In Car Nav?

[amshaw]

In another thread I was asking about a basic GPs unit.

Now Ive had the bright idea that if I spend a few hundred more $ ,I can get a in car nav unit....and maybe save my marriage https://www.aulro.com/afvb/ https://www.aulro.com/afvb/ https://www.aulro.com/afvb/ And as my wife cant nav to save her own life https://www.aulro.com/afvb/ , I would like to get to Melbourne more offen etc http://www.lrocv.com.au/forum/images/smiles/icon_cool.gif

I did a search and now Im very https://www.aulro.com/afvb/ https://www.aulro.com/afvb/

Where do I start ?
I want a user friendly unit,
can be easyly upgraded for new maps,
easy to use so I can just key in the address and it talks to me to that address.

I also noted that most of the units are around 100mm wide, does anybody have probs reading them?

I would like a well known brand ie Garmin, Tom Tom etc, so I can get it fixed etc.

I think I will have a real good look at the 4wd show on Sunday.

just after things to look out for ie "must have" feature's

[waynep]

Andrew

You need to be a bit careful in this area. As I understand it ( and I'm sure the real experts will chime in ) there are basically two types of GPS units around these days.

1. Your "street pilot" type which are the Tom Toms etc. These are the ones Harvey Norman and Dick Smith etc are flogging. They are great in the city and give you audio directions etc. However they are fairly useless in the bush. Some don't even supply a basic GPS position you can transfer to a paper map.

2. A mapping type GPS with the maps loaded and containing the bush tracks. This is your Garmin and Magellan type units. Apparently Magellan has the lead at the moment with their onboard mapping software which has most of the bush tracks on it.

Or you can go with a basic GPS such as the Garmin ETrex that does not contain mapping but does have snail trails and waypoints etc. You can also attach these units to a PC or PDA running mapping software. These can also be used for bushwalking etc.

Before you buy, its advisable you talk to a shop that supplies GPS to the 4WD fraternity such as Telstat down in Seaford or TimePlus in Sydney Road.

I am still running an old Garmin GPS 12XL that is black and white has no mapping but does have an external power input and an external antenna input. The latter is great if you are doing a lot of driving in dense bush. I would love to go to a full colour mapping unit when SWMBO can be convinved.

[amshaw]

After the $wd show I played with a Uniden 8350, and a garmin 310, I think that sounds right....anyway looks like neither will do the GPS fuctions I would need, so I will get both a Etrex GPS and one of the nav units listed....more likley the uniden, a bit cheaper and I felt more at ease with it, and its got a mp3 player !

Can others offer any comment on either uniden or Garmin units above please?

[dmdigital]

Andrew,
After getting severly lost in Melbourne on several occassions (2 involved trying to find Land Rover parts places:) ) I was really seriously thinking about the satNav options again.

The eTrex does everything I need for the bush, but I'm now thinking a good portable satNav unit to take on holidays would be great. That way I can use it in a hire car without having to leave it in there or leave it visable. I'm starting to look at pocket type alternatives for iPaq or similar and also the Garmin etc equivalent dedicated units. Let you know what I turn up.

Here's something to ponder

Do they make SatNav units that can be turned upside down so that women can use them like they do any other road map?? :wasntme:

[amshaw]

Andrew,
After getting severly lost in Melbourne on several occassions (2 involved trying to find Land Rover parts places:) ) I was really seriously thinking about the satNav options again.

The eTrex does everything I need for the bush, but I'm now thinking a good portable satNav unit to take on holidays would be great. That way I can use it in a hire car without having to leave it in there or leave it visable. I'm starting to look at pocket type alternatives for iPaq or similar and also the Garmin etc equivalent dedicated units. Let you know what I turn up.

Here's something to ponder

Do they make SatNav units that can be turned upside down so that women can use them like they do any other road map?? :wasntme:

LOL:imwithstupid: :bat: :bangin: :banban:

I need a satnav to save my marrage....much cheaper to buy a satnav rather than loose 1/2 I own, Marie is dead set hopless:eek: ....as you say the poor old Melways got dizzy from being turned every which way after each turn:censored: :bat:...oh she is blonde too, so that makes it worse

[dmdigital]

LOL:imwithstupid: :bat: :bangin: :banban:

I need a satnav to save my marrage....much cheaper to buy a satnav rather than loose 1/2 I own, Marie is dead set hopless:eek: ....as you say the poor old Melways got dizzy from being turned every which way after each turn:censored: :bat:...oh she is blonde too, so that makes it worse

Bloody hire cars only ever seem to have Gregorys in them. They might look like a Melways but that's here it ends:mad:

Oh and as I found driving around Brisbane last year, your wife will still corrected you for not following the SatNav properly even when it clearly would have taken you the wrong way down a oneway street:eek:

[amshaw]

Well we have a Uniden 8350 on the way, after a little play I will let you know what I think.

[QSDT]

Well we have a Uniden 8350 on the way, after a little play I will let you know what I think.

Please do looking at one myself could you let me know how it goes if you do when your off road where there are no maps. What sort of read out do you get on screen.

[Scouse]

I am still running an old Garmin GPS 12XL that is black and white has no mapping but does have an external power input and an external antenna input. Phew, someone else with one of these :) .

I tend to feel a bit inadequate these days when everyone else has their GPS all hooked up to a laptop with full topo maps in colour & I'm struggling away with my old 12XL, working out on a paper topo where the hell I am :( .

[amshaw]

well i got my unit after a long wait.

Very happy with it so far. Much better than the road angle we had a play with.

Very easy to use, a few changes can be made to the display but I really like the day/night button.....when drving at night it dull's the display ....well really changes all the colours so its just not as bright:eek: ....I think the Police would have a word with us if use the day setting at night....ie very hard to see the road past the glare of the unit.

there isnt too many changes that you can play with....thats the way i like it anyway KISS.:D ;)

Volume is very good ie load, even over the noise of the 300TDi thumping power house:p

Well thats all I can think of at 05:15 , if you have any questions just yell out and I will try and help....but as you can tell Im no techno Guru, but Ill have a go.

[Blknight.aus]

I have a Nav man type unit that has copilot live built in.

got it from harveys, Its great in the city and I found out on the xmas weekend I can get a copy of oziexplorer ce to run on it. Best of both worlds and I have a fully featured PDA to boot

[p38arover]

I've got an older Garmin eMap for general GPS duties and it works very well. It's biggest disadantages are that it won't run off 12 V directly, it needs a voltage regulator, its monochrome display is dim at night and hard to read in a car and it's worse during the day. Handheld, it's fine.

I recently bought an older colour iPAQ 1930 with a plug-in GPS card. (that uses the SDIO port) abd running Destinator software.

With the Destinator software one can select an address from ones contact list in the iPAQ and navigate to that address. You can select either North Up or you can keep your direction up (good for women like my wife who cannot navigate her way out a house without a street directory that can be rotated).

The voice and visual prompts are good although sometimes confusing when telling one to turn. You can dim the display for night use.

Oh, Destinator does give lat. and long. in degrees & mins but not UTM which I find far better when using it in conjunction with maps or a street directory (my Garmin eMap is set for UTM).

So far the biggest disadvantages are:

The hassle of plugging in the GPS card and waiting for it to get a position lock. Sometimes getting a lock takes ages. I think a later iPAQ with Bluetooth and a Bluetooth GPS card that is always powered and receiving would be far superior. If you forget to take the power lead and only switch the unit on when you get close to your destination, it may not get lock soon enough and you miss the turns you should have taken (been there, done that).
Sometimes it will suddenly give a false indication of where it thinks it is and this throws off the instructions wildly. For example, it might have navigated a route which takes you along a freeway where (obviously) there are no U-turns and maybe no exits anywhere nearby. It might be working fine when it will suddenly tell you to do a U-turn or a right or left turn. It now thinks it's on a roadway beside the freeway so it tries to navigate you to an on-ramp to get back onto the freeway. This happens in built-up areas, too. Once that happens you might as well turn it off or it will be squawking useless instructions at you for quite some time. Oh, it is fitted to a mount attached to the windscreen so it is in full view of the sky.Whatever you buy, the maps need to be updated cheaply,frequently and easily. Destinator uses MapInfo maps and I've already found errors in those. It doesn't even list one very old Sydney suburb and some of the streets around where I work (also an old area) are wrongly named or incorrect.


Ron

[Franz]

G'day Andrew,

Congrats on yout new SatNav equipment - I'm sure you'll get much enjoyment from it and your co-driver will become an expert navigator!

The latest in car navigation systems are very good but limited to town or major road usage. They allow simple, on the spot route planning and then give you turn by turn instructions. They also come with pre loaded maps for your region/country and have the facility to load other regions/countries. The major disadvantage of these systems is off the beaten track and here they have no maps available (not to my knowledge anyway).

To get decent off road navigation you will require software such as OziExplorer, maps of an appropriate scale, some form of hardware to run it on and a GPS receiver. You have an Etrex so are set on that score providing that you can get the appropriate cabling. The other hardware can be either a notebook PC, PDA or an in car PC with touch screen monitor. With these items you then need to plan your trip in advance, create a track file, waypoints and a route navigation file and load them when you set off. Ozi will give you some basic verbal navigation instructions but these are not as sophisticated as with the SatNav units. The other thing you will need to deal with is maps. You get none with the software and have to acquire these separately – if you don’t have a network, this can be expensive as there are many different maps available in various scales.

I run an IPAQ that is connected to a Garmin GPS2+ with external aerial mounted on the snorkel Ram. Software consists of OziExplorer CE and Tom Tom which I have found to be excellent after having used Destinator before (easier address input and clearer maps). My major bugbear is the size of the IPAQ screen and the lack of functionality of Ozi CE. Ideally (when I have lots of spare cash) is to buy a 7” motorised in dash touch screen and connect an in car PC to it. This will give me all the functionality of OziExplorer on my home PC plus a decent size screen to view my maps on.

Cheers,

Franz