Thread: Ranga's GPS for AULRO Subscribers

The original thread started by Ranga is getting a bit long now. I know because I have read every page a few times to help me make up my mind if I was prepared to take advantage of the offer.

So I thought it was worth starting a new one.

As someone who had never used a GPS before, I have to say I am greatly impressed with this unit, especially at the price.

Ranga's modifications turn it from what looks like a pretty cheap and nasty, not very useful thing into something that looks good and works well.

After following Ranga's instructions, adding Garmin XT and OziExplorer and registering my copy of OziExplorer and with a bit more advice and a local topo map from JLo, I now have what seems like a very useful little gadget.

After hearing stories about how satellite reception can be dodgy in heavily timbered country, I took mine for a drive this morning on narrow roads in the bush west of Tuross. A couple of kilometres of the tracks were so narrow that I needed to fold the mirrors in to get through.

At no stage did I have fewer than 10 satellites. I thought that was pretty impressive. Even inside the house with just one small window a metre or so away, it can lock onto enough satellites to get an accurate fix.

I know I have still only scratched the surface in terms of understanding what I can do with this GPS, but I am enjoying my voyage of discovery. It certainly made it a lot easier to work out which track was which this morning. That isn't always easy when a number of unsignposted firetrails branch off within a hundred metres or so.

This probably seems a bit ho hum to all the GPS experts out there who have been using them for years. However, it might encourage other members who are in two minds about whether they should get one. Perhaps I am easily impressed, but I think this little unit is marvelous.

Posting this also gives me a chance to publicly thank Ranga for the work he has put into this project and to thank JLo for the help, advice and resources he has given me.

Part of my education (starting from scratch) on the subject of GPS has come from discovering where I could find answers to questions and in some cases discovering what the questions were that i needed to ask.

I am beginning to realise just how many GPS related forums there are. Almost as many as the number of 4WD forums.

Others with the DealExtreme unit who knew what they were doing may not have run into this problem, but I have just found a simple solution to something that was a minor annoyance for me.

I installed a copy of Garmin XT for Windows CE v5.0. Each time I wanted to run it i had to manually start Windows CE and as well as that, the Port Splitter program seemed to be causing problems. I could run it, but it was complicated getting it started each time.

Someone on the Ppcwarez forum who seems to have some connection with Ranga, who posts there under a different username, offered the following solution.

PPCWarez • View topic - Garmin Mobile XT for Windows CE v5.00.20w + v5.00.10w

The solution is in Post #458.

Garmin now seems to start and stop as it should.

Finding answers is a bit easier when you have some idea of what questions to ask or what to look for.