4 out of 4 people found this review helpful.
Good solid product but black and white display
Date of Review: Dec 10, 2003
The Bottom Line: Best product for walking in the country but Ordinance Survey maps can't be loaded and no good for cities, black and white is out of date.
This product is Garmin's top handheld GPS (i.e. most expensive), I bought mine about 4 months ago and loaded it with MetroGuide CD without any problems;
On the plus side:
- it is great for walking in the county.
- suing simple menus you can tailor the screen page info to your specific needs from a comprehensive option list (e.g ETA, distance to destination, direction arrow etc.)
- you can navigate either with a map page or press a button and see an arrow with distance to destination and ETA which I love.
- takes to AA batteries which last a couple of hours but I carry a spare which is a much better option than recharging.
- I have used it on a train and in a taxi in a strange place and its great. You know your speed, where you are going, distance travelled etc. Zoom in and out on the map. Excellent!!! Be great to use on a cruise or on a plane (but I would not dare try it.
On the negative side
- I find the fact that its not in colour feels old fashioned. Why can't it be in colour (with a time-out to conserve battery life like all new mobile phones now on sale). I was tempted by the Megallan but I was not willing to compromise on size.
- I had hoped to use it when walking around strange cities but it is still too chunky for this and loses its signal most of the time when walking in a built up area like most cities.
- No detailed Ordinance Survey maps available for loading not even from a third parties, when walking all the map data you have is rivers and roads but no OS maps.
- Its memory is limited to holding about two/three counties (loaded from the METRO CD), which is disappointing considering this has the highest memory of the Garmin handhelds.
I am now thinking of selling it and waiting for the new GPSMPA 60CS (colour, larger screen).
