Author |
Message |
Froggy
| Posted on Friday, October 25, 2013 - 04:40 pm: |
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Reepi, get DRM free maps from OpenStreetMap http://garmin.openstreetmap.nl/ There are others, and I haven't tried it yet but my maps are starting to get long in the tooth so I'll be doing it soon. |
Oldog
| Posted on Friday, October 25, 2013 - 04:43 pm: |
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I hope that the zumo users are happy with their units, I purchased a 1450 nuvi some time ago, big screen, semi sun light readable, sorta works with gloves, not water proof or vibe resistant, but for the price of the zumo I can buy a number of them and a baggie works as a water proof case, If I kill it get another one. I can't justify 400$ difference between the car usage and bike usage. |
Ishai
| Posted on Friday, October 25, 2013 - 05:17 pm: |
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Reepicheep- yes, it has a wonderfull winding road function. What I do is once it plots a route to destination I check the "View Details " option, make sure its winding enough, and if not i press "find another" and check that. and it will take you onto some realy minor roads, at times hardpack dirt. I won't say it's flawless- but it is a lot of fun. I do not use the bluetooth, I went into the options and chose the sun light option, and its quite good in daylight- not excelent but good. Before using it make sure to get the latest maps and updates on line. As stated, I like it a lot. |
Sifo
| Posted on Friday, October 25, 2013 - 05:52 pm: |
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The Nuvi 500 and 550 while they are not considered motorcycle units, are water proof. They work OK with gloves, but the zoom feature is almost impossible to use while on the move. You do have to get an accessory power cord for it to wire to the bike (or just run on the units battery). The cigarette light plus will not last long on a bike, especially a 45 degree v-twin. I confirmed that quite quickly. Otherwise, I probably have close to 40K miles of use on mine. The screen is getting scratched up from sliding a dirty glove across a dirty screen, the paint is worn off the corners, but it's still working reasonably well. I don't see the ability to search for waterproof units on the Garmin site like they used to have. They really seem to nail bikers on price for some reason. They do, or at least did make waterproof units that weren't marketed to the bikers. |
Reepicheep
| Posted on Friday, October 25, 2013 - 06:29 pm: |
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Thanks Ishai, good info! |
Reepicheep
| Posted on Monday, October 28, 2013 - 06:14 pm: |
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Huh. Checked my local area, and OpenStreetMap has some things right that Garmin has wrong. I think that might be the same data NavFree is using. Wonder how hard it is to convert the data and actually live with it on an old Quest? Time to experiment I suppose... :/ |
Reepicheep
| Posted on Tuesday, October 29, 2013 - 09:33 am: |
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So far so good... isntalled it to the desktop and it works with MapSource. I'll try feeding it to the quest. If this works, people should be snapping up cheap quests on the used market. Not as a full fledged GPS, but as a "preplanned route director" device. |
Ratbuell
| Posted on Tuesday, October 29, 2013 - 10:03 am: |
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If youre hacking quests...I have a west coast unit that I can't unlock and use on the east coast. Any ideas to unlock it? Garmin was, unfortunately, zero help. |
Cataract2
| Posted on Tuesday, October 29, 2013 - 11:08 am: |
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Reep, here's a link for the Garmin OSM maps. http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/OSM_Map_On_Garm in/Download The download is at the bottom. I use the weekly or bi monthly updated ones. If you have an SD card it's pretty easy to install. Just download the file and unzip it onto your SD Card. You will need to look up the info on your device to find out where on the card it needs to go, but once it's there it should find it and you can activate it. |
Froggy
| Posted on Tuesday, October 29, 2013 - 12:10 pm: |
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The Quest probably predates SD cards |
Reepicheep
| Posted on Tuesday, October 29, 2013 - 12:23 pm: |
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It doesn't technically predate SD cards, Garmin just chose not to support them. Ok, and I guess they were actually compact flash cards back in those days.. Rat, that is exactly what the site linked above does... you keep using Mapsource, but you ditch all the Garmin map data, you use that OpenMaps data instead. It looks routable and everything. I haven't tried pushing it to the quest yet, but I got it as far as pulling it into mapsource, and it looks great so far. So it's not even really hacking the quest, just using an alternate open source map set, which is fantastic if it works. |
Reepicheep
| Posted on Thursday, October 31, 2013 - 09:46 am: |
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Thank you Frank! I had no idea the open maps data made it to the point where it would work with an old quest, but it appears it very well might. I have a map and route now loaded to a Quest 1 from that OSM data, with no illegal hacks or cracks. I'll try it on the way home and see if it gets wonky. I used Mapsource and it worked perfectly. I tried basecamp, and it's a bit wonky, but I cant figure out if thats basecamp wonky or OSM wonky. Basecamp changed how you modify routes, and its whacked, so I may just have to learn how to use it. Anyway, I'll start a new thread for this, but it is looking encouraging. DRM free updated map information for old Quests. Meaning that if you don't want a full navigation system, but you do want a weatherproof unit you can use to "help follow a complicated pre-planned route", there may be a $50 option now if you are willing to go the duck tape and bailing wire route (a used Quest). I'll start a new thread with more detail after I get a bit more figured out. |
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