GPS advice needed

[awayatc]

Looked for tomtom and garmin motorbike gps......
Bit expensive, and not in the country when i "needed" one for planned south island trip.

So i got an older car tomtom go 50 or something from TM for $50.00....
thinking was it didn't matter much if it wouldn't survive.

worked a treat, i had wired up usb and cigarette lighter type power to handlebars, and suction cup mount worked great inside screen on Harley, and on top of speedo as well.

Am an old tech person, so am easily impressed....but it worked a treat.
Real speed and speedlimits displayed, total kms and distance to go, real time and eta.....
impressed.
easy to keep dry with plastic bag or such

anybody came up with other good alternative, or are the expensive motorbike specific ones worth the premium?

can wurms open.....

[Akzle]

take the fucken fun out of it

[awayatc]

You ever run out of fuel on a 350 kg bike in or near "sumwhere"....?

Last time that happened was indeed hopefully last time....

Logging was happening nearby, so luckily a couple of liters of premix could be bartered.....,


but admittedly it feels a bit yuppie ish..
follow the arrow on way out of any maize.....
towards fuel, food or accomodation....
detours?
No problem.....
Finding any address in any town?

love it

[slofox]

I have a Zumo 220. Garmin, dedicated bike GPS.

It is nice to be able to leave it out in any weather and generally ignore it.

I mostly use it when I am totally lost in the depths of South Waikato. I hit "go home" and get to ride some routes I would never have thought of.

I also liked to use it to plan routes. But for some reason that function doesn't seem to work any more. Shit heap machine...

[nzspokes]

Looked for tomtom and garmin motorbike gps......
Bit expensive, and not in the country when i "needed" one for planned south island trip.

So i got an older car tomtom go 50 or something from TM for $50.00....
thinking was it didn't matter much if it wouldn't survive.

worked a treat, i had wired up usb and cigarette lighter type power to handlebars, and suction cup mount worked great inside screen on Harley, and on top of speedo as well.

Am an old tech person, so am easily impressed....but it worked a treat.
Real speed and speedlimits displayed, total kms and distance to go, real time and eta.....
impressed.
easy to keep dry with plastic bag or such

anybody came up with other good alternative, or are the expensive motorbike specific ones worth the premium?

can wurms open.....

So how hard are these things to use? Got a pic of your one?

[awayatc]

My little second hand tomtom is so easy to use that even i mastered it in a couple of minutes....
type in city, then it asks for street and number ....
After that it is just follow the arrow.....
you can zoom in or out even with glove on,
it tells you which street you are on and the names of the ones coming up.
On simple and easy touchscreen you can choose what you want highlighted. ..ie petrol food etc....

Battery unit charges through usb.....
once charged it works for 4 hours without being plugged in...

magic

[nzspokes]

I presume you have to update the maps?

Yeah old ones seem cheap on TM.

[iYRe]

ridewithgps app on my phone. Free.

[awayatc]

Yeah, you plug the thing into computer and you can update....
mine has lifetime updates
apparently not all do....
suction cup attachment may not suit every bike , but works for me (after you stick it on flattish surface it has a wee mechanism that turns a quarter turn to realy suck it tight....)
Was well worth the $50, i havent got any need to spend more....
it does what is is supposed to do, and it does it well....
( used extensively on 19 day roadtrip.....including drizzle)

[nzspokes]

ridewithgps app on my phone. Free.

Captain Obvious strikes again....

[nzspokes]

Yeah, you plug the thing into computer and you can update....
mine has lifetime updates
apparently not all do....
suction cup attachment may not suit every bike , but works for me (after you stick it on flattish surface it has a wee mechanism that turns a quarter turn to realy suck it tight....)
Was well worth the $50, i havent got any need to spend more....
it does what is is supposed to do, and it does it well....
( used extensively on 19 day roadtrip.....including drizzle)

Cheers. Will look into it.

[pritch]

I have two Garmins: a bike specific one, and a car model which was about 10% of the price.

The car one is kept right up to date because it's so easy. The Zumo has never been updated, although I recently bought an SD card recently so as to be able to upate it cause it must be time.

Putting a plastic bag over a GPS seemed a bit uummm basic(?) at first, but I do exactly that with the radar detector so what the Hell?

It desn't pay to just follow a GPS, they seem to have a nasty sense of humour.

[MarkH]

ridewithgps app on my phone. Free.

I've used a dedicated GPS (car model) and I've used my smart-phone.
There are advantages to a dedicated GPS of course, but there are some advantages to utilising a smart-phone you already have:
You already have the device so you don't need to buy another device.
You only have the one device to charge and you would be taking your smart-phone with you anyway.
You can mount your smart-phone where you can see it and plug in power, this keeps your phone charged while providing GPS functions.
Every few years when you decide to update your phone you don't have to also think about whether to buy a new GPS.
If the GPS software is shit you can change to other software, even paid for software works out cheaper than buying a dedicated GPS.

My phone is now coming up to 3 years old and I'm considering buying a new one, no real hurry but probably sometime this year anyway. I'm thinking that I'll make my next phone a water resistant model, handy even just for when I get caught in the rain.

For a GPS I don't even find a need for one very often, not really enough need to buy a dedicated device so it makes more sense to just make use of the phone for the task on those occasions that I need navigational help.
The car GPS I have still works, but the maps have never been updated and in fact when I looked into it I found that there are no map updates available (and wont ever be) so that device being over 5 years out of date (I think it is 7 or 8 years old now) isn't really worth using, it is an old & slow model anyway.

I've been using Mapfactor Navigator with the free open source maps (there is an option to pay for Tomtom maps with that app) and it has been working satisfactorily, but I might try out that ridewithgps app and see how it compares.

[awayatc]

Couple of problems with phone.....
it uses data...
its lcd screens not designed to be on all the time...
so screen goes off after few seconds?
way more expensive then $50..........

at least mine do...

my phones only live a few months ...tops,
so i only buy the cheap and nasty ones..
enough to ....text and call

[MarkH]

Couple of problems with phone.....
it uses data...
its lcd screens not designed to be on all the time...
so screen goes off after few seconds?
way more expensive then $50..........


Nope!
There are plenty of GPS apps that use offline maps, download updates at home through the WiFi and use the map software with no data needed, no cellphone signal needed either for that matter.
I've had no problems with LCD screens on the cellphone, they ARE designed to stay on as long as needed - people watch hours of video on their cellphones!
More expensive? Most people these days already have a smart phone, you can buy a new Android smartphone for UNDER $50!!!!!

So I'll say this - sorry, but you are incorrect on every point.
Using a cellphone for GPS navigation may not be perfect and there may be some things that a dedicated GPS does better, but none of what you mention are valid things.

[Gremlin]

I've used smartphones with GPS maps, open source maps and Garmin Zumo 550 (100k), Zumo 660 (50k), Zumo 590 (<10k, just fitted a short while ago) since circa 2008. All the Zumos still work, I just couldn't pass up the good prices I got each subsequent one at :lol:

It really depends on what you need. Motorcycle specific GPS are better and do cost more. They should be waterproof, reasonably rugged and wired into the bike (so no batteries going flat, struggling for power etc). Zumo is the Garmin motorcycle GPS range, usually with a lower model and a premium model (more bluetooth connections, more functionality like music player etc). You can wire communications to it (3.5 / 2.5 mm jacks) or wireless via bluetooth, plus connect a mobile to it for handling calls also via bluetooth. Adventure riders will go for a different range more suited to their track needs (as opposed to just road routing).

I don't use the Garmin maps, rather http://www.nzopengps.org/ but it is a little more technical. You'll lose speed advisory (Garmin weren't very accurate anyway) and junction view (NZ really isn't big enough to need that) but gain much more accurate maps. That open source project is only Garmin compatible (hence I've used so many Garmins).

If the current setup works for you, keep using it until it breaks?

[awayatc]

So I'll say this - sorry, but you are incorrect on every point.
Using a cellphone for GPS navigation may not be perfect and there may be some things that a dedicated GPS does better, but none of what you mention are valid things.


schoolteacher....?

most of my points valid for me and my phones....

appreciate the fact that there are map apps that work on gps only.....

i didnt know that.

Gremlins contribution i found less condescending, and therefor far more helpfull.

may keep cellphone thing in mind if i my work and play circumstances change enough for me to be able to keep a phone in working order for more then a couple of weeks....

cheers

[MarkH]

schoolteacher....?

most of my points valid for me and my phones....

appreciate the fact that there are map apps that work on gps only.....

i didnt know that.

Gremlins contribution i found less condescending, and therefor far more helpfull.

may keep cellphone thing in mind if i my work and play circumstances change enough for me to be able to keep a phone in working order for more then a couple of weeks....

cheers

I'm no school teacher.
I wasn't aiming to be condescending, just having a friendly debate in which I disagreed with the points you raised.
If anything I posted was unclear or incorrect then please feel free to question it, I don't mind being challenged and if someone can show where I'm wrong on any point then I get an opportunity to learn something - to me that is always worthwhile!

I don't really get how anyone can claim a cellphone is dearer unless they purchase a cellphone specifically for using GPS apps, but I really wasn't suggesting such a thing - I was suggesting using the cellphone you already own because there is zero cost.
I'm not really sure how any of your points mentioned in the post that I had quoted are valid for anyone, but I'm happy for clarification on any point you are sure is valid.

I also found Gremlin's post helpful, he mentioned some features of the Garmin GPSs that I've never seen on cellphones.
To me the cellphone is good in that I already have one and can use it for free, a dedicated GPS is good in other ways but would cost money to buy.

[Gremlin]

To me the cellphone is good in that I already have one and can use it for free, a dedicated GPS is good in other ways but would cost money to buy.
Horses for courses. I do a few km on the bike, I like exploring, finding errors in the maps and reporting it back etc. I continue to use the GPS during thunderstorms, across rivers, bouncing down gravel roads etc. Basically there is no reason I stop using the GPS and it handles all conditions. I also use it as a hub, controlling music stored on it, and controlling my mobile if I want that (not all the time, but sometimes necessary).

Some put a smartphone in the top of a tank bag. Often not really waterproof plus you struggle to use with gloves through plastic etc. I hate a tank bag on the bike unless I have to use one. I can use any combo of panniers, top box, tail pack and tank bag as I require. Your other option is getting a cradle for the phone that mounts on the handle bar. I'm unsure just how waterproof it is, plus how it will handle vibrations. I've got a company mobile, they're not cheap, I'm not testing it ;) Either way, you've got to then keep the phone charged as using the GPS and maps plus screen on all the time chews power. Is that connector waterproof?

Again... horses for courses. I do use tracking on mobile when mountain biking (I can map the trails and supply to include in the mapset) but daily use is purely get me from wherever I am to somewhere. GPS routes can be 5-10 waypoints (and I've had 20+ as well) to make a specific route and can be many hours long...

[MarkH]

Horses for courses.

Exactly!
It sounds like you get enough use out of the GPS to justify the expenditure on the dedicated unit, in your case you spent the money because it made sense to do so!

I have a waterproof case for my cellphone that attaches to a RAM mount, but it is pretty horrible in bright light, need a really bright screen on the phone to see it through the plastic cover. It works sweet at night or in low light, just really bad in full daylight.
This is the case: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00RZIFR1M?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o05_s00

What I'd like to do is go with a waterproof phone next time and then I could use a case that doesn't put some cheap plastic in front of the screen, should be easier to see then.
I'm considering buying a Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge, but I might wait a few months for pricing to get a bit better.

[slofox]

I used my cellphone GPS system on a recent trip (not a bike trip this time, wagon trip) to Whitianga. Just to see how good it was.

Actually, it was pretty good at the guidance part of it. Clear instructions, voice not too hard to listen to. Good volume. Only thing I missed was the name of the next street to turn into. Just "turn right in 400 metres."

I did notice that it gobbled power. And the phone ran pretty hot. Three hours of use and the battery was down to about 40%. Would take most of a week to use that much with what I normally do. The Zumo has always done a lot better than that.

But, yeah, for biking I like the Zumo. Worry free and free maps weekly if you want.

Incidentally, I never use the voice prompts on the bike. I did for a start but got sick of it.