Garmin GPSMAP 60CSx Handheld GPS Navigator
by Garmin
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Garmin GPSMAP 60CSx Handheld GPS Navigator
Customer Review: Garmin 60CSX
Summary: 5 Stars
I have had this unit now for several weeks. My previous handheld was the old GPSMap 76s. Man, what a difference! I've also had various other gps units in the past, mostly automotive types, so they really don't apply here.
My review here is all about the unit, not maps. You need to understand that this unit comes only with a very limited detail base map. Detailed maps are available from Garmin or from OTHER sources. Now, back to the hardware.....
This is NOT a unit designed for navigating in an automobile.
This IS a unit designed for portable use on the trail while on your person.
Battery life is exceptional. Uses two AAs.
The box said it came with a 64MB micro SD card. Mine had a 1 Gigabyte card in it!! Bonus!!
Case: tough, attractive, water-proof, and a great size to fit just about any hand.
Screen: Clear and crisp, good color, very readable. This is an OUTDOOR unit, it is designed to have direct sunlight on the display. The more light hitting this display the better it looks. There is a backlight for indoor or low light conditions. I bought the Invisible Shield by Zagg. Having tried a few, this is the absolute best one I have tried. I also use one of their products on my Blackberry screen for protection. Tuff as nails and protects your screen from scratches. Get it and be done with it, you won't be sorry.
Operation: Straight forward Garmin-style buttons and menus. Set-up is a snap for experienced users, and novices will find the unit intuitive and quick to learn.
Sensitivity: I've never seen anything like this unit when it comes to snagging sats. Indoors, under tree canopies, in your pocket, in the car, in the truck, it don't matter. This thing has much more sensitivity than I expected. I stick it in my pocket when walking the dog, just to see how far we go as we try different streets and routes in the neighborhood, it's just a fun and fantastic tool.
Accuracy: Most of the time the unit indicates an accuracy between 7 feet and 9 feet. I don't get to turned on about this metric since my uses do not require accuracy better than this. Unit utilizes WAAS to further improve accuracy.
SD card slot: The card required is the Micro SD card. It fits in a socket that lies just under the batteries. I bought a 4 Gig card, loaded it up with 3.6 gigs of planimetric and topomaps, and use the unit to turn maps on or off depending upon which one I choose to view. Sweet!
Powering the unit: Of course the internal batteries are the main power source. There are also two more ways to power the unit. One is via the USB port, utilizing the 5 volts DC available on any USB line or USB charger. The other is the Garmin 4-pin connector. This connector uses two pins for power, and two pins for data send-receive (serial). I prefer the Garmin connector due to it's design being more resistant to moisture.
Bonus uses: If you have mapping software on your laptop computer and that software supports GPS connectivity (i.e. Delorme Street Atlas) , just connect your 60CSX to the computer via USB and use your 60CXS as a great GPS sensor for your laptop as you travel down the road or as you creep through the woods.
Sensors: This unit has a barometric altimeter sensor. GPS derived altitude is usually not very accurate, but when used with the altimeter sensor, the altitude calculations are pretty darn accurate as far as I can tell. The unit also has an electronic compass which is a really cool bell and whistle. Do yourself a favor when on the trail and carry a real compass...Silva grade or better.
The unit comes with some Trip and Waypoint management software as well.
So anyway, that's about it for my review of the 60CSX. Happy GPSing!
Customer Review: Worth the price
Summary: 5 Stars
I bought this to accommodate driving, biking and hiking. I think it's a good compromise for all three. If you are exclusively going to use your GPS in the car, this one is not for you. In the car it's better to have a larger screen and voice commands. The processor is also a bit slow if you're in a city location making quick lefts and rights.
The reception on this unit will only cut out in tunnels. Otherwise, it seems always to be locked on, even when inside the glove box (not sure why). The display is extremely clear. The screen size difference from ETrex models makes a huge difference as a bigger screen gives you better perspective on a map.
Before you buy, keep some things in mind:
1. You must buy Garmin City Select software for street maps to use this for navigation. The price was $100 at this writing. You will need to unlock the software. You use the 8 digit code on the CD, then they email you with another 25 digit code you will use to unlock it (a bit of unnecessary pain there). I had trouble with the software not recognizing my unit through the USB cable. When I unplugged the unit, rebooted and then plugged back the unit, it was recognized and I could start loading maps.
2.National Geographic's Topo software will NOT work with any Garmin product (except waypoints, which are useless without maps). You must buy Garmin's Topo software. Garmin's software works well in the unit (the screen is small, so map detail level from 24k to 100k is not important. NG's software is much better for your computer, printing maps, etc. due to it's impressive detail and features.
3.Garmin's bicycle mount on Amazon.com does not hold the GPS well. The GPS is too expensive to chance losing it over some road bumps. Look for the Touratech motorcycle mount. Garmin's Automobile mounting kit is great. It has one stick-on mount and one beanbag mount that can be moved from car to car.
4.I think it's a good idea to read a lot of reviews here as many problems identified in one review are addressed in other reviews (i.e.: battery problems).
5.Garmin's customer service phone wait time is 15-60 minutes and is only available weekdays during working hours. It will take as much as a week for them to respond to email.
6.I recommend you get additional memory chips for the unit, $40 for 1G at this writing as you can load a large area at once. You'll never have to wonder what area maps you have inside.
7.You can use Garmin's City Navigator and Topo at the same time. They work as if you are laying one map over the other. Loading maps and switching between the two software products is not intuitive and too tedious to explain in a review. Call Garmin's customer service and have them guide you through it. You will NOT find these instructions in any manual from Garmin.
Now, have some fun and play with the unit. Once you have learned its logic, it is very easy to use. When learning in the car, have someone else drive while you play with the unit. You have to know the key positions and screens before you use it while driving.
The chasis is rugged and buttons are sturdy. The display is recessed to help protect it. Just the same, I recommend the protective case, which is a pricey piece of vinyl at $15.
I tried to address some things not already in other reviews. One last thing is to add up the costs of all the accompanying items you will need to make the unit useful to you. None of these things are cheap. They are all on the net somewhere and might include:
Street software
Topo software
AC adapter/Car holder
Bicycle mount
Protective case
Rechargeable batteries and charger
Customer Review: What a Huge Disappointment.
Summary: 1 Stars
All alpinists understand how crucial it is to always know what their elevation is. Unfortunately, keeping an accurate account of elevation is impossible with this GPS due to its altimeter, which cannot be deactivated, according to Garmin Tech Support.
You can't just use satellite data to determine elevation like with other GPS units. Instead, the unit takes some sort of average of what the satellites determine and over-mixes it with the altimeter data. This is giving me wildly changing and inaccurate elevation readings, even when my elevation is static. This is of course due to ever changing atmospheric pressure. This means that you must recalibrate the altimeter constantly. In order to recalibrate you must know the elevation you are at. (I reject the notion of using atmospheric pressure in such circumstances to recalibrate the altimeter. It works for pilots but is highly hazardous to an alpinist.)
But if you are able to continually recalibrate the altimeter because you always know your altitude, either based on fixed points or careful reading of decent topo maps, what is the point of the altimeter? The bottom line is that this unit is practically worthless for determining altitude for anything but very short periods of time unless weather conditions remain fairly static.
I climb almost exclusively in South America where accurate topo maps and fixed points are scarce to non-existent. The inability to use this unit to determine elevation makes it useless to me. I cannot stress enough that an alpinist should never buy a GPS unit, which uses the altimeter to determine elevation, unless the altimeter can be deactivated!
Of all of the corresponding instruction manuals for electronic devices that I have owned in my life, the 60CSx instruction manual is by far the worse. This GPS has a steep learning curve which is made infinitely worse by having an instruction manual that barely scratches the surface.
One example should suffice. The electronic compass interferes with the laying of tracks. You need to hold the unit level and point the antenna in front of you to make a highly reliable track. This is due to the fact that the factory has preset the unit to show compass direction, as opposed to direction determined solely by the satellite data, if you are going less than 10 miles an hour. Of course this can be set to as little as 1 km per hour so that as long as you are moving, even a little bit, the unit will make a very accurate and reliable track. However, nowhere in the instruction manual (including page 50), is any of this discussed. You simply have to figure it out on your own through trial and error.
Also, the chipset the unit shipped with is not the most recent and the unit will not update to the latest version. No one in Garmin Tech Support can explain this.
All in all, this is the most disappointing electronic purchase I have ever made and am stuck with it as I am now in South America and can't exchange it for a replacement due to customs laws down here. For now, I will simply continue to use my trusty and reliable Magellan SporTrak Pro.
I love Amazon.com and have spent a sizable fortune here over the years. For the sake of fairness to Amazon.com, I admit that this is the first horrible product that I have ever purchased from them. And, I blame Garmin, not Amazon.com.
I wrote this review because I feel a particular responsibility to my fellow alpinists to give them fair warning about this product. Don't trust your life with it.
Caveat Emptor
Customer Review: Buyer Beware! Initial Purchase Sucks You Into More Expenditures - Upgrades Downright PAINFUL!
Summary: 2 Stars
I was looking for a "Top of the line" consumer product - and have had good luck with Garmin aviation products in the past - so I thought the GPSMAP 60CSx was a good choice.
Though the unit does have some nice features - but it has some glaring deficiencies that must be acknowledged for the sake of would-be buyers.
NO MAPS ARE INCLUDED WITH THE UNIT. OK - there is a "base map" that comes with it - but it only includes major highways. Even in a "big city" there aren't enough streets shown to figure out where you are with any degree of precision. In rural areas or small towns - you will appear to be out in a field when you're actually walking down Main street. The "Base Map" included is nothing but a tease - COMPLETELY worthless.
THE "OPTIONAL" MAPS ARE EXPENSIVE - Figure on spending at least $60 for a detailed map that includes the lower 49 (lower 49?! Wonder if that includes Hawaii or???)
This is just plain "cheap" on Garmin's part. The POS Nextar GPS I bought for $59 2 years ago has detailed maps included. Can't Garmin do you the same courtesy when you spend $2oo+ for their "premium" GPS?
THE INCLUDED MICRO SD CHIP IS TOO SMALL TO DOWNLOAD A MAP TO. Geesh guys - thanks for the "free" 1GB Micro SD chip. Too bad the smallest map takes 1.2GIG! I had to go out and buy one for $15. Isn't your customer's convenience worth that much?
YOU CAN'T DOWNLOAD MAPS DIRECTLY TO THE GPSMAP 60CSx! That's right - this top of the line product can't just be hooked to your PC with the USB cable to download the upgrades. You have to download the map to the Micro SD with an adapter. Another trap - the software used for downloading doesn't "know" that the GPSMAP 60CSx can't directly accept a download - it implies that it can, then will stubbornly try to do it - making you waste time until it times out with no helpful error message.
Garmin's licensing and copy-protection schemes make you jump through quite a few hoops. In spite of the fact you can't download maps directly to this unit - you *MUST* have the unit attached to the PC while you're downloading AS WELL AS having the micro SD attached. Apparently Garmin's software doesn't like Mozilla Firefox either. Trying to use that browser won't show you the option link you need to select the Micro SD as a download destination. Downloading the 1GB+ file - even at DSL speeds - DID take quite a long time. Apparently Garmin's "time remaining" feature on the connection software is schizophrenic - as it bounced between 21 minutes and 45 minutes and a few other random numbers before it finally finished - some large number of hours later - I got tired and went to bed 3 hours after it started downloading. "Maddening" and "Patience-trying" are two good terms for what you will endure installing maps on this device. If I have a Garmin software "engineer" with me when I was doing, I likely would have throttled him before the night was over. It's *THAT* bad.
Bitches aside - time will tell how useful this unit is, but if actually using it is near as painful as just installing a map - I don't have high expectations
So - go ahead and buy this unit in spite of my and other warnings about what it won't do or does poorly. I'm sure it has redeeming qualities I haven't discovered yet - but DO BE ADVISED that getting to any level of basic useability, you WILL be spending another $75+ bucks just for continental US road maps. Topo or international will set you back more.
Consider buying a unit where this is included.
Customer Review: Awesome Handheld GPS Receiver
Summary: 5 Stars
This is the second handheld receiver I have owned in as many years. My first was a Magellan ExPlorist 500. I purchased it in haste and did not read any reviews or do any research about it. I purchased the street map software in addition so as to be able to navigate to any desired location. I broke it in on a road trip from Alabama to Tennessee to Ohio to Pennsylvania to Washington, D.C. to Virginia and finally back home to Alabama. In all, I was happy with the ability to enter a destination and be directed close enough to find the exact location.
The cable connection on the back of the unit is its weak link. There is a very small screw on the cable that threads into an equally small hole. This cable is used to send and receive data and also recharge the battery. I accidentally overtightened, just a bit, and stripped the threads on the hole. The cable would not stay attached without taping it to the unit....frustrating. The rechargable battery's life was not very long either.
In desperation I looked for a replacement. I got over the inital sticker shock of what a quality unit would cost. I spent two weeks researching different units but all reviews pointed toward the 60csx. It had more "bells and whistles" and the quality Garmin name. The additional software needed to navigate down to street level is awesome but pricey.
The data cable for this unit is more solid and the connection has no screws to overtighten. The included cable is a miniature USB connection and the software is a breeze to set up. The unlock code process will prevent you from using more than one unit with it but you can install the software on more than one computer.
Some argue that you can get a "car only" unit for less that already has all of the maps...true. But I can take mine with me anywhere...car, woods, bicycle, walking, etc....try that with a car unit that does not come with a belt clip.
I did not care if it played movies, pictures or mp3's...I'm driving! I should not need to watch movies or pictures while doing that. As for music, I already have that covered.
There is no voice that tells you what turns to take. I did not need that feature....my wife does just fine in that area (I love you dear).
In all, this unit packs a lot of features that I have yet to explore and I am very pleased with it. I found the best price here with amazon.com and also purchased the windshield mount which is rock solid and adjusts to any needed angle...it even allows the unit to be rotated 360 degrees once it is attached.
My unit shipped with a 128MB card instead of the listed 64MB. I purchased a 2GB card and had plenty of room to load the entire US and Canada maps. Batteries are rated for 18-20 hours and I would have to agree with that....have used for the past month on a daily basis.
Lock on with satellites is very quick as compared to the Magellan unit....really quick. I turned unit off before leaving my house and turned back on after traveling for 60 miles.....it took about 52 seconds to find me. Magellan would have taken minutes!!!! Garmin has got a winning vote from me!
This unit is also great for geocaching! Just check out www.geocaching.com and discover that they are very Garmin friendly!