A "car gps" for the bike?

[Sandrenseren]

Hey..

My cousin recently bought a Garmin Edge 705 and got me thinking about getting a gps for the bike too. However he's already on his third 705 as he has had all sorts of problems and bugs with the first two. Googling and reading your forum tells a similar story about instability and bugs with different gps units. Oddly enough Garmin's car products are known to be rock solid and reliable, so why can't we have the same in a bike gps?

I already have a bike computer that logs heart rate and all sorts of stuff, so I don't really need any of that in a gps unit.

I basically only need two things:

1) To be able to input an address and get directions on how to get there via bike routes.
2) Reliability.

I kinda want a "car gps" with road and topo maps that will survive being strapped to the handlebar of my mountainbike. I don't need the ability to upload training routes to the internet, preplan routes before I leave home and all that. I just want what any simple car gps can do, allow me to input an address and tell me how to get there.

I could juts buy a cheap car gps and strap it to my bike, but I doubt it'll survive rain, mud and being shaken around. A car gps with a headphone jack so I could throw it in my backpack and use a cheap earpiece for "left in 50 meters" would work for me too.

Which gps for your bike would you get if pure turn by turn navigation and reliability was the key?

[Kim]

The motorbike-oriented TomTom might be worth considering... Power's going to be the limiting factor.

[Cunobelin]

The Garmin Edge 800 does all of that and also has an "Automotive mode" that is virtually the same as a car one, but within the voice.

[plum]

If you just want to chuck it in a backpack and use the audio navigation then almost any mobile phone will do. I  navigated for ages like that with a pre-GPS phone with TomTom mobile installed and connected to a a GPS dongle. When I bought a Legend hcx I sold the dongle on here. I only traded up to get the preplanning done easier. A more recent phone with GPS on board is even easier. Long distances need a battery pack is the issue with on board GPS, old phones and dongles will run for hours though.

I've never had any reliability issues using my legend for route planning.

[Cunobelin]

I have a Garmin Montana that does the job, but is a little bulky.

Got a good deal from Cotswold Outdoor

[tiermat]

You can do this type of navigation with the 705.

When I went to Spain earlier this year I had a number of preset routes entered in my 705, but circumstances meant I needed to change plans, and routing to a new town was easy.

However it is a lot more basic, so don't expect door-to-door navigation, but it is good enough to get you from a to b.

[Cunobelin]

Beware that the routing of these is always by algorithm and not common sense.

Don't do what many people do and rely on the routing.

If you set say "Avoid main roads" then you will get a 3 mile detour when the main road had a perfectly acceptable cycle route.

Also it tends to be shortest ar fastest not neccessarily "most sensible" or "most convenient

[Biggsy]

I've had no failures with my Garmin Edge 605 (like the 705 but with fewer bells and whistles), and I get the impression that most users of the 605/705 do not get serious problems with them.  The usual complaint is about the built-in battery that doesn't last long enough for the mega-rides that the more hardcore members of the forum do, but it's no problem for more ordinary cycling.

[frankly frankie]

Some of the Garmin Nuvi range used to be ruggedised and waterproof - model 500 and 550 - don't know if any current models are.  If you really want a car satnav for the bike.  Power would be the issue, as mentioned elsewhere.

Personally I go the other way and use my Etrex in the car ...

[Sandrenseren]

I ended up buying a HTC Explorer smartphone and a waterproof Klickfix Iphone holder, works like a charm. I was out looking at cheap car gps units, none of which had headphone outputs, and it turned out I could get the phone cheaper than a decent car gps so I pulled the trigger and bought it.

Now I can get turn-by-turn navigation with voice commands in my ear plus all sorts of other clever stuff if I feel like it.

[Ham]

 Oddly enough Garmin's car products are known to be rock solid and reliable, so why can't we have the same in a bike gps?

Urmmm... have you TRIED using a gramin car GPS rattling about on a bike? Wet in the rain? I haven't but I'd not put any money on it.

The GPS unit I use is the Oregon, as I use it handheld as well. Works great with openstreetmap, very rugged, AA batteries. Doesn't sound a perfect match for what you want, but you might want to consider.

[Sandrenseren]

 Oddly enough Garmin's car products are known to be rock solid and reliable, so why can't we have the same in a bike gps?

Urmmm... have you TRIED using a gramin car GPS rattling about on a bike? Wet in the rain? I haven't but I'd not put any money on it.

No, as I stated: "I could juts buy a cheap car gps and strap it to my bike, but I doubt it'll survive rain, mud and being shaken around."

The rock solid reliability I referred to was the software. If you buy a Garmin car gps for your car it just works. I had a garmin device in a company car for some years and never, ever had any issues with it, I just punched in the address and got the directions I needed every single time.

If you google a bit on Garmins bike series, for example the Edge 705 you will hear about all sorts of issues, the device suddenly rebooting after 50 km, using 5 minutes to calculate a route, all sorts of bugs.

If Garmin can make a car gps that never fails, why can't they do the same with a bike gps?

The GPS unit I use is the Oregon, as I use it handheld as well. Works great with openstreetmap, very rugged, AA batteries. Doesn't sound a perfect match for what you want, but you might want to consider.

I've looked at the Oregon and Etrex series, but ended up with a smartphone so far. Currently I use it in a waterproof iphone holder strapped to my top tube, it might not survive the bumpy ride in the long run, time will tell. If it turns out to be a problem, I can always pop it in my backpack instead and just get the directions via an earpiece or maybe get one of those iphone carriers runners strap to their arm.

[Biggsy]

You'll find complaints about ANY product if you Google enough.  I've never had a serious problem with my 605, by the way.  I don't expect it to be as powerful as a car GPS because it's smaller.  And your smartphone battery won't last long if using it as a sat nav all the time, unless you have it connected to an external power supply.

[fuaran]

I think the Edge 605/705 were a "new generation", quite different to any previous Garmins. So they had a few bugs when they were released. It seems most of the problems have since been fixed with software updates.

The Colorado/Oregon/Dakota/new Etrex are also kind of new generation. But they all have much the same software, so any problems should be fixed across the whole range. The Colorado and Oregon have been available for a few years now, so hopefully most of the bugs have been fixed already.

And I think some of the problems are from people using them in convoluted ways. They have many more features than most car GPS devices, so more things that can go wrong.