Customer Reviews
If you Hunt, Don't leave home without your Garmin 60 map cs
Ok, I had owned a Garmin 45XL & It lasted 10 years ! Wow !!! So, I knew I was going to buy a new Garmin. Just what Unit? After all my research I got the Garmin map 60cs. It sure is nice to have your maps in your GPS & not on paper. 56 MB of memory is great! The battery life was around 18 hours (2 AA batteries)Very good! I love the electronic compass, Need not move to get your compass reading. :-) Love the highway tracking & routes & the way it promts you to turn ! cool.....& off road, Most of the areas I hunt will fit all @ once on this unit.with the base map still on the unit. I also got the MapSource United States Topo ! The Only fall backs on this unit are no expandable memory ! But, 56 MB will do for now. The other fall back is that the Topo mapsource only comes in 1:100,000 scale.....Needs to be 1:124,000 scale.. maybe in the future!!!! Over all it's a great unit for hunting & getting around town.
Nice unit, but check out the map60 cs-x
I just received my map 60cs-x recentlly from Amazon, I don't know why they say its not released yet. It's been available since December 2005. Anyway, I really like my Map60cs and its 56 mb of internal memory, but that is now my daughter's unit. The Map 60cs-x comes with 64 mb of trans-flash memory which is "semi"-removable. Garmin intends to sell trans-flash cards w/ pre loaded maps, but they are as yet un-available. However, 512 mb Scan-Disk trans-flash cards are available for about 45 bucks. That aughta hold just about every map in existance. I just purchased one, put all 40 mb of maps i had in my Map 60cs, and, as you can immagine, hardly put a dent in the available memory of that gihugeic memory card. I'm sure a 1 gb card is not far off in Scan-Disk's future.
Scan-Disk says the trans flash card is "semi" removable because its tiny size, about the size of your pinky nail, is rather delicate. However, once you lock one in, i doubt you'll ever need to remove it.
Other improvements: the Map 60cs-x seems to lock sattelites better than my Map 60cs and the backlight seems brighter, but that my be my elaited sense of reality.
My only criticizm of either unit is that the stated battery life of either is grossly exagerated. Also, i wish, in some conditions, that i could make the screen brighter. Oh, and Garmin needs to make their products MAC compatible. But Magellin dosn't work with MACs either (nativelly) so, whatchagonnado?
Either unit is tough and rugged and probably the best choice for a hand-held. I also have Garmin's auto mount and handlebar mount, which work pretty good as well. I don't do product reviews very often, but I like this product so much that i have to say: GET ONE! (either one...) You won't be dissapointed.
If it wern't for my two and 1/2 criticizms, I'd give either unit a "5".
-jg
Overall it is much more than what I was expecting
The Garmin 60cs is a very great piece of technology. I got my unit about a week ago and have slowly been learning its functions. To use the general gps functions are pretty self-explanatory, especially if you have had any previous gps experience.
Pros:
* The color screen is very easy to see in daylight and looks sharp.
* The screens load relatively quickly, especially compared to the old garmin etrex vista that I used in the past.
* The setup is highly customizable to your preferences.
* Satellite accuracy is great.
* For me, the basemap that comes standard on the unit was fine. You can still figure just fine how to get to where you want to go, you just have to use a little more logical reasoning.
* This unit is very easy and fun to use for geocaching (I found my first cache yesterday, and the gps was right on on locating the cooridinates)
* Battery life seems very good- I have probably used 15 hours and still have 2 of 4 bars left on battery display
Cons:
* Unit is slightly bigger than what I was expecting. Especially the thickness. (About 1 inch thick). Doesn't fit quite as well in my hand as what I was hoping for. Overall tho, this is a very minor gripe as I grow to love this gps more and more each day.
*The manual is not very well written, especially in regards to hooking up the gps to the computer and downloading and uploading maps/coordinates.
