What is GPS Utility? Is that a Garmin plugin? (I'm not particularly well skilled in computer use...) Is there a trick? process? download? to make it transfer routes to the Zumo? Many thanks for your help!

[PAULBACH]

After a route has been plotted using mapsource software the user can save the route in several formats. Two of the formats are

• Gdb and
• Gpx

After reading all the posts in this thread what is the difference between saving in Gdb (the default choice) and Gpx which Garmin seems to use to transfer to their units?

[marchyman]

gdb: garmin proprietary gps info database format (but it has been reverse engineered) invented for use in mapsource.

gpx: open format (an xml schema) invented by topographics, I think, used for vender agnostic gps data interchange. This format is now starting to be used by garmin.

http://www.topografix.com/gpx.asp says:

The GPX 1.1 schema was released on August 9, 2004. GPX has been the de-facto XML standard for lightweight interchange of GPS data since the initial GPX 1.0 release in 2002. GPX is being used by dozens of software programs and Web services for GPS data exchange, mapping, and geocaching.

If you want your data usable in non-garmin devices or software then GPX is a safer choice. Also, you can look at (and edit!) a gpx file in a text editor. I sometimes do that to trim track logs downloaded from the gps in gpx format.

[BASKETCASE]

Coming back to this topic I've been through a couple of changes since my earlier posts.

My first GPS was a 2003/2004 era StreetPilot III Colormap. Big, heavy, and limited to the Garmin proprietary memory cards.

Next I bought the Nuvi 550. Supposedly motorcycle friendly. I have concluded it is okay but so neutered down in terms of features and function that I have developed a bit of disappointment with it.

After a bunch of reading on handhelds I bought a 76Csx for offroad use and am still getting acquainted with it. The screen is small but feature wise, it is a huge step forward and reminds me of the feature rich StreetPilot series. It will import tracks and track back, which means I can take tracks from other riders and either follow them in the raw format, or convert them into routes using the software.

After I get back from the CDT this summer I'll update my impressions of it.