I just couldn't help myself...

A little geocaching GPS humour:

OpenCaching.com... Competition or Plan B?

There's been a lot of buzz surrounding OpenCaching.com, and rightly so. GPSr manufacturing juggernaut Garmin opening it's own geocaching website is huge. Garmin directly competing against GeoCaching.com seems almost like an attack on a site that has practically built geocaching (and sold a lot of Garmin products in the process).

And that's not going to go without controversy. Delorme and Magellan have both backed Geocaching.com Of course no one expected otherwise. But the question that needs to be answered: Why is Garmin doing this at all?

Market share is a part of it. But the real issue: Stability. Let's face it, car navigation systems are on the way out. Cell phones are quickly adapting to GPS and people don't want to buy a GPSr if they don't need it. So who is going to buy Garmin GPSrs? Geocachers, that's who.

Geocaching is unique in that there's really only one source, that being geocaching.com. Garmin knows that relying solely on geocaching.com is dangerous. Terracaching.com is closing and that took a lot of people by surprise. Anything could happen, Groundspeak could be breaking some tax law you and I have never heard of and be shut down. It could be hacked or have a DOS attack, who knows? This is the Internet and things happen. So what would Garmin do then? What would YOU do then?

If this were really about promoting Garmin products, why are other GPSrs allowed? In fact I don't see any mention of Garmin GPSr products on the site, even the "GPS Devices". People can go on all day about competition and how it advances things. But really the win here is that not only Garmin, but the Geocaching community as a whole has a back-up to geocaching.com. Opencaching.com might just keep our community alive and, at least for now, sleep a little better at night.

GPSr Review: Magellan Triton 500

The Triton 500 is a fine piece of hardware. It's very accurate and easy to use. It has tons of features for geocaching, trails, and way points. In fact the only big problem with the 500 is its supporting software, Vantagepoint.

When I first installed Vantagepoint several days before I got my 500, I was excited. It looked similar to Google Earth and felt like iTunes. Then I started adding in the geocaches and it worked beautifully! Using the file system I quickly had them sorted out into cities and then regions within cities and then specific trails and dense areas.

"THIS IS GREAT!" I thought, just being able to select a file and throw it on your GPSr and have all the geocaches in town? Brilliant. And with them saved on your computer you'd be able to add them to your GPSr offline! So where could we go wrong?

Then the Triton came in. I went in to upload the caches in my area and was greeted with a list of the 500 caches I had in Vantagepoint. What? You can't just select a folder to add? WHY BOTHER WITH THE FOLDERS AT ALL THEN!? WHAT A TEASE!

Now let's get to the other problems. The base map that the Triton comes with should be something standard right? Wrong. The base map for the Triton 500 is HORRIBLE! You'd think it would be something akin to a Google map, with roads and such. But no, it only shows highways and those are mostly off too. I get that Magellan wants to make money by selling maps, but holy crap, its $200+ GPSr with a blank screen. And your asking me to shell out $100+ just so I can use it?

Luckily you have the option to find maps online and it's lucky that there's a decent community behind the Triton. So I added a whole bunch of Ontario maps which work out pretty well. Unfortunately to do this you have to go through VantagePoint, which brings us to our next problem: Freezing. Vantagepoint freezes, a lot. Trying to add maps? Freeze. Trying to add geocaches? Freeze. Then there's blue screens. Yes plugging in the Triton 500 to my computer cause Blue Screens of Death too. If someone knows how to fix this please let me know. But really? It's inexcusable. The Triton also has issues where it shuts down too.

Now if this is sounding like a rant I apologize. Its not. I actually love my "Maggie", 99% of the time it's been right on target. The breadcrumbs system gives you a reference from which you can orientate yourself. The compass tools, Geocache descriptions and hints work well too. And although I've been told batteries don't hold up well, in my field use, the batteries have stood for me a good 20 hours. Which is usually two good long geocaching days at least.

In conclusion, the Triton 500 is a great GPSr hobbled by its supporting software. Think of VantagePoint as the Annie Wilkes and Paul Sheldon as the Triton. Am I going to throw this GPSr away or sell it? No, I like it too much. But the problems with VantagePoint will definitely make me look at a cell phone GPSr or Garmin next time.