Need datalogger help

Hello all ,
A good friend, who is going on 89 and still soaring with the eagles,
needs some help on a GPS he is thinking of buying. He flies locally
only in S. Fla. and his datalogger has seen its last day and he want
to replace it with
1. BendixKing AV80R found at MarvGolden.com or,
2. Garmin eTrex Vista HCx Color as listed on a Amazon (the one in
soaring mag.).
He wants to be able to insert either manually or with a PC airports
not shown on Sectionals and be able to download his flights to look at
on a PC. He does not like the PDA idea and of course has set a
budget.
Look at these and reply if it can be done , plus how. He likes the
screen style of these and other GPSs. I myself am on the first rung of
the ladder of computer knowledge standing next to him, so keep it
easy.
Thanks,
R

On Sun, 15 Feb 2009 16:30:06 -0800, hretting wrote:

1. BendixKing AV80R found at MarvGolden.com or, 2. Garmin eTrex Vista
HCx Color as listed on a Amazon (the one in soaring mag.).

I know nothing about the Bendix, so I'll leave that for others to comment
about.

However, wrt Garmins, I'd strongly suggest he goes and plays with an
eTrex before he buys one. My reason for saying this is the placement of
its buttons and the way they're used. They are round the edge of the
thing and it has relatively few of them, so it tends to need multiple
keystrokes to do anything.

He should try before he buys and do that one-handed with the eTrex on a
table or (better) held by somebody at the sort of attitude and distance
from him that it will be in the cockpit on its mount. He may well find
that it is harder to use that way than a model that, like the old GPS II+
and III+, have buttons on the front and that generally only need a single
button push to complete an operation.

IOW, of the current models he may find that a GPS 72, GPS 76 or any of
the GPSMAP series will suit him better than an eTrex or the other models
with buttons on the edges.

I assume that he'll want it mounted on the panel and/or on some sort of
flexible support. If so, a further consideration must be the availability
and cost of a suitable mounting. Those bits of plastic are surprisingly
expensive for what they are.

He might also consider using something like an HP 31x GPS-equipped PDA or
a Binatone X350 satnav and run XCSoar on it. I have an X350 with XCSoar
installed. Initial impressions are good but I haven't yet flown with it.


--
martin@ | Martin Gregorie
gregorie. | Essex, UK
org |

On Feb 15, 6:30*pm, hretting wrote:
Hello all ,
A good friend, who is going on 89 and still soaring with the eagles,
needs some help on a GPS he is thinking of buying. He flies locally
only in S. Fla. and his datalogger has seen its last day and he want
to replace it with
1. BendixKing AV80R found at MarvGolden.com or,
2. Garmin eTrex Vista HCx Color as listed on a Amazon (the one in
soaring mag.).
He wants to be able to insert either manually or with a PC airports
not shown on Sectionals and be able to download his flights to look at
on a PC. He does not like the PDA idea and of course has set a
budget.
Look at these and reply if it can be done , plus how. He likes the
screen style of these and other GPSs. I myself am on the first rung of
the ladder of computer knowledge standing next to him, so keep it
easy.
Thanks,
R

I would also like to add that I had some problems with my Garmin Etrex
Vista HC but it isn't really Garmin's fault. Specifically, the
interface for downloading and loading is done via USB port and I
needed a serial cable interface since I do use a PDA. Also, I found
the Garmin difficult to use at times. Again, I am sure that if I kept
at it, I would learn to operate it much better.

One other thing, mine goes through batteries fast!!

Robert

Hretting,

You say "datalogger" and list some devices. Unfortunately, none of
those devices qualifies as a datalogger in the true "soaring" sense of
the word.

That is, none of the devices that you mention can be used for soaring
badges or contests. I am unsure about OLC. Plus, as standalone GPS
devices they aren't optimized for soaring (tasks, turnpoints,
thermaling, etc). To get all that, you need a FAI secure flight
recorder and a PDA for moving map.

One option is a PDA with soaring software and a GPS card.
http://cumulus-soaring.com has some examples. The soaring software
will log your flights in a way that I believe will work with OLC (but
not badges and most contests).

Anyway, I'd love to see a one piece, standalone, Garmin/Etrex like
handheld device that has a moving map, with soaring optimized software
and FAI certified (really wishful as it needs an altitude tran
$ducer). I think that some handheld GPS manufacturer should see the
light and make their platform "open" (like cell phones are moving
towards, iphone, Windows Mobile, Google phone) so that developers can
come up with way-cool applications for nitch markets....like us!

On Feb 15, 7:30*pm, hretting wrote:
Hello all ,
A good friend, who is going on 89 and still soaring with the eagles,
needs some help on a GPS he is thinking of buying. He flies locally
only in S. Fla. and his datalogger has seen its last day and he want
to replace it with
1. BendixKing AV80R found at MarvGolden.com or,
2. Garmin eTrex Vista HCx Color as listed on a Amazon (the one in
soaring mag.).
He wants to be able to insert either manually or with a PC airports
not shown on Sectionals and be able to download his flights to look at
on a PC. He does not like the PDA idea and of course has set a
budget.
Look at these and reply if it can be done , plus how. He likes the
screen style of these and other GPSs. I myself am on the first rung of
the ladder of computer knowledge standing next to him, so keep it
easy.
Thanks,
R

Hi Henry,

If you lean him more toward the Garmin GPSMAP series (say the 76),
here's a scorecard against your requirements:

- Insert airports (whether shown on sectionals or not). Yes.
Using G72Win or SeeYou, he can take a file that you might use for your
"official" IGC approved logger and load it. We have a number of guys
in our club who are 100% computer illiterate, but they can always find
someone to help them with a one-time load of the airport database.
- Download flights. Yes. The GPSMap has plenty of trackpoints
(10,000 if I recall) for logging even a relatively long flight of 6 or
7 hours.
- User Interface. The GPSMAP lets you set up certain screens with
the information you want (such as distance, bearing, current speed) on
a couple of screens. Again, if your buddy wants a low fuss-factor,
there's usually someone around who can help with the one-time setup.
- Budget. Yes. Figure less than $150 street price nowadays.

I've logged everything from "casual" flights in my sydicate's G103 to
a 750K triangle in my LS8 using the Garmin without ever having a
failure. Meanwhile, my Cambridge and EW Microrecorder have missed
some of my best flights due to one silly reason or another.

Reach out directly if you want some more thoughts on the Garmins.

P3

Responding to ID67, my friend only flys local and OLC is not too
important. I am steering him in that direction because I think he
would enjoy it a great deal (I need more than just myself in the
"Gliding Alligators"). If you would read the opening again, he is not
a fan of PDAs. He just wants to be able to look at his flights and
have navigation info. Also, all these Garmins and the like are
"dataloggers" dropping bread crumbs along the way, and he could care
less about "security" or "approved" as he already has his Diamond
Badge. Question is, can he access the flight log and put it to use.

P3,
your info is great and we are looking in that direction. ?? Does the
GPSMap series provide altitude info. in the download. I may email you
with questions and help.
Thanks to all,
R

On Feb 17, 8:06*pm, hretting wrote:
Responding to ID67, my friend only flys local and OLC is not too
important. I am steering him in that direction because I think he
would enjoy it a great deal (I need more than just myself in the
"Gliding Alligators"). If you would read the opening again, he is not
a fan of PDAs. He just wants to be able to look at his flights and
have navigation info. Also, all these Garmins and the like are
"dataloggers" dropping bread crumbs along the way, and he could care
less about "security" or "approved" as he already has his Diamond
Badge. Question is, can he access the flight log and put it to use.

P3,
your info is great and we are looking in that direction. ?? Does the
GPSMap series provide altitude info. in the download. I may email you
with questions and help.
Thanks to all,
R

Short answer is yes - the download includes GPS altitude. If you
look at a log file downloaded from the Garmin using either SeeYou or
G72Win and play it back (say using SeeYou), it will look more or less
identical to a logfile you downloaded using your Cambridge 302, for
example. Certainly for someone who just wants to look at how long he
was up, how far he went, average rates of climb, etc. these logfiles
are more than good enough.

P3

EXCELLENT! I found a sample of the 76SCx and was amaze. I'll email you
for help and set-up. I believe this is the one.
R