Decent deal or no deal at all?

[Trekkin and Birdin]

Hi,

We’re looking to get a better GPSr in the near future and got this offer from a place we’ve purchased from in the past. It’s a package deal for the Garmin 60CSx, including these other items, for just over $400.

Choose the Outdoor Value Package and get Mapsource TOPO U.S. 2008, a 1 GB microSD memory card, and Carrying Case at great savings.

I know I could surf and find out the average combined total, but figured maybe someone here could save me that time! TIA for any input. I think we just want to get a new one so we can send it back if anything comes up with it. Will the turn by turn that comes with the unit be enough for getting us places? Keep in mind we’ve done paper caching and looking at little google maps to get us around to this point, so we do have some internal navigation skills of our own, LOL.

[Vegas Gamblers]

I have to say go for it. The site that I use to check prices for GPS’rs shows that the 60csx is $399 with nothing added. The turn by turn is a function that is excellent. It will get you close to the caches and you wont need to check the paper maps. I vote go for it.

[WI_Robin]

I would have to say it depends on if you are going to use the TOPO maps, or get regular maps for it. The memory cards are not that expensive and I found this listing on E-bay – eBay Listing $269 plus $17.48 shipping. Feedback of 10,232 99.9% positive. A garmin authorized dealer, giving it a 1 year warrenty – with extended warrenty available. It is “reconditioned” but they have new ones available on E-bay as well. I bought my 60cs on E-bay about a year ago for $175 with the mapquest softwear and have never had a problem with it. I took a chance though, I did buy it from a individual vs a dealer.

[Team Hemisphere Dancer]

The basemap in the 60CSX is not good enough for detailed turn by turn directions. I don’t have the 08 TOPO so I cannot speak for that. If you are purchasing it for the turn by turn you will want a city nav. map and it will run you around 100 bucks. The micro SD cards are real cheap so they don’t add a lot to the value of the package.

If you look around you can get a better deal on the gpsr and then get the city nave somewhere else and you should be all set. TOPO is nice but I really don’t use it a lot. You may be able to find a better deal when purchasing them separately.

[cheezehead]

I have the Map60csx. I have the old version the Mapsource Topo program. For the most part, if you are in the sticks geocaching the program works fine. The Auto route however does not. It was explained to me somewhere that the Topo program is not set up for autorouting.
Some of the fire lane names are wrong but it does show most trails.
I paid $399 for my unit last August. Bought the whole topo program the year before for $100.

[TyeDyeSkyGuy]

Good e-Bay Buy-it-now price for 60csx is $278 with free shipping frm a Platinum Powerseller. Brand new.

1GB SD on eBay $0.99 + $1.88 shipping.

And if you want to use this thing for driving, your going to need street maps, not topo maps.

Garmin 2008 City Navigator on e-Bay $48.33 + $9.50 shipping.

Total=$338.70

Id’ bet that the guy selling the 60CSX has the software and SD card as well, and would combine shipping for an even better deal.

[Trekkin and Birdin]

Thanks for your input, everyone. We mostly needed the info on the correct mapping program. Trekkin’ always grumbles about forgetting to grab his topo maps, but I figure, when we get to a place, you can kind of figure out if the lines are close together or far apart by looking!

We’ll shop around a bit.

[Sloughfoot]

We have had a 60CSx since 3/06 (bought it off of the Internet for $400) and added the City Nav N. America micro SD chip (from Garmin about $130 ) about 3 mo. ago. Part Number 010-10679-50.

We have been real impressed with the routing features. It doesn’t talk to you but beeps and displays in large letters exactly when a turn is coming up. It works just as well in the countryside as it does in the city. It also contains other things such as gas stations.

The only complaint that I can think of is how it affects the compass page. When I make my final approach to a cache I like to use the compass screen and it seems like the compass is always pointing at the next turn instead of the cache so when I get close to the final I will do another “find” and select “off road” to get the compass to point directly at the cache.

I have been in email contact with Garmin trying to solve this minor little problem but we haven’t come up with a setting that works . I would like the compass to always point at the final location rather then down the road. But I know how to get around the problem so now it’s not really a big deal.

The 60csx is a great unit and is also good on batteries and I would highly recommend it. Be a little careful buying the mapping CD’s off of ebay because there are some licensing issues that might make the CD useless. Also the chip used in the 60CSX is not a standard SD. It is a micro SD, max size of 2GB. The micro SD is only about 1/2″ square and you can’t buy them just anywhere. These issues are why I decided to buy the preloaded City Nav chip direct from Garmin.

Happy hunting

[Team Hemisphere Dancer]

Sloughfoot,

When you are routing “on Road” to a cache it will point you to the next turn. But you solve it by: When on the map screen hit menu/recalculate/Off road then switch to the compass screen. I have just come to view that as normal and is not too much of a problem.

Hemi

[hogrod]

Walmart.com has the 60Csx for $305 most of the time. http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=4564610

you can buy a 1gb microSD card online from newegg.com for under $6
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820134409

Now you can choose what maps you buy…. I have both the topo 2008 and city Navigator 2008NT, I much prefer the auto-routing and more accurate street maps with city navigator.
If I was buying maps again I wouldn’t buy the NT maps, they are a tad slower on redraws than the Non-NT maps. They are compressed differently so you can fit most of the US on a 1gb card, but I already own a 2gb card so thats a non-issue.

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