GPS Units

[PeteS]

Cheers for the advice. Yes, I'd seen the offer on Amazon - pretty good when the likes of Cotswold are asking £400 for it. Think its worth a punt though I admit I'm still having reservations over the 1:25000 maps - I spend quite a bit of time in the lakes/ N.Wales and think it would good to have the option to have the more detailed maps but at the price Satmap are charging, that's not likely to happen! I do like the flexibility of the Garmin in that respect.............decisions, decisions.......!!!!

[IanDarkpeak]

Cheers for the advice. Yes, I'd seen the offer on Amazon - pretty good when the likes of Cotswold are asking £400 for it. Think its worth a punt though I admit I'm still having reservations over the 1:25000 maps - I spend quite a bit of time in the lakes/ N.Wales and think it would good to have the option to have the more detailed maps but at the price Satmap are charging, that's not likely to happen! I do like the flexibility of the Garmin in that respect.............decisions, decisions.......!!!!

Where are you based Pete?

[PeteS]

Based in midlands and do most of my running in shropshire, worcs and staffs. Try to get away to the lakes and wales as often as poss though nowhere near as much as I would like.....

[Martyn P]

Had a look at both the SatMap and GPSMAP62S last night.
Both units come with full GB OS 1:50000 and to my thinking that would be sufficient for 99% of the scenarios I could imagine using it in.
So, although the Garmin seems to have the advantage in that I could load custom maps or by smaller areas of 1:25000 at a lower price, I'm not sure I'm going to need them. At the end of the day, I'm always going to have a paper map and compass with me anyway.
Of the 2, I think I prefer the Satmap - the resolution of the display is better and I found it easier to use. My only reservation is on build quality - the Garmin seemed far more robust.
Anybody, got a SatMap and can comment?

Incidentally, the retailer confirmed they had quite a few eTrex 30s returned as faulty and so were not currently stocking them.

Interesting - I'll be keeping a close eye on mine then! FWIW I had it with me all day yesterday out on the 3Ps course and although I didn't really need it to navigate, kept a close eye on it so as spot any freezing. Seemed OK .... maybe I got a good one!

[PeteS]

Interesting - I'll be keeping a close eye on mine then! FWIW I had it with me all day yesterday out on the 3Ps course and although I didn't really need it to navigate, kept a close eye on it so as spot any freezing. Seemed OK .... maybe I got a good one!

Yeh! seems you did. I doubt they are all bad - the chap in the shop said they had been popular but had some returned with what he described as "teething problems". Didn't specify what.

[Theolneywayisup]

I got the etrex 30 for Christmas and have only used it a few times but the ascent/descent measurements are way out. We're talking 3 times the actual amount here! Also shows far more ascent than descent each time even though I start and finish at the same place.

I have e mailed garmin this week and await a reply. Not sure if it is faulty or its me that's faulty somewhere! Have tried to calibrate so don't think that is the problem.

[Martyn P]

I got the etrex 30 for Christmas and have only used it a few times but the ascent/descent measurements are way out. We're talking 3 times the actual amount here! Also shows far more ascent than descent each time even though I start and finish at the same place.

I have e mailed garmin this week and await a reply. Not sure if it is faulty or its me that's faulty somewhere! Have tried to calibrate so don't think that is the problem.

Actually, I have noticed this too and am at a loss to explain it. The funny thing is, if you save a given track and import it into Garmin Connect it shows a true cumulative ascent. For example I carried the eTrex30 on Saturday at Trollers and at the end the trip computer told me that I'd climbed 11,000ft and coveredd 25.2 miles. The imported track in Garmin Connect showed 24.99 miles (about right) and 2,600ft-ish - probably correct.

So, the question is - what do those figures mean on the trip computer? Odd, because it would seem that the unit is recording fundamentally the correct data - just not showing it!

[Mark G]

I was given a recent back copy of E&T (Engineering and technology) magazine, interesting article about concerns arising over the perceived vulnerability of GPS systems and in some corners its being regarded as the next possible year 2K - and we all know how much of a problem that was in the actual event - but there do seem to be some serious concerns due to the reliance of industry etc on the system. Biggest one from our perspective would be a partial/slight distortion - ie your system gives a wrong reading but not so far out that its obvious. Mariners seem to be moving towards something called ELoran (I can remember using the original Loran sailing in the seventies, hope its better nowadays) but apparantly you can 'buy a gps jammer on the internet for £40 that will knock out all signals within a 10km radius' - and if you really can someone will do it for fun sooner or later, just to see what happens!
I dont know how likely any of this is in reality but its an interesting possibility.

[wycoller]

There is lots of technical data about heights in the older gps watch threads. Basically depends what you want to measure. If you climb over a bank and then descend is that height gained/lost or are you measuring the height difference between the start and the summit? Generally we refer to the latter.

When loaded onto the computer it goes through various smoothing algorythms and you can often alter these. In general the ascent/descent from the compuetr will be closest to what we would measure directly off a map.

[stumpy]

Yep, GPS ascent figures are not worth the pixels they appear on! The corrected elevation data, on Garmin Connect is more accurate (though I think it under records compared to good old contour line counting!!). Garmin say:

What are Elevation Corrections? Elevation Corrections cross reference the horizontal position (latitude/longitude) provided by the GPS with elevation data that has been acquired by professional surveys. When corrections to elevation data are made, each trackpoint of your activity now contains the elevation from the web service, not the elevation provided by your GPS device.
Garmin Connect selectively applies corrections to depict a more realistic representation of your elevation experience. Activities recorded from devices without a barometric altimeter are enabled with Elevation Corrections by default. Alternatively, activities recorded by devices with a barometric altimeter generally contain accurate elevation data and therefore Elevation Corrections are disabled by default. For those users who are familiar with the MotionBased Gravity service, this is the same service.