what GPS do you have

i was looking to buy a GPS but i dont know much about them. i dont know witch is a good one to buy? what i am looking for is one that you can down load rural maps in detail 1:25,000 or closer if possible and down load 4wding/camping/fishing maps? is there one out there or am i asking for to much out of them.
what are people using?

Repco have the Navman MY75 (something) on sale ATM for $345, I believe it runs Hema 4WD maps as well as street maps. Might be worth a look!! BTW Hema are about as good as they come for offroad maps.

Cheers Brad

I have a TomTom One XL, useless as soon as you leave the bitumen.

Jason I think my Navman S50might have been made in the same factory! lol

Garmin Etrex Ledgend...................................., handheld

Garmin Oregon 450, w/ TOPO Aust mapping....handheld

Garmin Nuvi 1490T, w/TOPO Aust mapping.

Garmin all the way.

I have a Pioneer in-dash unit that uses iGo. It has some dirt roads, not all, and isn't 100% accurate. It doesn't allow for changing maps.

For your purpose I'd look elsewhere. Most of the shop-bought stuff will be restrictive too, because they want to hold on to the money they make selling you map updates.

I'll be putting a Hema Navigator on the wishlist.

I've just got the Garmin 62S with topo maps. Got it at Johnny Appleseed on special at the moment. Has forestry tracks loaded on it. Was looking at the Garmen Oregon 450T however the touch screen is a pain when you've got man fingers, and besides the maps on it are out of date.

As a reseller of Mio I used to like their GPS's, mine didn't have all the offroad maps but it learnt on the go and if I took it somewhere it could get me back there at a later date. However since Mio merged and subsequently took over Navman things have changed. They are still good bitumen GPS units and but they are becoming rather expensive to keep up to date and without hacking the software you can't run alternate maps. That being said hacking the system to run anything is not that hard and even the older ones do have enough memory and power to run todays maps, the problem of course is that hacking the unit voids warranty.

When it comes to a good GPS the unit and the name on it means bugger all, the thing that makes the difference is the installed maps, if you can install your chosen maps you'll get as much out of a $150 GPS as a $500 GPS.

Red Dog said:

I've just got the Garmin 62S with topo maps. Got it at Johnny Appleseed on special at the moment. Has forestry tracks loaded on it. Was looking at the Garmen Oregon 450T however the touch screen is a pain when you've got man fingers, and besides the maps on it are out of date.

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Strange,

my 450 and 1490T have the latest

I use a Garmin 60csx handheld, with the Oz topo maps and the mapsource software. I also use Destinator (Centrafuse) on a car PC. Destinator uses Sensis maps which covers every named road in Oz.

i bought a no name brand of flea-bay.

its a 7" colour touch screen, mounts on windscreen by a huge suction cap and bracket. Came with a 4Gb SD card, which i've swapped over for a 16GB card.

It came with IGO8 street navigation software, reverse camera etc.

I now have Oziexplorer CE (only $40 for the viewer program), and load external maps for the location where i'm going to go 4wd'ing. I like that, because i get to stuff around for ages looking at the maps before i go anywhere, and then only load on the maps i know i'll need for a given trip.

Pity the reverse camera is NOT waterproof so i'll need to look for a replacement real soon.

You still haven't fixed that camera?? Sheesh I thought I was slack when it came to mods $15 and 10 mins work Woody come on boy get with the game!!

KraftyPg said:

You still haven't fixed that camera?? Sheesh I thought I was slack when it came to mods $15 and 10 mins work Woody come on boy get with the game!!

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took me ages to install it the first time ... now i have ta re-route the cables to do INSIDE, or i'll have to get a totally waterproof camera ...

until i decide WHAT i'm going to do, i cant decide what unit to try to buy.

I've had my camera apart completely, gotta admit I never tested it for water but having had it in as many pieces as it comes in I know that sealing it would be a breeze. I brought mine as a part of a kit but the camera is available for about $15 on ebay.

geez krafty ... your just trying to make MORE work for me ...

for $15 i cant be stuffed pulling it apart, drying it out and then sealing it all back together again ...

so when i can be bothered, i'll go online to fleabay and buy a replacement camera ... not doing it now, supposed to go out for a job measure (except its pissn down with rain and i dont want to go out)

thanks for the heads up, means I'll be getting wet soon.

Let me know when you are doing it and I'll find the mob I brought mine off and see if you think it's suitable.

My GPS consists of a CFS map book and a compass - neither have ever let me down nor run out of power!

N

nakedape said:

My GPS consists of a CFS map book and a compass - neither have ever let me down nor run out of power!

N

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I think real maps are going to become a thing of the past and reading them will become a lost skill.

It's much easier to be told, turn by turn, where to drive. It's just a shame that most navigation units don't know the phrase "You idiot, don't take THAT left, take the OTHER left".

I do find the navigation unit handy, especially since if I'm alone I can continue driving with relative faith that I'm heading the right way.

Although - truth be told - that isn't always the case. My Navman - yes, I own one and this is why I'll never buy another - doesn't know where Canberra is. I set it as a destination so I can see how far to go, and it asked me to turn left just near Mittagong onto this tiny country single-lane road. It wouldn't re-path either - it insisted that I "perform a u-turn when possible" for kilometres, until I turned the stupid thing off.