Magellan Marine GPS

[sunnydude2]

Anyone have one of these on thier boat? Looking at an fairly inexpensive way to have mapping capabilities on both helms.

[SomeSailor]

I'm a Garmin guy myself. We've had 6 of them and they've all perfromed flawlessly.

[Seapuppy]

I have the old magellan maps 410 series...pretty cool unit....works great.....I use it over my raymarine built in...

[sunnydude2]

Is there really a need to buy the additional maps/charts if you are staying in san juans and canadian islands?

[Seapuppy]

The stock software that is loaded doesn't have the detail of the cmaps software....such as all the channel markers and it even gets down to the level of finger piers......really great details on the software....like my cmaps software will show water depth's, good details on the islands....rocks and shoals....bouys....and points of interest......alot more detail is there but it comes at a price...I paid 99 bucks for the key code to unlock the puget sound areas...now I need the north puget sound area and will have to call them and get that key to load into my 410....

[sunnydude2]

How do you like the 410? I see one cheap on ebay brand new.

[SomeSailor]

Get a Garmin that does Blue Charts. The most detailed charts you can get (IMO) and are all vector based so they stay sharp right down to a finger pier.

It's an awesome deal as you can get Pacific Northwest (Oregon to Gulf Islands) for only $100 on CD. You can then upload any and all to your unit.

You can also run the software on your PC and set routes and waypoints for upload to your GPS unit. I have the CD that you could check out if you wanna look it over before you bought something.

[Tedster]

I easiest out of the box GPS to use by far is a Garmin. Buttons are obvious and all models work very much the same way if you upgrade!
Ted :D

[Seapuppy]

although garmin's are good units...alot of people like them...I've been more than happy with my 410...really is an awesome unit....good graphics even in grey scale and the detail can go down to 300 ft scale.....I like the magellan's....others like the garmin's....it's whatever you like to use........ :argh arr

[SomeSailor]

Not really. There's a huge difference.

For one:

Here's Friday Harbor at 300' detail:

http://www.iboatnw.com/gallery/data/media/25/300_ft_Detail.jpg

And heres the same screen at 80' detail:

http://www.iboatnw.com/gallery/data/media/25/80_ft_Detail.jpg

Both will tell you a lot but the detail is much greater when you get down to 80'

And... you can't run the Magellen from a laptop or upload download data (for $125). With Garmin Bluecharts, I can upload the same data into my $100 handheld that I do to my $1000 chartplotter. They can talk back and forth and all of my travels can be integrated into a laptop for use at home.

Very cool software.

[Seapuppy]

mike..read the post above...I didn't say or compare anything between the two...didn't say one was better or different.....I just said that I have enjoyed my 410...mine will go below 300 ft detail scale...but I just picked that scale cuz at 300 ft it works extremely well......can I hook it up to a laptop??.yeah..but I don't see a need too.......some people like the garmens and others like the magellan's......no comparison from my part.....only cuz I don't know that much about garmen's gps's hand helds...so...don't know what differences your talking about...... :argh arr

[sunnydude2]

Thanks for the information guys.

[SomeSailor]

No problem Sean.

When you start shopping around, lemme know. I can tell you some of the more technical aspects of them both. BlueCharts are very cool and the detail can't be beat. Raster based charts are OK, but very limited in detail in the higher resolutions.

If you want to check out the CD, lemme know. It's fully functional, but serialized to the unit so you wouldn't be upload maps, but everything else works (routes, waypoints, trips, etc).

[sunnydude2]

I will do that SS. :)

Might take a looksy at the cd too. You buy the cd in addition to the gps right? Do you have to 'unlock' the maps to upload?

[SomeSailor]

Yeah. What happens is you buy the GPS, and the Bluecharts are extra. The CD costs like $100 and you get one region unlock included. You go to the Garmin website and enter you GPS serno. They give you an unlock code.

I can give you a copy of my CD, and it has my unlock code in it. You can use it all you want on a laptop, and can even use it to upload / download from a GPS, you just wont be able to upload maps to a GPS (unless it's mine).

Very nice mapping software and since its the EXACT same images you'll see on your GPS, it is very easy to familiarize yourself with and area. You can even "playback" trips. Funny to see how erradically we really drive out there :)

What I did with mine was bought the chartplotter, and then uploaded maps to its chip, used a laptop downstairs to "repeat" the chartplotter. Slick setup, especially for a bigger boat.

[sunnydude2]

You need all that for your carver? :D

Well when i make good on the lunch i owe you, maybe i can get a copy of the disk to familiarize myself. I definately want the capabilities to upload maps to the unit, whichever one i get.

[SomeSailor]

Neah... little Carver has no GPS :)

It does have a flasher :)

My NEXT boat... will have all the goodies... :D

[Roel Jansen]

Sean,

What model of Magellan are you looking at? I have the FX 324 color. Considering the price more than halve of the Ray marine which I think is the best as I may believe a big test in the leading boating magazine over here I think it was a very good buy.

And I ask the Garmin guys what does a Garmin have in advantage over this unit and please no emotions but facts please. I had or still have a Garmin 12 C and that was the reason for me not even look at Garmin again what a POS. Sunshine? Screen bleeding all over!
But I am sure that some Garmins are good ones but I think that simply the Brand Garmin isn't a guarantee that every thing they sell is good.

[SomeSailor]

But I am sure that some Garmins are good ones but I think that simply the Brand Garmin isn't a guarantee that every thing they sell is good.

That's always true Roel. We have 2 eTrex Legends, 1 eTrex and had a Garmin Marine 48, and a GPS-188 Sounder. They've all worked wonderfully so far. Blue Charts are one feature that stands out as a key point in going with them as I see it though. That doesn't apply in your situation though.

[Randygh]

Sean--I purchased a Garmin 172c and the chip for the Puget Sound to Nanaimo region. We just took a weeklong vacation to the Canadian Gulf Islands and the unit worked perfectly. Hardly used my paper charts. Very handy when traveling in unfamiliar waters. By zooming in to a large scale, the map showed better detail than my paper chart. It has an internal antenna and my position accuracy was great, <20' most of the time. I purchased the unit on eBay and the chip through an online retail outlet. Saved alot of money by purchasing online.

[sunnydude2]

Randy...Passed you around Index when you were coming west last weekend. Glad to hear you had a good trip.

The 176 is portable right with the internal antenna. I like that one. Can it be hooked up to an external antenna? I want to only purchase one gps that i can move from upper to lower helm.

[Randygh]

Sean--I cannot hook my 172c internal antenna GPS to an external antenna. I'm not familar with external antenna models and their portability. Since you want to use the unit at two stations a portable internal antenna model may work for you. With an internal antenna, I'd be concerned that the inside the cabin reception would be as good as on the flybridge.

[Roel Jansen]

Mike,

Pop in late on the subject again but is what you post of the charts at 300 and 80 is that the quality of C-Map charts or from another programm? I think in detail this really doesn't match the Cartography based on Navionics Gold card quality. I didn't expected C-Map would be that less in detail.

[SomeSailor]

There are basically two different ways of going about charts. There are "raster" based charts and "vector" based charts. Bluecharts (and some others)n are vector-based. The difference is that a raster chart is a scanned image of an actual chart and a vector chart is a chart that is drawn from the coordinates (datum) stored in the database that created the actual chart.

Raster charts are very familiar, and are nice because they look very much like paper charts, but are limited because just as with any other computer image, you cannot zoom in infinitely without losing great amounts of detail. The only alternative is to store multiple charts of various resolution or zoom factors. This eats lots of space and severely limits the ability to carry many areas. (but can be done)

Vector based charts on the other hand, have the freedom of storing only the data that describes an actual map. In the case of Bluecharts, these datum points are obtained directly from the agencies that provide the paper maps themselves. From these datum points you can add all sorts of things and then recreate the map in all of the detail you chose.

A raster-based cartography set can be just as detailed as a vector based set, but you're talking about systems with hard drives, tons of memory and processing power, etc.

You're a printing guy... it's much like someone handing you a group of paper documents to reproduce or the actual original vector based artwork. It's just a matter of being able to reproduce a true paper chart faithfully. Both methods can accomplish the task, but one is much easier and economical. Where else can you get all of the ENTIRE United States marine areas... on one CD... for $125 or so?