My first Garmin GPS was over 12 years ago; it was a 12xl. Since that time I have owned 9 Garmin units: 12xl, 12map, GPSIII+, eMap (x2), GPSV, 60CSX, Street Pilot C330 (x2). If you notice, I have not upgraded to any new current Garmin model. I currently own and use the 60csx & C330. With all of this said, I have a history with this company. I have had other brands of GPS’s over the years but always come back to Garmin; it’s the only GPS I have ever recommended.
My job & volunteer work pretty much requires me to have a GPS. I am a licensed Paramedic & Firefighter, work commercial ambulance as well as volunteer on a local FD, Red Cross, Regional Medical Reserve Corps, State Disaster Response Team, and Federal Disaster Medical Assistance Team. I am also in the process of joining the Civil Air Patrol. I have been deployed to 911, Ivan, Indonesia, Katrina, and most recently Haiti. It’s safe to say I have put your GPS units through the gauntlet. They are built well, but the level of technology is still not on par with the times.
I remember my first conversation with a Garmin tech back in the late 90’s; we spent over an hour on the phone talking about how the new 12 point receiver was revolutionary. We went over chipsets, power consumption, accuracy and signal strength in technical terms; it was a great conversation. I have had several of these over the years with Garmin techs, the last of which was over the amazing SIRFStarIII in the 60CSX. I have had subsequent conversations with your techs, but the quality of the conversation seemed parallel to the quality of your new products. Total crap.
Here is a summary of a recent conversation with your tech support. I called to find out if my 60CSX had a 65nm or 90nm SIRFIII. This is kind of a specific slightly out of the ordinary technical question, but not one that was so difficult that techs in the past could not answer or at least look up. The rep pretty much blew me off saying that he did not know what I was talking about and wanted to know why I was asking. I said I found it funny that Garmin no longer listed chipsets under product specs (they used to but now all it says is “a highly sensitive chipset”) and the lack of that information just goes to show the company knows they are putting cheap crap chips in newer GPS in order to increase profits (cheap chips cost less). The rep told me he has never heard of any problems with the new chips and then asked if there was anything else he could help me with, signifying he was done talking with me. I hung up and called back, talking to another rep who said she was not sure about chipsets but could ask HER tech support (funny tech support at Garmin now has its OWN tech support, LOL!!!). I gave up at that point but thanked her for her time; at least she offered to do more than the first rep.
My reason was that I just found out the 60 models have changed over to a different chipset and wanted to get a backup 60CSX SURFStarIII before they all vanished. All the reviews posted on the 65nm SIRFStarIII chipset show it provides much better performance than the SIRFStarIII 90nm. Even taking that into account, the SIRFStarIII 90nm still does circles around just about every other chipset that Garmin in now using (STMicro Teseo/Cartesio). The only other chipset Garmin uses that can come close to the performance of the SIRFStarIII is the MTKII (The original MTK was crap) but it’s -165 dBm sensitivity still falls behind the -159dBm of the SIRFStarIII. These numbers may mean nothing to the average consumer, but when you are crawling under rubble and in collapsed tunnels, the quality of your GPS’s receiver chip means EVERYTHING. My 60CSX can lock on to satellites in a basement that is 12FT underground, with 2 stories of house above; that’s a good GPS!
After all the problems with the Colorado and this new Garmin made “in-house” chipset, I decided not to upgrade. To date, there is nothing new worth getting in the handheld department, which is seriously disappointing. Also the recent marketing nonsense is only rivaled by Apple and its crap marketing theory. You really think a 3mp camera is worth an extra $100? My cell phone has an 8mp camera, a 1ghz processor, 512ram, and 8gb of storage. New, out of contract it costs about $480, which is still less than your Oregon 550 which in comparison technology wise is substandard even though you claim it’s your flagship handheld. Its freekin 2010 and you are still using USB 1.1 in some of your new GPS’s, which is something that should be criminal. Where the *** are you finding this archaic technology, caves in Afghanistan? Scratch that, a good friend of mine in the Army SF’s has been in caves in Afghanistan and described the tech there, its old but not that old. You realize USB 2.0 specification was released in April 2000? That was 10 years ago. Christ, get with the times.
I bought Topo 2008 a few years back and was annoyed as *** at the fact you choose to make the map sections so small, thus crippling people from loading its entirety on your very limited 2025 map segment limit. Ironically the DVD was only half full, meaning you have no excuse for not putting two different mapsets on there, one with small segments for older units with less memory and one for modern units with large SD cards. I see you have had no problem with this in your new “t” models which seem to have the entre US Topo installed. Let me guess you rebuilt the maps with smaller segments just for those units? How about releasing an update for your paying customers? Ya, I won’t hold my breath.
For the purpose of this post I compared the specs of your old GPS12 and the new Oregon 400 and got a good laugh out of the fact that the 12CS (1998) can hold the same number of waypoints. The 60CSX can hold the same number of Tracks as the 12 units released in 1998; at least you raised that number with the newer models but it’s still ironic the 60CSX was made 7 years later then the 12 models but has similar specs. My point is you are pulling the same crap Apple does which is upgrade your technology extremely slowly with one or two new features every new model. This trend is getting worse too, which is why I decided to write this post now instead of years ago.
Where your technology SHOULD be in 2010: First, stop using these garbage cheap chipsets in your flagship models. Your customers pay for quality; stop screwing us and trying to sneakily hide it by removing specs from your website. Cell phones have had HD screens now for years and touch screen ones to boot. I would expect more from your screens by now. Your processors, memory and storage are all 5+ years behind the times and need upgrading. If you actually upgraded your tech we might be able to load a good amount of map segments onto our units. Using USB 1.1 is a joke and its insulting to your customers you think USB 2.0 is a “premium option”. If you are going to charge an extra $100 for a camera, how about putting one worth paying extra for like an 8mp model. These cameras will never be better than the most basic point and shoot models (never mind a DSLR) but at least it’s better than 3mp.
You have had GPS’s with barometric pressure sensors for years now yet you still refuse to add Storm Watch to your software. One example is Brunton makes the ACD pro weather sensor which uses barometric pressure to predict storms. This is not some new technology; people have been doing this for hundreds of years, just not electronically. I am sure your hikers would like to know the pressure is dropping, thus a storm is coming. You added a crappy camera but still no temperature gauge? Come on, please start thinking about your users needs. IPX7 is not bad, but it would be nice to see IPX8. Olympus, Canon, Pentex, etc all have low cost point and shoot cameras with IPX8 10m+. Most are freeze, crush, and drop proof too. A 3-Axis compass should be standard. Also, it’s time to expand your graphical interface beyond the cartoonish ones you are using now to something more professional. Allowing customers to upload skins would be nice but it’s still no substitute of a good default interface. Custom maps and aerial imagery are a must.
If you notice I have left out things like wifi, internet browsers, loading apps, etc. The more of this stuff that’s added the more buggy and bogged down electronics seems to get. I do not expect my GPS to act like a cell phone or computer but there is no excuse for a slow processor, limited track/waypoint/route saves, limited map segments, etc. All of these limits can be fixed if you upgrade your tech, which is something that has not been done in years. You can dress up these new units any way you like but the limitations are not far off from your GPS units 12 years ago. If you expect people to drop $600 for a new GPS, it would be nice if it actually included some new technology and not the cheapest chipset your finance department can get a hold of either.
/rant
Flame away fanboys, flame away.
None from this quarter.