Rand McNally has entered the handheld market and it looks promising the Foris 850 1000 saved tracks Street and Topo maps Water proof Might have to check it out
The company website has no technical details. But a quick web search did find a beta tester report. http://seattlebackpackersmagazine.com/rand-mcnally-foris-gps-beta-test/ No info about accepting a GPX download. A complaint about short battery life. Apparently no external power cable. The touch screen did work with gloves. Doesn't sound like a full featured Adv Rider GPS unit.
If it allows downloads ( importing) of high resolution GPX files then I would say it does more than most Garmins, and for the price you get road and Topo maps, turn by turn routing even when routing on a track, Does Loop routes, a big plus IMO not to mention 1000 track files and 7000 waypoints I will try to contact them on the track format they are using and the amount of track points allowed per file. That would be the killer for me if you can't import GPX files. unless GpsBabel has a conversion for the format they use.
Got this answer today From Rand McNally Good morning Robert, To answer your questions: 1. We use the website: http://www.geocaching.com/ for track logging. 2. Yes, you are allowed to import tracks from the PC. 3. We use the GPX format. 4. No, our format is not proprietary. Thank you for your interest in Rand McNally products! Best Regards, Rand McNally Store Store@RandMcNally.com http://www.RandMcNally.com Travel Trucking Education So $399 for a GPS that has Street maps, Topo maps that does Auto routing even from road to trail, Allows importing of 'gpx' track, saves up to 1000 tracks, 7000 waypoints, does not seem out of line to me. It only has a 3" screen, would have been nice to have a 4" or even a 5" ????????
I asked a few more questions Here is what they said What is the track logging capacity for track points per saved track?? Each track can be 25,000 points. The number of tracks in limited only by storage space. That is very GOOD Can you set it by time and or distance and are those adjustable? IE; every 10' or 50' etc??? No. Track recording/shape point frequency is handled dynamically by the device to optimize the precision versus storage dilemma. There is no shape point thinning capabilities for importing. However there are third party GIS applications which can provide this functionality. With that may points per track who cares about setting the freq Can you display multiple tracks on the screen at once? can you select only the tracks you want to display? That is a must have option. You can select and display any track on the device or on the Trailhead software. But you cannot view multiple tracks at one time. Yes, you can select only the tracks you want to display. Good and Bad,, Like for a Dual Sport ride that Has segments they would have to be combined , like Countdowns Dual Sport rides he has hard ways and easy ways all in many segments, the Multiple segments could be combined say for a hardway or Easy way for each day, Then just turn on that days track. That would be very easy. ( He has to do segments to get the track resolution up for the older Garmins with a 500 point per track limit, They only allow you to load twenty 500 point tracks)
Are map sets available for international travel? Has Rand McNally developed any offline desktop trip-planning software to go with it?
Since they have partnered with FALK Navigation and looks like their LUX32 unit which has maps for 20 countries pre-loaded on it, it would make sense if the unit sells to offer other map sets. Don't know on the PC side yet, since it uses GPX and will convert a track to a route, there are plenty of map programs to work with.
