The Garmin 496...a teenager's review

"Thomas Borchert" wrote in message
...
Jay,

"If Microsoft built the X-Box the way Garmin built the 496, they'd
have sold about five of them..."


They did, comparatively.

Have your son try Anywhere map.

--
Thomas Borchert (EDDH)

Thomas,

Presumably you've used both the Garmin and Anywheremap products. What is
your opinion of their relative merits?

KB

Jay Honeck wrote:
4. In order to click on the desired airport, you must "slew" the
cursor off the edge of the screen in order to find it. This means
hold the arrow button down, slew to the edge of the screen -- wait
three seconds while the screen disappears and reappears -- and
continue.

The REALLY bad thing is that the cursor doesn't stop moving when the
screen disappears, so that in those three seconds you can easily WAY
over-shoot your target airport. (I've even ended up in a different
state during the time it's blank.)

It takes much less time and effort if you first zoom out, requiring only
a small amount of cursor movement to get it near the airport you want,
then zoom back in to the exact point you want.

"If Microsoft built the X-Box the way Garmin built the 496, they'd
have sold about five of them..."

They did, comparatively.

That's funny -- every kid my son knows owns an X-box. If only Garmin
were so unlucky...
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Out of curiosity, I was looking at Lowrances marine product line yesterday.
Some of their units include XM weather as a feature. So, lowrance has the
institutional knowledge. The question is when will they come out with the
product.

That's incredible. They've already GOT weather, and can't figure out
how to get it into an aviation box?

I can't wait to hear their excuses at OSH *this* year!

;-)
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

It takes much less time and effort if you first zoom out, requiring only
a small amount of cursor movement to get it near the airport you want,
then zoom back in to the exact point you want.

This helps, to some degree, but does not eliminate the problem. Often
when you hit the arrow button (that moves the cursor) there will be an
annoying lag before anything happens. Then, when it reappears, your
cursor may (or may not) be anywhere near what you were aiming to hit.

There is also the problem with decluttering. When you zoom out,
Garmin (by necessity, due to the puny screen) declutters the screen.
This makes all the smaller airports (and most detail) disappear
entirely. It's hard to click on an airport if its not displayed.

Everything we're discussing is a compromise due to poor design. For
$3K, I don't deserve poor design -- but until Lowrance and AvMap get
their fingers out of their collective butts, we're stuck with it.

(And, BTW, NONE of my comments are a slam on XM weather. To have the
clouds, radar, METAR and TAF data overlaid on a moving map is worth
putting up with a lot of crap -- which is why we reluctantly purchased
the 496 at OSH last year.)
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Jay,

Being able to simply click on the airport to see ALL information is
the single coolest thing about the 496


Well, if it's so cool, why are you complaining about it? gd&r

--
Thomas Borchert (EDDH)

Kyle,

Presumably you've used both the Garmin and Anywheremap products. What is
your opinion of their relative merits?


I have more experience with the Garmin. The Anywheremap is "nicer" in that
it shows more cool stuff. Thus, I thought Jay Jr. might like it better. But
I don't care for the stylus interface in a plane much - and I've had Windows
Mobile crash just too often.

--
Thomas Borchert (EDDH)

Jay,

That's funny -- every kid my son knows owns an X-box.


No offense, but we've been through this before. As we have discussed
here at numerous occasions, there's a difference between "Jay's world"
and statistics.

The Xbox 360 has sold badly. Less have been sold than even MS expected.
Way less. The Xbox venture as a whole so far is a loss for MS - albeit
one they can afford. If it wasn't for Sony being so immensely dumb, the
Xbox would be close to non-existent. With current generation consoles,
the Wii is the success story.

Oh, and the Xbox 360s will have to have a factory defect repaired. All
of them.

--
Thomas Borchert (EDDH)

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
ups.com...
Out of curiosity, I was looking at Lowrances marine product line
yesterday.
Some of their units include XM weather as a feature. So, lowrance has
the
institutional knowledge. The question is when will they come out with
the
product.

That's incredible. They've already GOT weather, and can't figure out
how to get it into an aviation box?

I think I spoke too soon. Another review of Lowrances product line doesn't
show any XM products. It was Garmin's marine line that had XM.

Sorry for the tease!


I can't wait to hear their excuses at OSH *this* year!

;-)
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
oups.com...
It takes much less time and effort if you first zoom out, requiring only
a small amount of cursor movement to get it near the airport you want,
then zoom back in to the exact point you want.
[snip]

heres some snipets of an article from the NYTimes which your son might find
interesting

SOMETIMES there is a huge disconnect between the people who make a product
and the people who use it. The creator of a Web site may assume too much
knowledge on the part of users, leading to confusion. Software designers may
not anticipate user behavior that can unintentionally destroy an entire
database. Manufacturers can make equipment that inadvertently increases the
likelihood of repetitive stress injuries.

Enter the usability professional, whose work has recently developed into a
solid career track, driven mostly by advancements in technology.

The Usability Professionals' Association offers tutorials and holds an
annual meeting. The Society for Technical Communication also has a group on
usability and user experience.

General online job boards are a good resource for usability jobs. In
addition, the usability association lists job postings on its Web site, and
job placement firms like Bestica Inc. specialize in usability design jobs.

Harvinder Singh, president of Bestica, which is based in San Antonio, says
that there is a shortage of people to fill usability jobs.

"We're working with companies like Microsoft and Yahoo and having a lot of
trouble finding user-experienced people," he said.

More companies are dividing the various aspects of the job, he said. A
business might want a usability researcher to go out and talk with users and
examine what they're comfortable with. Then it might employ a usability
design expert to incorporate the researcher's findings into the way a
product works.

According to information compiled by the usability association in 2005,
annual pay in the field in the United States started at about $49,000 and
rose to about $120,000. The average salary was $86,500.

Usability position are receiving more visibility within companies, and
high-ranking positions like director of usability are being created, Mr.
Danas of Microsoft said. "From a career standpoint I think there's a lot of
opportunity, and that's getting broader every day," he said.