Garmin GPS e-trex

not a bad device for the absolute basics. but not the best either.

it doesn’t perform basic things such as real distance. for example. when traveling from point A to B, if direct point to point with equal elevation is 100 meters, it will record it as that. but if point B is 100 meters higher, it will still record the distance as 100m when in actuality it is further (in case you can’t remember pythagorean theorem… ). the device measures elevation so it would be a simple calculation to figure out real distance.

the usability also is poor. it is apparent that the antenae is on the top of the device. but the neck strap, forces the device to hang upside down. thus the reception is poorer. In many cases, the device would lose reception, but simply turning it over in the exact same spot, would fix the prob. This is a bit dumb of the designers.

I also didn’t like the screen size or screen orientation options. it always forces your current location to be fixed in the middle of the screen, so it is not possible to zoom into other places along your route.

as for interfacing with a PC, you have to buy a proprietary cable to do so, and it doesn’t come with any useful software. so transfering the waypoints to my PC was a bit of a learning curve – i ended up using a combination of Google Earth because i couldn’t get other software to import from my device.

overall, it worked in recording the points along my travel, but other than that, it was useless. the manual is far too basic, and doesn’t actually help in planning.