I’m considering a bar mount GPS for navigation purposes as an alternative to paper maps and to provide added confidence when exploring for trails.

I really don’t know much about them, had been thinking in the general direction of one of the better Etrexes, but just seen a Dakota that looks suspiciously well specced for the price…

What are anyone’s thoughts? More interested in mapping and nav than data logging, but I gather the logging pretty much is standard apart from whether or not there’s a Barometric altimeter, which adds a huge chunk to price?

The recent Etrex models and the Dakota are pretty similar. Its mainly a question of whether you want a touch screen (Dakota) or buttons (Etrex). I prefer buttons, as easier to use while riding, especially if wearing gloves or if the screen gets wet or muddy etc.
The screen on the Dakota is a bit bigger, which is good for viewing maps. But maybe not as bright.

For specific models: The Dakota 10 can not take a memory card, so limited memory if you want to add maps. The Dakota 20 can take a MicroSD card, plus has the barometric altimeter and compass, and can connect to heart rate or cadence sensors.
Similar for the Etrex 20 and 30: both can take memory cards, but the 30 has the altimeter, compass and supports heart rate/cadence.

Ta. Any major differences in ability to set up a waypoint/breadcrumb trail via pc before leaving, or marking interesting things you plan to return for?

I have the garmin oregon which has a similar touchscreen to the dakota. On the whole the device is great but the touchscreen is the bit that lets it down, input is not very precise and after using any kind of decent smartphone touchscreen the oregon feels a bit clunky. Unless the touchscreen has been greatly improved on more recent models I would be tempted to go for button controls.

If you really are all about the navigation rather than all the bells and whistles offered by the garmin units then satmap might be worth a look. It’s a nice big screen, big button controls and is really geared towards purely navigation.

From last time’s similar thread I found a new Dakota 10 for £75. Uses AA batteries which is a must for me and the touchscreen works well, even through 2 pairs of gloves. Plenty of internal memory for the Free talkytoaster 1:50k whole UK with contours on, plus loads of GPX files, routes, etc.

The mounts are only a couple quid each on ebay too. Win.

The ONLY thing I don’t like with these though is a Max 250 waypoints per route. But if you route using Bikehike you can handily reduce the number of waypoints down to whatever you like. Or you have to split the route into smaller sections.

That’s a limitation with most (all?) GPS systems. Create it as a track, not a route.

Blimey, those Satmaps are mega bucks. 😯

scotroutes, thank you.

Create or import a route into Bikehike, save as a GPX TRACK straight to GPS. On the GPS, from WHERE TO? menu, select TRACKS and there it is with zillions of coursepoints.

🙂

Well I’m now sorted for £75 with full UK mapping and all the usual data for Strava etc, excluding HR and cadence of course.

Blimey, those Satmaps are mega bucks.

They are, and worse than that, you can easily make the point that they do considerably less than even the fairly basic garmin devices. But they are very well thought out and do what they set out to do very well. They are probably the best device that I’ve come across for replacing a paper map.

I thought 85-90 quid on the Dakota looked good (handtec).

So they’re even cheaper elsewhere? If they’re getting the thumbs up at that price, I’m willing to take a punt and maybe upgrade later if the idea really works for me.

Are they on any sort of standard Garmin mount or is it custom?

Also, I note the talky toaster 1:50000’s. Is there a cheaper than Garmin/OS alternative for 1:25000? And how well does the non SD card Dakota do for map storage? If you needed to, could you pull files off to a laptop and upload fresh data in their place if you’re riding in a different place?

Ideally a 1:50000 Base Map of the UK and detail 1:25000’s of heavily ridden areas would be ace…

Are they on any sort of standard Garmin mount or is it custom?

Dakota and Oregon bike mount

Mine is a complete bitch to get on and off the mount, nothing like as easy as the mounts that they make for the edge units. You can view this as a positive (you’re unlikely to accidentally displace the gps) or as a negative (you’ll be swearing a lot every time to try and detach it from the bike). Also it has a tendency to rotate with the weight of the unit so needs something to counter this. Rubber used to add a bit of frictionbetween the cable ties and the stem/handlebars works for me.

They are, and worse than that, you can easily make the point that they do considerably less than even the fairly basic garmin devices. But they are very well thought out and do what they set out to do very well. They are probably the best device that I’ve come across for replacing a paper map.

muppetWrangler – that’s interesting feedback, thanks. On my second Garmin (both different Etrex models) and struggle to read numbers on the screen. It’s also cracked from an off and really couldn’t bear to pay a lot of money to replace it! All I need is something that will give me a grid ref, nothing else required.

A very simple phone app will do that, or find an old Garmin on ebay – one with no mapping etc (like a Geko or old Etrex)

The TalkyToaster maps are not really 1:50,000 – they are vector maps, so don’t have a specific scale as such. This means you can zoom in as much as you want, to see more details. They are based on OpenStreetMap, so the quality may vary. But for many parts of the UK, they are more detailed and up to date than any of the Ordnance Survey maps.

Note the latest version of the TalkyToaster maps needs about 700MB. They Dakota 10 only has 850MB, so you might find newer versions of the maps won’t fit.

You can buy the actual OS 1:50K or 1:25K maps to load on a Garmin. But they are rather expensive, and need lots of memory, and look pretty rubbish on a small screen. So I think free maps based on OpenStreetMap are usually more useful.

Good to know. I thought the memory might become an issue. I can see this turning into a ‘£5 more…’ quest!

I have a Satmap (got it in a sale, as they are expensive), it works fine for me as a navigation device but I was somewhat peeved at their support attitude – (the rubber cover that covers the usb point is held on by a sort of rubber hinge -this is now mainly broken), when I asked if the did spares they suggested sending it in for a £40 service, to add insult to injury the joystick rubber has now fallen off – I suppose it bits keep breaking it will make the service worthwhile.

oh the satmap bar mount is imo not a great design, it’s a wrapround clamp strap(not O rind/rubber etc), it does’t appear to be able to grip smooth bike bars that well, then wears shiny/smooth, becomes very slippery and doesn’t stay in place

cg, I have an OLD garmin extrex for sale (no OS Maps, rubbish road maps) but records and gives OS etc and you can upload tracks and follow (*direction arrow only)

I was lucky finding a Dakota 10 for £75 unused. TBH the 20 isn’t much more so I’d go for one of them if I hadn’t had that bit of luck.

Anyone got a link to the Talkytoaster download ?

http://talkytoaster.info/ukmaps.htm

Thanks smurfly

Can you use a garmin to construct a route on the fly, or set a goto, like on the Satmap ?

Do the garmins show the other routes you have loaded, but are not active, in the same area as the active one, like the satmap does ?

So, the Dakota 20 is basically same but with compass, bars altimeter and SD slot, and the talky toaster maps are getting to the size they may soon if not already fit a Dakota 10’s 850MB?

Yes, get the 20 for the sake of another few bob. Current maps fit on my 10, with room for routes tracks but in hindsight the 20 would have been a better bet.

Also I’m getting a lower climbing figure from Strava upload than wot is says on my 10. The barimetric altitude wotsit on the 20 may (or may not) make a difference.

More interested in mapping and nav than data logging, but I gather the logging pretty much is standard apart from whether or not there’s a Barometric altimeter, which adds a huge chunk to price?

There may be differences in the sampling frequency and accuracy between navigation devices and performance tracking. Navigation doesn’t need the detail that tracking for Strava use may require, i.e. tracking of every little twist in the trail, and sampling doesn’t need to be high compared to performance tracking. There’s no need for features to sync to heart rate monitors, speed and cadence sensors etc either.

Barometric stuff may need some calibration for accuracy, and is skewed by weather. GPS altitude is worse though. However if you were tracking in Strava and some others they correct altitude on the web anyway based on known elevations.

For navigation, considered a phone with a rugged mount? ViewRanger on a decent smartphone will do a good job with a big screen and you can use OSM maps. Battery life is a problem though if you’re going to have it with an active display for the ride. The screen on a phone is the biggest battery drain. You can get external battery packs for some phones though to power during the ride, and some models have better life than others.

Dedicated devices can have displays that work better in daylight without the need for the backlight on all the time, which means they last a lot longer on a charge. Varies by model though.

Oh and http://www.dcrainmaker.com/ has *very* comprehensive reviews of GPS devices.

I’ve just upgraded from an Etrex to a Dakota from Hantec with the bar mount for navigation and it’s perfect.
Got the whole of the UK on OS mapping for around £22 from http://www.ioffer.com from a retailer called Dazzler.
All 3 for atound £150 bargain

talky toaster maps are getting to the size they may soon if not already fit a Dakota 10’s 850MB?

I tend to create a custom map these days c/o http://garmin.openstreetmap.nl/

Whole Europe and whole country maps are available ready made iirc, but when you live somewhere like here with several countries within 3-4 hours drive, and cross border riding/walking/skiing, it makes sense. Think my map, with all the bits I care about, comes in at 94Mb covering bits of about 6 countries.

Cool, ta. And esp for reminding me about dcrainmaker.

I did think about phones, but tbh between battery life and vulnerability, I’d rather have a purpose device on AA’s…

Strongly suspect a Dakota 20 is in the future.

For the Dakota I was recommended these which I picked up for a fiver locally at our ASDA (on offer) and they come out best in the reviews as well.
Just make sure you set your GPS to using Lithium batteries, now a couple of quid more.
http://groceries.asda.com/asda-webstore/landing/home.shtml?cmpid=ahc-_-ghs-d1-_-asdacom-dsk-_-hp#/product/11504181

Right, I’m taking an uncharacteristically long time making my mind up abou. This electronic witchcraft…

Various have suggested Etrexes as alternatives, and so far as I can see the screen is a little different, battery life a little better, internal memory bigger, but joystick vs osk annoys some for data entry where necessary.

Any owners of both on relative mtb usability, please?

Bit late but……

I’ve had a Dakota 20 for a few years now (not long after they came out).

The first unit borked after one of the many firmware updates – the frequency of updates seems to have slowed down over the last year.

(Seems to be that you should update as Administrator and connect directly, not via USB hub or even front USB ports.)

The current unit has been used a lot (by my reckoning). It’s fitted on one of ^–those mounts, on the top tube. I also loop a lanyard around as, on very rocky stuff, it’s made an attempted escape.

The unit has been well soaked and covered in mud – I use and recommend a replaceable screen cover. No ingress into the device noted.

I have the 50K landranger maps loaded.

These are pretty good but there can be delays in rendering, if you are swiping to view the maps. That is it can take between 5-30 seconds to render some of the screen. This does not happen regularly.

I use the device with gloves on and for the most part, this is ok. Occasionally a fat finger moment creates a “pin” but the on screen buttons are big enough to sort the issue.

I’ve not used it in hard winter conditions, or with really, really thick gloves but my feeling is it could be a bit frustrating.

The (map) screen is readable on the top tube unless looking for fine detail.

The “trip meter” screen is pretty good – you can customize the display to have avg. speed, altitude, etc, etc.

I have not used the compass feature.

I’ve only used the altimeter as very, very rough guide.

I run the unit on rechargeable batteries (remember to change battery type in the setup). They last pretty well in average temps – 5hrs and still going.

To extend battery life, i set the screen to switch off after 15 seconds and I dont leave the display on the “map view”.

The associated “Base Camp” software comes from the Nokia PC Suite school of development but is OK to use.

Uploading stuff to Strava is possible – i use the “manual method” – i.e. connect the Dakota, navigate to the device, file system, pick the relevant GPX file. Pretty painless IMHO.

Cant comment on Garmin Connect compatibility.

I would definitely buy another Dekota 20, if this one dies.