Garmin V

[Jhammer]

Is the Garmin V to out of date ? I have not had a Gps, so I do not have anything to compare to . The price is low and I have heard the black and white screen can be seen better in sunlight.

[HardCase]

There are a number of GPS devices more "modern" than the GarminV, but for the price it's a great and very useful unit. I got one about a year ago and have no desire to upgrade, although may wish to do so someday.

[NJ_Bob]

Originally Posted by Jhammer

Is the Garmin V to out of date ? I have not had a Gps, so I do not have anything to compare to . The price is low and I have heard the black and white screen can be seen beter in sunlight.

It depends. What do you want to do with it?

[Jhammer]

I want to use it for touring in the central US

[BUBB]

What are they going for now?

I've had a Garmin V for a couple of years now. I'm rough on it -- it's been replaced 2x by Garmin - once in warranty for a water leak, once out of warranty for a water leak. Both were free.

Right now the 3rd unit has a broken pin in the data/power port, which makes loading maps a problem in that I have to rig something to work... bummer. I think the flat fee to have something fixed is like $100 - $150 (am I wrong?) and I don't think it's worth it.

The 18-19 meg of memory is a drawback on really long trips. Although I went 470 miles today and stayed on the detailed maps, if you are going state to state, I think you are going to get on the basemap pretty often. Plus it takes ages to load the maps via serial port. My version of the maps (is there more than one?) are not always accurate and up to date.

These are all the downsides - Despite them, I what that GPS has added to my riding has more than outweighed the downsides - but I am never going to buy a new V unless they are about $125 or less.

[Jhammer]

New,I seen them just a little under $250.00
The Quest was my next choice but it is double the $$$

[memphisslim]

I used one for years and still have it, good machine.

[BUBB]

Originally Posted by Jhammer

New,I seen them just a little under $250.00
The Quest was my next choice but it is double the $$

The Quest is more than double the GPS too... but those $$$$$'s!!!!!

[LarryB]

To give you an idea as to how much memory you need, I can just barely load enough City Select 6 maps in the 115mb 76CS to go from Seattle to San Diego. This just covers I-5 corridor. If I venture too far off I-5 I'm sunk without some way to load additional data. Here is a screen shot showing how much memory the maps take.

Notice the pink boxes covering I-5 on the map. Each little square is a seperate map. You select the maps by highlighting them in MapSource and the sending them to the GPS. You can see the map list on the left. At the bottom of the map list is the total amount of memory required. If you select too many maps they won't load to the GPS.

As you can see, if you want to travel without reloading you need memory. The 19mb in the Garmin-V won't get you very far.

[Bayou Boy]

I also have the Garmin V. The 19MB memory sucks. But it works out to be enough map for the day for me here in the south. I can travel with my Powerbook and reload it each night of a trip if I need to. For my trip next week to west Texas I'm going to be able to load 3-4 days of maps in. But there isn't much in the way of civiliuzation in west Texas.

[DangerMoney]

I also have the GPS V. If you're crossing the country then you don't need the DETAILED (downloaded) maps for your trip. The basemap can get you from one side of the country to the other. Just load the detailed map for your destination city. The black and white screen doesn't wash-out in sunlight. You can also load more map data if you don't load the autorouting data with the maps.

[msells]

I bought a used Garmin Streetpilot (mono screen) for around $170 on ebay. Compare it to the V at Garmin:

Unlike the V it is expandable with Garmin memory cards.
It's twice the weight of the V.
The Streetpilot has way fewer Tracklog points, routers, and waypoints/route.
The V uses City Select for maps while the Streetpilot uses MetroGuide

Can someone else comment on the +/- of the MetroGuide maps? I haven't played with my unit much beyond powering it on and using whatever maps were already loaded into it. It almost sounds like the Streetpilot won't do turn-by-turn routing on the device (which isn't a huge deal for me) but the V will.

-m

[HardCase]

I agree that the limited memory of the V is a drawback. Most of my riding is done in Montana and N. Idaho, and I like the Topo maps for that (although they have some drawbacks and aren't very up-to-date), so the 19MB is more than sufficient, but for a trip to Arizona last year I did what DangerMoney suggested since I don't have a laptop.

One of the plusses to me of the V is it's size. The StreetPilot or 76/276 units are twice the size which is okay if you leave it on the bike, but I like to hike and it's great to have one unit that you can pop off the bike and carry with you, stick in a pocket, etc. The Quest appears to be closer to the V in size and interests me, but I'm wondering what it's storage/memory capacity might be.

[toban]

I have had mine for 3 years. I used it in the Iron Butt Rally in '03. I like the screen as it is very clear and readable in all conditions. I Ram mounted it on the handlebar in the vertical mode and had it up high, left of the guages. The memory is the only drawback in my opinion. The suggestion above that you don't need the local routes transiting the country is correct. The base map is fine. However, for the type of combat long distance riding I do the 2610 will hold all of North America for me, and that is a significant plus, at the loss of visibility in daylight. So as usual I will have two GPS's on the bike on any long tour. In this case the GPS V and the 2610. Probably on different screens.

Loading maps from Mapsource is relatively slow and in an event like a rally you don't have the time to keep uploading unless you can do it while you ride. I had thought about doing that from my Libretto, but decided that it wasn't worth the effort. The problem is that you will be on the base map, and that will get you into the vicinity, but will not afford you the same auto-routing through obvious shortcuts that having the detailed maps will. On occasion I've just had to take it on faith that if a semi-trailer was turning down a small country road it must be for a reason. It will only do the auto-routing using the data it has access to.

However, I think that most on this list are not riding in a rally where you might be anywhere in North America in a week, with only an hour to plan. Most will know what the destination is for the portion of the ride that they will be off the major roads, and in the rural West you can load a lot of area because the detail is not like loading a city. I realise it is nice to have all the data, all the time, but in the example with the screen capture of Mapsource above, you could determine where you wanted the detail before the trip and load that portion and leave the rest on the base map. Riding from Winnipeg to tour in Wyoming, Utah and Colorado last August where we were doing 4500 miles in a week, I loaded Utah, and portions of Colorado and Wyoming. The rest of the ride was on base route highways where the extra detail was not necessary, because we would not be using any back roads in those areas transiting to our destination.

Also appreciated is the ability to program the information you wish to see on the second screen. I was able to set mine up exactly as I wanted it.

The last point is that it takes a standard Garmin plug which is easily sourced. The 2610 has a new proprietary plug. I much prefer the old one which I have hard wired on the 3 bikes I ride regularly.

Still, for all round use by a first time user I believe that this is a very good unit, if you think that you can work around the shortcoming of the memory.

If this unit could accept a compact flash card as additional memory it would be hard to beat.

Mike

[NJ_Bob]

Originally Posted by toban

...The base map is fine.... I think that most on this list are not riding in a rally where you might be anywhere in North America in a week, with only an hour to plan.

I think you need to go into what "fine" means. Fine means that you cannot rely 100% on what the base map tells you. You must use an alternative map in order to interpret the GPS information. Fine also means that it will tell you you are off-route while you are in fact on-route - and it will do that a lot. If you are not sure, and try to follow it's instructions to get back on route, you may end up on a route you had no intention of using. This all due to inaccuracies in the base map. This is not to say that the detailed maps are perfect - they're not. But, they're vastly better than the base map. Can it get you home on major routes - yes, but you have to be prepared for some unexpected behaviors.

With that said, I now have a 2610 with a 2G card and all the detail maps loaded for all of NA. Do I need it all? Heck no. Do I need to connect it to a computer if my plans change? No. This is a *HUGE* plus to me. The 2610 is ready no matter where I want to go. I go on a business trip, toss it in my briefcase with the beanbag mount and I use it in the rental cage. We drive in the family cage to NJ for Christmas, and every detail is there including the names and addresses of all sorts of possible destinations - it's really awesome.

This summer, I'm planning a 6k to 8k round trip with a stop at the BMW MOA in the middle - I don't need to do anything but punch in the first destination I want to go to. When I get there, I punch in the next one, and so on. No computer, no downloading. Priceless.

Originally Posted by toban

If this unit could accept a compact flash card as additional memory it would be hard to beat.

Agreed. If it could hold all the detailed maps like the 2610, I would likely have kept my GPS V. Even so, the 2610 is SO much faster it would be hard to go back to the V even with more memory.

My experience with the GPS V was truly dissappointing,and I attribute it all to the very poor quality of the base map. The 2610's capabilities and performance have fully met my expectations.

(I'm considering getting a older GPS 3 for some of the unique real-time displays it offers, that neither the V or the 2610 have to use in conjunction with the 2610.)