For the geek who has everything ...

Well, I'm a bit of a gadget geek, however hardly ever buy any. I
always think "but will I use it, and is it perfect?". So, I've just
offloaded my old non-mapping GPS with cycle bracket for a fairly
reasonable sum and just put in an order for a Garmin Edge 705.

So, what's a Garmin Edge 705 I hear you ask, sell it to me. It's just
a GPS, but it has a colour screen and you can load up maps onto it. In
fact, Open Street Map are able to be uploaded too, which is quite
cool. The things this thing does is pretty cool, including your
cadence, heart rate etc. Also, a proper barometric height rather than
a GPS guess. You can race yourself on regular rides too ...

Anyway, I don't work for Garmin, just a tad excited.

I have done some research, and in the end plomped for dabs.com who are
selling this at £263.49 inc VAT + P&P (they give a £20 voucher during
the buying process). Sigma sport have this at £359.99 ....

So, just pretend its your birthday or something ... stock arrives on
6th March ...

elyob said the following on 29/02/2008 14:33:

I have done some research, and in the end plomped for dabs.com who are
selling this at £263.49 inc VAT + P&P (they give a £20 voucher during
the buying process). Sigma sport have this at £359.99 ....

Whereas an OS map costs, what, £7.00? :-)

--
Paul Boyd
http://www.paul-boyd.co.uk/

On 29 Feb, 14:33, elyob wrote:
So, what's a Garmin Edge 705 I hear you ask, sell it to me. It's just
a GPS, but it has a colour screen and you can load up maps onto it. In
fact, Open Street Map are able to be uploaded too, which is quite
cool.

I got a Garmin Vista for Christmas coz I'm a geek with a terrible
sense of direction and I wanted a GPS for my bike but I'm not bothered
about stuff like heart rate and cadance.

The openstreetmap stuff is brilliant. In fact I've got really into
contributing to it, filling in quite a few blanks near where I live
and taking lunchtime walks near work to fill in all the little missing
alleys and footways. It's a great way to find odd little places and
cut-throughs you never knew existed and I've also got a much quieter
cycle route to work now. I love the way you can easily fix the maps
if they're wrong or stuff is missing. So I say: make use of it but
also contribute back to the project.

In ,
Paul Boyd usenet.is.worse@plusnet tweaked the Babbage-Engine to tell us:
elyob said the following on 29/02/2008 14:33:

I have done some research, and in the end plomped for dabs.com who
are selling this at £263.49 inc VAT + P&P (they give a £20 voucher
during the buying process). Sigma sport have this at £359.99 ....

Whereas an OS map costs, what, £7.00? :-)

Before all these new-fangled electro-gizmos came along, the popular method
among Audaxers was to buy a motoring atlas and cut out the relevant pages.
My first lasted me three years before the most popular pages started to
disintegrate...

--
Dave Larrington
http://www.legslarry.beerdrinkers.co.uk
Pepperoni and green peppers, mushrooms, olives, chives!

On Feb 29, 2:45*pm, Paul Boyd usenet.is.worse@plusnet wrote:
elyob said the following on 29/02/2008 14:33:

I have done some research, and in the end plomped for dabs.com who are
selling this at £263.49 inc VAT + P&P (they give a £20 voucher during
the buying process). Sigma sport have this at £359.99 ....

Whereas an OS map costs, what, £7.00? :-)

A gps isn't something you /need/, but following a complex route on a
bike is so much easier with one, particularly if it's wet, windy, etc.

I got an eTrex venture for Christmas, just been planning my first solo
ride with it for tomorrow, across Dartmoor. (We've done one tandem
ride with it, but it was on the stoker bars, so I don't feel I've used
it properly yet.)

Rob

On 29 Feb, 14:54, POHB wrote:
On 29 Feb, 14:33, elyob wrote:

So, what's a Garmin Edge 705 I hear you ask, sell it to me. It's just
a GPS, but it has a colour screen and you can load up maps onto it. In
fact, Open Street Map are able to be uploaded too, which is quite
cool.

I got a Garmin Vista for Christmas coz I'm a geek with a terrible
sense of direction and I wanted a GPS for my bike but I'm not bothered
about stuff like heart rate and cadance.

The openstreetmap stuff is brilliant. In fact I've got really into
contributing to it, filling in quite a few blanks near where I live
and taking lunchtime walks near work to fill in all the little missing
alleys and footways. It's a great way to find odd little places and
cut-throughs you never knew existed and I've also got a much quieter
cycle route to work now. I love the way you can easily fix the maps
if they're wrong or stuff is missing. So I say: make use of it but
also contribute back to the project.

I've not really figured out how to contribute. However, am off to
Morrocco soon, and will be taking another GPS gizmo I have and will
record some tracks.

Is just walking them and uploading them without naming them considered
bad practice?

On 29 Feb, 15:24, elyob wrote:
I've not really figured out how to contribute. However, am off to
Morrocco soon, and will be taking another GPS gizmo I have and will
record some tracks.

Is just walking them and uploading them without naming them considered bad practice?

I'm pretty new to the scene so not best placed to judge. But IMHO
just uploading the tracks would be better than nothing. Uploading
them and then tracing and simply tagging them as roads or paths would
be splendid, names would be icing the cake. Have a go near home
before you go away, try out the Potlach online editor, it's really
easy to use and only takes a few minutes to trace over a route. I bet
there's a few minor streets or paths near you that you could
contribute.

elyob wrote:


Anyway, I don't work for Garmin, just a tad excited.

I have done some research, and in the end plomped for dabs.com who are
selling this at £263.49 inc VAT + P&P (they give a £20 voucher during
the buying process). Sigma sport have this at £359.99 ....

So, just pretend its your birthday or something ... stock arrives on
6th March ...

I've had the Edge 305 for about 18 months.... and I'm loving it. I use
it more to tell me where I've been instead of where I'm going. In
time-trials I have my previous tracks stored so that I can race against
myself, and see in an easy to understand way how I am performing with
the simple graphical interface.

I like the fact that it's a simple unit and can change it quicjkly
between any of my bikes. I have the cadence/speed sensor only on the
bike on turbo...

However... it's not without flaw. The unit powers off intermittently,
without pattern. Sometimes it does it because of judder in the road
surface, but often does it on evening time trials in the summer when
it's just a bit warm. The battery on the 305 is not too hot either. 12
hours is advertised, but in reality it lasts about 6 hours.

I hope they've engineered those faults out with the 705.

Garmin customer service is "so-so", not the best but then again not as
bad as some. I did get a replacement for one unit that was switching
itslef off repeatedly... 21 day turn around.

I use Memory Map with the OS Landranger 50:000 series maps. I have the
25:000 series too but hardly use them. I think Memory Map is expensive..
but "bittorrents" are cheap if you get my drift.

Whereas an OS map costs, what, £7.00? :-)


Not for the whole country! Probably cost more than the GPS and you
wouldn't fit them all into your panniers, and they'd need
waterproofing - which means you have to take them out and re-fold them
in strong winds and heavy rains.

Out of interest, does the 705 do OS maps now? I thought is was more
of a basic road-map/tomtom atlas style display - good enough for roads
but not cutting it for the tracks.

Alternatives available are smart-phones with memory-map/viewRanger and
the SatNav A10. It'd be interesting to try the 705 as it's dedictaed
for cycling - esp the virtual race bit - let us know how you get on
with it..

Enjoy!

Duncan

Before all these new-fangled electro-gizmos came along, the popular method
among Audaxers was to buy a motoring atlas and cut out the relevant pages.
My first lasted me three years before the most popular pages started to
disintegrate...


I still plan to do that in case the device gets knackered in a fall,
or loses power, or stops working for any other reason.