Your first GPS

[Geocaching Womble]

Hi everyone, what was your first GPS and who was the manufactuer.

Mine was a Garmin Etrek H which I still have and is slightly battered

Thanks
Dominic

[bargee72]

A bruised and battered Garmin Etrex yellow which i'm still using now

[The Syllogiser]

A bruised and battered Garmin Etrex yellow which i'm still using now

it's OK if you have great buddies who "guide" you to the cache . . .

[alicephilippa]

eTrex H, and it does exactly what is needed. Gets me to the cache and is sometimes more accurate than the owners clue. cf. Windy Hill.

On Windy Hill the clue said 3m (~10ft) from corner. eTrex said 29ft from corner. Cache when dug out of snow and ice was 28ft from corner.

[PopUpPirate]

Basic Garmin GPS 60... nice, but superceded by PDA

[ChannelFadge]

Etrex H. It points me in the direction of caches and tells me how close I am to them. What else do you need for caching?
Actually my first cache locator was google maps and a bad sense of direction. I got lost so many times but the adventures were fun

[Team SLuG]

Etrex H. We had a School PTFA event cancelled, and the returned money was just about enough to buy a yellow brick. It's now supported by an iPod Touch using Geosphere to store cache details.

[ferreter38]

A bruised and battered Garmin Etrex yellow which i'm still using now

Same as Iain but I've upgraded to a Colorado 300, still take the old yellow brick with me when I go out caching.

I've more or less ditched the PDA in favour of a notebook... only weighs the same as a bag of sugar and can have a pile of decent sized OS maps on the HD. Doesn't struggle to load 'em in like the PDA did. However, I don't think the notebook will be all that easy to use if it's raining.

[ferreter38]

A bruised and battered Garmin Etrex yellow which i'm still using now

it's OK if you have great buddies who "guide" you to the cache . . .

Mock ye not. Iain and I did OK with the old yellow bricks on the Tackler's Trail when we were trailing behind... or at least I was, Iain was being a gentleman and keeping me company.

[bargee72]

A bruised and battered Garmin Etrex yellow which i'm still using now

it's OK if you have great buddies who "guide" you to the cache . . .

Mock ye not. Iain and I did OK with the old yellow bricks on the Tackler's Trail when we were trailing behind... or at least I was, Iain was being a gentleman and keeping me company.

He may be referring to Himself anf kevin managing to find a ccache in stockport whilst steaming Drunk that i couldnt find stone cold sober.

the etrex yellow is a brilliant rugid bit of kit, you dont need all the bells and whistles, A note book ( paper kind) and a paper map for the area are all you need.
The fun is in the planning of a day out rather than just grabbing your fancy 300 quid gps and heading out and not reading cache pages etc.

[alicephilippa]

The fun is in the planning of a day out rather than just grabbing your fancy 300 quid gps and heading out and not reading cache pages etc.

I've been known with the bumblebee not to read cache pages anyway when they are on home turf.

[ferreter38]

He may be referring to Himself anf kevin managing to find a ccache in stockport whilst steaming Drunk that i couldnt find stone cold sober.

the etrex yellow is a brilliant rugid bit of kit, you dont need all the bells and whistles, A note book ( paper kind) and a paper map for the area are all you need.
The fun is in the planning of a day out rather than just grabbing your fancy 300 quid gps and heading out and not reading cache pages etc.

I have started taking a paper map - a printout from an OS map with flags marking the caches - if you try to add names etc you can't see the detail on the map. The free map I've got uploaded to my Colorado isn't all that brilliant but using the hard copy and the GPSr works for me. I like having the cache details, logs and hints available with just a couple button presses. Still have the brick in my rucksack though... not parting with it

I've got that lot in Stockport on my to do list, I really must make the effort and get over there, still had a nice wander round the Skew Bridge and up to Fredericks yesterday afternoon.

[bargee72]

He may be referring to Himself anf kevin managing to find a ccache in stockport whilst steaming Drunk that i couldnt find stone cold sober.

the etrex yellow is a brilliant rugid bit of kit, you dont need all the bells and whistles, A note book ( paper kind) and a paper map for the area are all you need.
The fun is in the planning of a day out rather than just grabbing your fancy 300 quid gps and heading out and not reading cache pages etc.

I have started taking a paper map - a printout from an OS map with flags marking the caches - if you try to add names etc you can't see the detail on the map. The free map I've got uploaded to my Colorado isn't all that brilliant but using the hard copy and the GPSr works for me. I like having the cache details, logs and hints available with just a couple button presses. Still have the brick in my rucksack though... not parting with it

I've got that lot in Stockport on my to do list, I really must make the effort and get over there, still had a nice wander round the Skew Bridge and up to Fredericks yesterday afternoon.

dont bother with the stockport nanos, catch the 199 up to new mills and do my 2 puzzle caches and lodgebarns multicache in new mills centre it is superb

[JeremyR]

I started out with Google Earth printouts and maps but my first GPS proper was a yellow eTrex (no 'H' for me ). I graduated to an eTrex Vista HCx last Christmas and a damn fine unit it is, too. I intend to put it to much better use this year than I did last year (only 19 finds last year )

[alicephilippa]

dont bother with the stockport nanos

The Stockport nanos are an interesting bunch, placed for proper points of interest. Not placed just because.

[bargee72]

dont bother with the stockport nanos

The Stockport nanos are an interesting bunch, placed for proper points of interest. Not placed just because.

dont bother with the stockport nanos

The Stockport nanos are an interesting bunch, placed for proper points of interest. Not placed just because.

Much better to get out in the hills

They are still urban Nanos even though thy are better than average ones

[teamhillside]

Old eTrex yellow (non-H) bought in about 2001, I think before selective availability was switched off. Not entirely sure why I bought it, think at the time that it was intended for doing lots of hill walking. In the end had 4 children so haven't reached the levels of walking I intended just yet - but we're getting there!!

The eTrex is particularly battered and bruised, and the black band as well as having come off due to the sticky deteriorating has also been snapped by one of my darling sons (I know which one, I still hold a grudge!). Now held together with sellotape, I don't feel the love for it as much as I used to, but it is still simple to use and gets close enough to GZ so long as I accept it will never direct me with a high degree of precision. Clues relied upon quite a lot!!

(If anyone has a spare / broken eTrex with an intact black rubber band that they would like to donate for "parts" I would gratefully receive!)

I now have a £10 bluetooth GPSr from ebay, and the accuracy difference (when used with my old and battered Sony K750i phone plus trekbuddy / GPSJ) is phenomenal. Shame that the combination of phone and available j2me software isn't that great. Both GPSJ and Trekbuddy just need a small amount of extra work and they would be almost perfect paperless caching apps (for me, anyway!)

Matt

[JeremyR]

(If anyone has a spare / broken eTrex with an intact black rubber band that they would like to donate for "parts" I would gratefully receive!)

Double-sided duct-tape is your friend Regular double-sided tape isn't going to be up to the job but duct-tape should be fine... Just clean the gunk off and make sure the strip of tape is slightly narrower than the black band.

[Team SLuG]

Double-sided duct-tape is your friend

Is there anything that stuff can't do?

[teamhillside]

(If anyone has a spare / broken eTrex with an intact black rubber band that they would like to donate for "parts" I would gratefully receive!)

Double-sided duct-tape is your friend Regular double-sided tape isn't going to be up to the job but duct-tape should be fine... Just clean the gunk off and make sure the strip of tape is slightly narrower than the black band.

Actually, its not the sticking that's the main problem for me - its the fact that the black band is split in two! Its all stuck fine, and works fine. Its just an aesthetic thing.

Though if I do lay my hands on a full black band, double sided duct tape will come to the fore! (Any brands to recommend? "Duck" tape seems OK)

Matt

[vw_keychain]

I too started with Google aerial print outs and maps but my first GPS was a Garmin Etrex Vista that I borrowed from Rangerchuk and then bought off him for £10 when he upgraded to a Colorado.

I now have an Etrex Summit HC which I use and also an ipaq but haven't started using that for caching yet.