El Cheapo GPS Receiver
 

On Sun, 11 Dec 2005 12:41:27 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:
DeLorme has a special out on its 2006 edition of Street Atlas, and
offers a $100 USB GPS antenna for use in the car, or, I assume, for use
in a boat with some sort of NAV software on a laptop.

Has anyone tried one of these receivers with NAV software?

=================================================

I've been using the old version of Delorme's USB GPS with Maptech
chatrting software for at least three or four years. It works fine.
The new version of their GPS is USB only however. The older one could
be ordered with a RS-232 serial port cable which is what my nav
software wants to see.

That is the only caveat that I would offer: Be sure your charting
package will accept data on a USB port, or buy a USB to serial
converter.

Telling Clues to Truth
 

Harry Krause wrote:

I'm thinking of it first for car use on trips to cities where I might
want to see a street map or restaurants, museums, etc. I like the big
screen of a laptop.

But I wouldn't mind playing with it on a boat, too. If memory serves,
Maptech offers a cheapo nav package, too. I'll check it out.

Thanks.

There are many prosodic system clues in Harry's prose. I quick study of
the first sentence in his second paragraph above shows he substituted an
"a" for his original first draft "the". And what does that tell us? No
lobsta!!!

--
Skipper

El Cheapo GPS Receiver
 

On Sun, 11 Dec 2005 13:24:43 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:

I'm thinking of it first for car use on trips to cities where I might
want to see a street map or restaurants, museums, etc. I like the big
screen of a laptop.

========================================

It works fine for that, better however when you've got a second person
in the car to do the navigating.

We use Streetmap mostly for trip planning, but it is also very good
for finding alternate local routes if the Interstates get backed up.
We have literally saved hours on at least a few occassions, once many
years ago when we were headed south on I95 at Christmas time and
things were horendously backed up near Alexandria, VA. We rarely
drive any distance at all without it since the Florida Interstates are
notorious for severe backups, and you get out in the boondocks pretty
quickly once off the beaten path.

Telling Clues to Truth
 

Skipper wrote:
Harry Krause wrote:


I'm thinking of it first for car use on trips to cities where I might
want to see a street map or restaurants, museums, etc. I like the big
screen of a laptop.


But I wouldn't mind playing with it on a boat, too. If memory serves,
Maptech offers a cheapo nav package, too. I'll check it out.


Thanks.


There are many prosodic system clues in Harry's prose. I quick study of
the first sentence in his second paragraph above shows he substituted an
"a" for his original first draft "the". And what does that tell us? No
lobsta!!!

--
Skipper

If he has more than one boat...would he say 'the' boat?

El Cheapo GPS Receiver
 

On Sun, 11 Dec 2005 18:22:14 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:

You've be pleased to know that the interstates around Alexandria
(Beltway, I-95, I-395) have been the recipients of billions of dollars
in spending to bring them up to handling the traffic of 20 years ago.

========================================

Last time I was through there we were pulling over 6,000 lbs of boat
and trailer. Everything went OK that trip.

Telling Clues to Truth
 

On Mon, 12 Dec 2005 00:17:36 GMT, Gene Kearns
wrote:

http://myworkshop.idleplay.net/ Homepage*
http://www.thebayguide.com/rec.boats Rec.boats at Lee Yeaton's Bayguide

============================================

Speaking of "The Bayguide", do you know if Lee Yeaton is still around?
I sent him some pictures of our new boat a while back and never heard
anything in return.

Telling Clues to Truth
 

On Sun, 11 Dec 2005 20:09:32 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:

Hey...he has a wheelchair and bad knees and a wife who suffers from
seasickness. Is that enough?

===========================

Don't they have a kind of boat known as a "RORO" (Roll On Roll Off)?

http://www.macgregor-group.com/defau... 4329153226143

or

http://tinyurl.com/e3u7n

Telling Clues to Truth
 

Wayne.B wrote:
On Sun, 11 Dec 2005 20:09:32 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:


Hey...he has a wheelchair and bad knees and a wife who suffers from
seasickness. Is that enough?


===========================

Don't they have a kind of boat known as a "RORO" (Roll On Roll Off)?

http://www.macgregor-group.com/defau... 4329153226143

or

http://tinyurl.com/e3u7n

RORO ships have been coming here for decades.
I even worked on one while in school unloading Volvos
http://www.portofhalifax.ca/AbsPage....iteid=1&lang=1

El Cheapo GPS Receiver
 

On Mon, 12 Dec 2005 06:21:51 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:

While hanging around the mall waiting for my wife yesterday afternoon, I
wandered into an electronics store and noticed a perfectly reasonable
laptop computer with what looked like a 15" screen selling for under
$700. Add $400 to that for nav software, and a USB GPS, and you have
something far more usable than the typical 10" chart nav display, which
probably sells for at least twice as much, or close to it. If you're
controlling your boat from inside a cabin, where the unit is protected
from the elements, it seems to me a far smarter purchase, since you can
do so much more with that laptop.

======================================

There are many good used/reconditioned laptops available in the $300
range which makes the argument even more compelling. These laptops
are typically Compaq or IBM Pentium 3s with decent screens, hard disks
and sometimes a DVD.

The argument for a dedicated marine chartplotter is screen brightness,
waterproofing and better zoomed in detail. The ideal is to have both.

El Cheapo GPS Receiver
 

Harry Krause wrote:
Wayne.B wrote:
On Sun, 11 Dec 2005 12:41:27 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:
DeLorme has a special out on its 2006 edition of Street Atlas, and
offers a $100 USB GPS antenna for use in the car, or, I assume, for use
in a boat with some sort of NAV software on a laptop.

Has anyone tried one of these receivers with NAV software?

=================================================

I've been using the old version of Delorme's USB GPS with Maptech
chatrting software for at least three or four years. It works fine.
The new version of their GPS is USB only however. The older one could
be ordered with a RS-232 serial port cable which is what my nav
software wants to see.

That is the only caveat that I would offer: Be sure your charting
package will accept data on a USB port, or buy a USB to serial
converter.


I'm thinking of it first for car use on trips to cities where I might
want to see a street map or restaurants, museums, etc. I like the big
screen of a laptop.

But I wouldn't mind playing with it on a boat, too. If memory serves,
Maptech offers a cheapo nav package, too. I'll check it out.

Thanks.

Harry, I've got the Delorme GPS and Street Atlas 2004 edition, and I
love taking the laptop on trips, it's very accurate and a lot of fun.
Never heard whether or not you can use it with nav software, though.