Garmin Hardware
Many GPSr(eceivers) are on the market. For the kind of traveling that we do the most well known brands are Garmin, Magellan and Lowrance We decided to go for a Garmin as Tracks4Africa and T4Australia sell maps which can only be uploaded on a mapping capable Garmin unit.
Garmin has a huge range of GPSr’s. In essence all units do the same thing, they position you more or less exact on Earth. The unit we bought is a Model 60CSx, functions which were for us important are:
- It can be used in the car as well as on foot (hiking).
- It has a compass function and an altimeter.
- It uses SD cards to store maps, waypoints, tracks and POI’s.
- It is very sturdy and water-resistant.
The accuracy of the signal is very good thanks to the SIRFIII chipset. More for our convenience we added an external antenna, also from Garmin, to have more flexibility where we can put the 60CSx in the car. Practical is as well that if the unit gets the current from the additional cigarette plug lead, the system notices this so you can leave your batteries in the unit.
If one needs a really watertight system Garmin has the 76CSx on offer which has the same function as ours but is designed for use on water and really watertight.
Good websites for information are:
www.garmin.de
In German, this site has very good information and a great selection tool. We found the Garmin site of Switzerland in this respect pretty useless.
Also in German, we bought our Garmin at this Webshop. The site is filled with good and interesting information. You can also subscribe to a regular Newsletter.