What's your favorite brand of GPS and why?

Garmin is my favorite! I like the ease of operation. Very user friendly!!

CamoGrizzly

I haven't really decided on a favorite myself yet.

I have a Garmin, and my girlfriend uses a Magellan. I like the menus, ease of use, features of the Garmin. I like the Magellan because when it locks on, it stays locked on, it gets a much better "fix". It's kind of like if they put them together, it would make the worlds best GPS.

Bushnell have a new GPS out that I would like to see. It has the capability of using topo maps, or aerial photographs. I was reading the other day that they are about to add a color version. The reviews so far have been very good for them that I've read, and looks like it may be a great GPS unit. The only thing that looks like would hold it back, is not being able to upgrade the memory.

I have 3 different GPS's
The first one is a Magellan Roadmate 300 NA mounted in my Truck. It works great for routing trips, but has to be connected to a power source, and uses a SD Memory Card.

I bought a Garmit Etrec Legend CX for the Side by Side a few months ago and now trying to learn how to use it to make up a list of waypoints and tracks. It is small and easy to carry. The bad news is that You can not hook it to a power source, batteries only.

Last week I purchased a new Magellan Crossover 2500 NA. Magellan sent me and E-mail on a specical deal for owners of the Roadmate 300. I really like it the best. It has a 4 Gig. Hard Drive, plus a SD Memory slot, built in battery, plus it has 2 power cords, It will play Music and Photos. So far I like it the Best.

Well after reading many reviews, I selected the Garmin Etrex CX. It is very small, has numerouse features including city navigation should you decide to use it in your car for trips, the display shows up very good under strong sunlight, and it seems to pick up well. Below is a picture of it mounted in a Ram Mount on my Polaris X2. I'm just starting to map out the Black Mountain ATV park, but it seems to be a perfect fit for my tasks.

I have a Garmin Etrex Legend CX.It comes with a 64 Meg card.
I can' pick up a 2 Gig card for $29.
Is there any need to have 2 Gig. card?
Is the 64 Meg Big enough?

Well, I don't know about you...but I'll bet it's big enough for me...mine also has a 64MB card. My bet is that the only real need you'd have for a 2GB card is so that you could keep street level maps of the entire USA loaded at all times.

Since all I'm basically doing is storing trail tracks on mine, I doubt that I'll ever need more than 64Mb....but if I ever do need more, it looks like it'll be a cheap upgrade.

How much does this model GPS cost? I am looking to upgrade from a black and white Legend.

CamoGrizzly

Mine's a Garmin Legend etrex C. It's color,..and I'm getting more familiar with it. Now,...if I could only find my Black Mountain Tracks that I save to one of our 5 Computers. DELL should send me some free stock....

Check out Cabela's.

Sent You A PM.

I saw the Legend CX on sale at walmart.com for $226 just the base unit I think. You'll have to look elsewhere for bundles.

I have a Garmin Gpsmap 60CSx with City Navigator North America, United States Topo, US Topo 24k National Parks (east) and U.S. Recreational lakes with fishing hotspots. Also recently aquired a Garmin Etrex LegendCx for a backup. Garmin allows you to use two units on their software. I have all four different software loaded in my Gps for use on the road, on the trail, and on the water. Currently have the 1gb chips in both units to support all the maps. To the best of my knowledge the C stands for color, S stands for Altimeter and Compass and X stands for extended memory ie (micro sd card). Oh yeah. I am really happy with both units.

Also check out the Garmin.com website. They have some nice units. Got mine from chumbo.com (cheapest at the time) Garmin has one now that tracks your 'huntin dog". You can see where he is on your screen.

I like my Magellan Crossover 2500T the best. It can use batteries or 12 volt DC, or 120 Volt AC. It is more user friendly that the others. It is mounted in the truck and take it out and use it on the ATV or as a hand helded.

Good to see such a thread started, cuz I'm planning on replacing a GPS and need to know from the experts if it will do what I want before the purchase.
The one I have found that seems to fit my needs is the Garmin gpsmap 60cx
but the main question is will it show the area in enough detail to really know where I'm at? Like nearby roads (gravel) stores, church, etc. in the topo software? I found a website that sells the topo sd cards preloaded for the area you want in the range of $40-$50 each. If I did not get confused at all the gps units I browsed over I believe it will accept a dc power supply, memory cards, usb cable, etc.
If I'm barking up the wrong unit feel free to let me know that also.

Well, I'd like to help you, but so far, all I'm using mine for is to record trails when I go riding. I've got the Garmin Etrex Vista CX with a ram mount....and I really like it...nice and small and works great. Although I've never seen it myself, I've heard that the topo maps do have some great detail but I'm not sure about secondary gravel/dirt roads. If you don't get a responce from this genral post, try PMing some of the more active GPS posters in here that have the Garmin unit. I can't remember his name, but there was one guy on here who had a whole GPS unit for sale like mine....GPS/Mount/Loaded Maps....if you can find his post, he might be able to give you your answer. I'll look back through messages and see if I can find his name.

Hey, look at this post:

http://www.kyoutdoors.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=5492

Scroll down the page to 800 Sportsmans post. He's the one that said he'd had his for quite a while and it was loaded with maps....he migh be able to answer your question if you PM him.

Doc, I am by no means an expert, but I had the same questions before I made the plunge. I have the Vista Cx, and I love it. I was looking at the 60 CSx, and Radar had the Vista that he was pleased with. Below is what I based my decision between these two units on.

The 60's are excellent units. You've probably already looked at the etrex line, but I thought I would throw this in to give you something to ponder. Besides the obvious difference in size, the etrex Vista Cx has all the same features as the 60 CSx with these differences: web price - 60/$350 vista/$235, High sensitivity receiver - 60/yes vista/no (hasn't been a problem), waypoints - 60/1000 vista/500, tide tables - 60/yes vista/no. Garmin is introducing the vista HCx with the high sensitivity receiver, if you feel you need it. They're showing it the same price as the Cx on their site, but I haven't done a web search to check prices or availability yet.

As far as maps go. The base map is a decent map. Large searchable database of points or interest and good enough to be used for turn by turn routing. If your wanting the trails and rural roads on the unit go with the mapsource Topo for the Garmin. Unless you can find it in a bundle, get the base unit then purchase the new TOPO US 2008. It's scheduled for a mid June release. The detail is greatly improved over previous versions and some new stuff. Looks like map source took a hint from DeLorme on this latest release. Keep in mind when your looking at the SD card maps, your only getting the map for that region. I looked at that option and found I would need 2-3 regions just to get the surrounding states I would want. The web price on the topo '08 is in the $90 range. So, for the price of a couple of SD maps you could have the entire US and the mapsource software with all the bells and whistles.

IMO if your looking at Garmin, if you can live with a slightly smaller unit with all the features, and if you don't mind saving $125 or so, the Vista Cx is worth the look.

Interesting read and much needed info Rockcrawler, I'll check it out at this time I'm still open to different models as long as the screen size is the same.
Only problem I could run into is if the buttons are on the side, I have a ram mount already but it squeezes the unit into the cradle and must have top mounted buttons.

Thanks for the information.

Yeah...your current ram mount is a consideration...I believe though that if you went with the Visat unit, all you'd have to replace on the ram mount is the plast cradle that scews to the swivel unit. I'm almost posite you can order the individual pieces for the ram mount systems.