Garmin Etrex H GPS Geocaching Review

I finally found some time to write a review about my new Etrex H.
When searching for a new unit, reviews are always fun to read, but I couldn't find to many reviews when I was searching. This is probably due to the fact that the Etrex H is a quite recent model. However I promised myself to write a review when I've had the chance to test it fully. So here it is (finally).

The test is fully focused on Geocaching, since that is what I'm using the GPS unit for :)

In the box

The yellow Etrex H
A wristwrap
Manuals and a quickstart guide

There are no batteries included, but I was aware of that, so I bought a set of four AA NiMh2500 batteries, which were charged in advance :)

Let's Go!

As told in the manual, I went outside after inserting the batteries and firing the device up. It took about 2 minutes to calibrate and search for sattelites. It was however a very rainy day, which could cause some difficulties to find signals.

The real test began when we had the chance to do some geocaching.

The usability of the device for entering waypoints is one of the biggest disadvantages. I have used the Etrex Legend C which was much easier to use, but I guess this is probably one of the points Garmin saved money on, to make the Etrex H as cheap as it is... To overcome this problem, I ordered a serial cable on ebay, which arrived pretty quick, although it had to travel from Hongkong to Belgium :) Although it only solves part of the problem (when doing multicaches, you still have to enter coordinates manually), it is certainly a recommended attribute.

Out in the woods, the Etrex H never let me down. I have changed batteries before they ran out, but 10 hours without recharging is easily achievable. The Etrex H has indeed good reception, even in difficult areas with lot of trees or in the city.

The trip computer seems not as accurate as it should be. When putting the GPS in your jacket, it's not registering the complete distance. I haven't had the time to install the firmware upgrade from the end of october. Maybe this is solved. Measuring the distance we walked is however not one of the features I bought this device for.

Conclusion?

If you are new to geocaching, and want to spend as less money as possible, the Etrex H is a good choice. For fanatics however, the burden of inserting waypoints will quickly become to big, and the device will end up in the bin (or on ebay).
For us, this is however completely what we expected from it. It's cheap, and so far we have a 100% success rate on finding the caches. (15 out of 15 I guess:) )

GPS update

The shop where I ordered our GPS (Etrex H) called today. They had some bad news, the shipment of Garmin did not include our GPS.

But, since we are leaving on a holiday, they could offer us a replacement GPS until we returned! I was stunned by the service, which I was definitely not expecting. Chapeau for Traxs!

So we are on the road with a Garmin Extrex Legend C! We will be going for our first GPS-based geocaches this weekend! To be continued!

New hobby: Geocaching!

About two weeks ago, Sophie told me about some friends of her, who were enjoying their new hobby.
"They walked with a GPS in search of some treasure".

My first thoughts were: "WTF and WTF".

After she told me the GPS wasn't actually very sofisticated, but was just giving coordinates and directions, my second thoughts were: "WTF, and who spends money on such things?"

After rethinking it, and doing some google, and finding some other friends who were also enjoying their hobby (WTF). My state of mind started changing slowly.

I got interested in geocaching (as it's called), and we found our first geocache, without a GPS :) (It was actually located about 750metres from our appartment).

For those who want a decent definition:

Geocaching is an entertaining adventure game for gps users. Participating in a cache hunt is a good way to take advantage of the wonderful features and capability of a gps unit. The basic idea is to have individuals and organizations set up caches all over the world and share the locations of these caches on the internet. GPS users can then use the location coordinates to find the caches. Once found, a cache may provide the visitor with a wide variety of rewards. All the visitor is asked to do is if they get something they should try to leave something for the cache.

So my interest began to grow, and I started looking for an affordable GPS. I started looking for a GPS which I could use for geocaching and for car navigation. This seemed a bad idea since they are completely different. Car navigators are not accurate enough, and have difficulties for getting GPS signals in woods e.g. GPSes which can do both, cost easily up to 600 euros (maps included)...
So I started looking for a cheap handheld GPS, excellent for Geocaching. I finally ordered the Garmin Etrex H, where the H stands for High Sensitivity receiver. Which should get us within 3 metres of every cache we would like to find.



Since saturday, I'm waiting on the Garmin delivery at the local dealer. I'm hoping we will receive it before monday noon, since we are leaving for Disneyland at that time.
We would love to take the GPS with us, since there are some geocaches in paris which we would love to add to our "caches found" list. At the end of our 5-day trip to Paris, we are going to the seaside to spend the weekend (since they have geocaches everywhere, they also exist in Knokke... There are about 450.000 geocaches worldwide).

That should be enough to find new energy to start working again on monday!

New Camera!!!

Wednesday, I received my new camera, and I finally found some time to post some pictures I took...

It's a canon powershot A610, and I bought it (after reading a lot of reviews at dpreview) at fotal, a very nice and good online shop... I paid 300€ for the camera, 4 good quality batteries, a loader, a little bag and a 1GB SD-card.

But now back to the results...

I started experimenting on a meeting in Brussels (couldn't leave my camera I received minutes before behind... (I used 4 AA-batteries that were included, but normally don't last as long as the NiMh batteries, although they aren't empty after a whole day of experimenting...)

(This is one of the demo-devices we used, just to illustrate the macro power of this camera)

At home, I took some other macro's of some fragrance sticks Sophie bought:



And today, I took some pictures of the evening sun (the first time since weeks this is possible in Belgium :D), with a balloon and some birds flying over...


Just some practicing, but I like the camera very much already!