Garmin Oregon 550t

[Gringo Pescador]

Not a review (yet). My wife got me one for Christmas. I haven't had a chance to really play with it in the field but really looking forward to using it, especially on river floats and to mark bank spots. Anyone else have one? Any tips? Planning on picking up the satellite and topo map subscriptions, anyone else use them? What about Basecamp? I loaded it on my PC, looks pretty straight forward, any tips on that?

[Mike Carey]

Gringo, you should have shown me this when I was over. I love my GArmin and this is like mine on steriods! Very cool. You will absolutely love having it on the river, wherever. It should come with BaseCamp, which is "OK" software. It gets the job done. You can enter in waypoints and routes from your Base Camp software into your unit. Works good. Get the topos and you'll be in business for any Alpine hikes as well.

[BentRod]

Gringo,
I bought this same unit for my family for Xmas. I previously had a much older eTrex Vista that I'd use for hunting, fishing, hiking, and geocaching, but it did not have a high sensitivity antenna, so made using it anywhere but out in the open on a clear day quite frustrating. A problem almost anywhere you go on this side of the state.
My daughter and I have only used the Oregon 550t on a couple geocaches since we got it, but have been very impressed so far. Heads and tails above the old eTrex.
I did a lot research prior to making the purchase and although basecamp and the preloaded topos are ok, I have read that there are a lot of non-Garmin maps and programs that you can download off the internet and use for free if you want to avoid the $$$ Garmin charges for their mapping software. I have yet to play with it in detail, so am learning myself, but have read that some third party maps files are better than those provided by Garmin if you want to go through the effort of finding and modifying them for your own use. Certainly let us know if you find anything fun/useful.
Oh, depending what you want to load in relation to maps, you will probably need to purchase a microSD card as all the internal memory has been taken up with the pre-loaded Garmin topo maps. If you don't already know, the downside to purchasing maps through Garmin is that you're extremely limited if you get them via download or purchase their preloaded microSD cards. FWIW.

FWIW.

[Bodofish]

Tons of Garmin and 3rd party software out there. Maps, every size and description, most seem to be land based for travel. If you have an old machine you don't mind reloading occasionally lots of folks are "sharing". I was working on some ux based map/sonar stuff and you couldn't swing a dead cat without hitting something for the Garmin brand.

[racfish]

I have the Garmin but hadnt used it much. I went out with a friend of mine crabbing last year. Whenever we dropped a pot he set it up in the GPS unit. Do all GPS units have that capability or is there a special one for marine use?

[BentRod]

I have the Garmin but hadnt used it much. I went out with a friend of mine crabbing last year. Whenever we dropped a pot he set it up in the GPS unit. Do all GPS units have that capability or is there a special one for marine use?

rac, pretty much all handheld GPS units have the ability to mark a "waypoint". You don't need a marine unit to mark the geographic coordinates on the water. I used mine for the same purpose and it just marks the coordinates at the specified location so you can navigate back to that exact point. Works GREAT for marking crab and shrimp buoys. Won't drop pots anymore without marking location on a GPS. Saves a lot of time and frustration.

[racfish]

It was very nice especially when there are 100's of bouys that all look the same.

[zen leecher]

I use one over here in Moses Lake to mark hunting spots, parking spots and routes to either. Bumbling one's way in the fog or at o'dark thirty isn't fun.

[The Quadfather]

I have the Garmin but hadnt used it much. I went out with a friend of mine crabbing last year. Whenever we dropped a pot he set it up in the GPS unit. Do all GPS units have that capability or is there a special one for marine use?

rac, pretty much all handheld GPS units have the ability to mark a "waypoint". You don't need a marine unit to mark the geographic coordinates on the water. I used mine for the same purpose and it just marks the coordinates at the specified location so you can navigate back to that exact point. Works GREAT for marking crab and shrimp buoys. Won't drop pots anymore without marking location on a GPS. Saves a lot of time and frustration.

I've got a Marine unit, Rac. The only benefit I can see is that it has a lot of pre packaged maps of water bodies. I am actually considering selling it an coming into the 21st century. Works fine, but it looks like one of the early cells phones that were like a shoe.

[hlindsay]

I got the 550t last year when my old GPS died. I am still getting use to some of the things it does. I paid the $30 for the sat photos, I really like that, and a hunting map program I got (http://www.huntinggpsmaps.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;).The map program tells me what land I am on down to the name of the land owner. It is actually a little scary because I can now know the name of every one in the houses around me, or where ever. I think some counties don't give all the info out.
For hunting and hiking it is great. It works well on the water but may not be the best thing going for that use.

[zen leecher]

I'm going to get the gpshunting program before next years season. I want to know what's public, private and where the boundries are. Over here some of the borders are a bit blurred.

[racfish]

Thanks for the url Hlindsay. Im gonna put that on my GPE also good info for both hunring and off roading.