Roger Long wrote:
"Dennis Pogson" wrote

One tip Roger. When selecting charts to upload to the unit, you may
overlook
the fact that some larger area charts contain smaller area charts,
ie the same area is covered on 2 or more charts, but be aware that
the detail contained in the small area chart can be substantially
greater than that contained in the large area chart, so that zooming
in to a large area chart
does not give you the same amount of detail as using the smaller area
chart.


Are you saying that, if you have both charts loaded and active and
zoom in, the unit will give priority to the large scale chart and
suddenly present you with no detail as you sail into a bay or harbor?
This is a very important point because it could lead to loss of a
boat and life in a high stress situation. Having to suddenly go back
into set up and turn off the large scale chart just as I'm entering a
harbor would probably be enough to lead me to Ebay the whole thing.
I'll check this on mine but I'd appreciate your (or other Garmin
user) clarifiying as these kinds of operation are not always
consistent.

The road / chart conflict I know about. That's why I'm segregating
road and marine data on two separate data cards.

No, I am saying that if you load the large-scale chart, but miss out the
smaller-scale chart, you will have only the detail which is included on the
large-scale chart, so either load both, or just the small-scale charts. The
Garmin always seems to seek out the chart with the greatest detail when you
zoom in. These smaller charts do not always overlap anyhow, so you are best
to load the large-scale charts as well as the small-scale ones. If you find
yourself in an area not covered by a small-scale chart, you will know,
because as you zoom in, you lose detail.

Be careful when using the selection tool in Mapsource and examine the
highlighted chart borders carefully. As a check, list the charts you have
selected before uploading them to the Garmin, including any Tide and Marine
Services files since these are very useful when calculating HW and LW and
range without having to use your tide tables from the almanac. If you forget
to load these you have to do a complete reload of all the charts together
with the Tides and Marine Services files.

This is the way it works with my 60CS, your unit is obviously a CSx unit so
maybe using data cards does eliminate the problem of the Garmin deleting all
the charts in it's memory before loading new ones, i.e. you can't add charts
to the ones that are already there (in my 60CS that is), you have to upload
the whole of the old portfolio plus any new charts you may have forgotten.
Built-in memory probably behaves differently to SD card memory, so ignore if
all this is bull****!

I have found that having a pocketable chart display unit, which contains
good detailed charts, is a great asset, and saves having to leap up and down
the main hatch to check your laptop screen. I am getting too long in the
tooth for this game, and can do without the excercise! The BlueCharts are
superb in this area (West of Scotland) and I can usually manage without
resorting to paper stuff!

Dennis.