Small GPS to find car in parking lot?

[woolygums]

I have sophisticated car navigation systems to find all sorts of routes and points of interest. No problems there!

However my wife and I like to travel and walk around new places. Often when we are in another city, we get "turned around" and lost.

We need a simple GPS to help us find our way back to the parked car or hotel. We can set a waypoint when we leave I know how to do that!

Maybe a "breadcrumbs" trail?

Small enough to fit in pocket.

Would like to have the WAAS or better accuracy. Rechargeable or AA replaceable batteries.

Would be good to have capability in foreign cities (European, Indonesian, Asia, China, Japan)

Thanks
Bill
Atlanta Georgia

[Maxi]

I'd have thought all you need is a any old hand-held device and just set where you leave your car as a 'favorite'. Then when you want to go back to it navigate to that favorite.

Why would you need WAAS/better accuracy? Surely you can see your car when your within e few feet of it?

Maybe I'm missing the point...wouldn't be the first time.

[woolygums]

Hi Maxi,

I may be confused here. I have seen several GPS in comparative review that say "accurate <49 feet."

That is probably accurate enough, but then I see some that are MUCH more accurate.

Also I get TOTALLY confused with all the little differences.

What is the difference between a "waypoint" and a "favorite." I would think that I would need to set the car as a waypoint since I would be parking in different locations.

I thought that a 'favorite' was more like a restaurant that I would return to in the future.

I would also like my 'car finder' to be small, like a cell phone size. I am riight now looking at this.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=5796759270&ssPageName=STRK:MEWA:IT

Looks pretty good. Need to do a little research. I like the size and that it has a rechargeable lithium battery with a 15 hour life. I have also looked at the Garmin Geko a little bigger, but uses replaceable batteries I can get anywhere.

[Maxi]

Sorry woolygums, I got a bit confused by this line:-

[woolygums]

I mentioned early on that I am not familiar with a lot of the terminology. This thread is helping me better define my objectives.

I want a small GPS that has the sensitivity to work in metropolitan areas all over the world. I have read about some of the small GPS units that don't work very well around tall buildings or even with foliage overhead. I don't want one of these.

I would like it to have AA or AAA replaceable batteries in case I am somewhere that does not have electricity to recharge, or in case I forget to put it on the chrager at the end of a day.

I guess that 50 feet accuracy is fine.

Would like to have a GPS about the size of a cell phone.

Thanks,

Bill, lost in Atlanta

[oddsock]

[mcewena]

What about this:

http://www.gpsinformation.us/quest/questrev.html

[Skippy]

I would recommend Garmin too.

The Geko's are very basic but cheap.

The advantage you get with something like a VistaC is that you can upload tracks (the breadcrumb trails) to your PC after a trip and you can use your PC to create and edit waypoints (or favourites - same thing) on your GPS.

The VistaC can also take street maps or USA topographical maps (extra cost option) and give you turn by turn directions to your destination. This is deadly cool, and it's worth considering paying a bit more for the feature if you visit unfamiliar areas quite often.

I have a Quest which comes with Streetmaps included in the price, it's water proof, battery lasts about 18 hours (and recharges in the car or from the mains), it has a nice colour screen, it gives voice directions and it's equally at home in the car/Bike/trail/boat/plane.

When I park somewhere I mark a waypoint and then it's easy to navigate back to where you parked.

Generally speaking:

There are a lot of claims about accuracy. With WAAS enabled, you can get supposedly get 6ft accuracy under good conditions though I have never tested it against a properly surveyed point. Certainly you can navigate back to within a few feet of a waypoint you have marked a few hours before. If you return a day later then you might be 20 feet off though.

There are a lot of claims about sensitivity in urban canyons and under trees. In reality this varies an awful lot. If your GPS already has a good fix after being in an open area and you enter a heavily built-up area then you have a reasonable chance of holding a fix.

If you are trying to get a first fix from cold (GPS switched off for > 8 hours) then it can take 5 minutes to get a fix in difficult conditions. This is common to all the GPS units I have used.

Buy the Vista-C or Quest.

Good luck! x
_________________
Gone fishing!

[Maxi]

[DavidHobbs]

Are there really pocketsized little GPS devices available for stuff lieke this?

[Maxi]

[Maxi]

....and that was only four years ago!

[woolygums]

[MarkHewitt]

Personally I would recommend something like TomTom for a smartphone with their GPS receiver. It gets decent reception in city centres,, I've used it myself many times.

The big advatage is that you only need to carry the small GPS reciever, you would carry the phone anyway. I often find the map feature on it's own very useful, in a city you can often easily find out the name of the road you are on so can track down where you are via the map and work it out from there.

Most portable GPS units will do you fine, I think you are probably over analysing the specific requirements of the situation. Something which often results in spending much more money than you need to!

[kartracer]

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