Handheld GPS Reviews

Price:$192.05

Magellan eXplorist GC Waterproof Geocaching GPS Product Reviews

A well-priced, well-made geocaching device for neophytes and those on a budget, April 23, 2010

What is Geocaching? It’s an outdoor activity akin to treasure hunting, in which participants use a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver to hide and seek containers (called “geocaches” or “caches”) anywhere in the world.

Sound interesting? Then you might want to give the Magellan eXplorist GC Handheld Geocaching GPS Navigator a whirl. It’s an entry-level GPS geocaching device that is perfectly suited for neophytes, yet has enough capabilities to suit the basic needs of geocaching veterans.

The good:

No-frills geocaching device is perfect for newbies as it covers all the basics expected from a geocaching device; It has a nice, colorful screen; its interface is intuitive and easy to use, with very precise tracking and a nice compass feature; is small (but not too much so), ruggedly-built, waterproof and feels very comfortable in the hands; battery life is stated by Magellan to be a very good 15 hours, but my experience with the eXplorist GC using standard Duracell batteries has averaged battery life at around 17-18 hours; has a “suspend mode” that preserves battery life; it comes preloaded with 1,000 of the most popular worldwide geocache locations; it includes a highly detailed worldwide basemap; it can accommodate up to 500 waypoints and 5,000 point tracklogs; USB interface is non-proprietary; various plug-ins and firmware updates (as well as the device’s user manual) is (or will be) available through Magellan’s website, promising increased device functionality and software improvements; optional 30-day trial for premium geocaching membership services, which allow for great features such as paperless caching, pocket queries and bookmarks (after the 30 day trial, there is a $30 annual fee or a $10 three-month fee for the optional membership service); price is right for a GPS geocaching device of this caliber.

The bad:

No other GPS capabilities besides geocaching included in package; no option to add external memory; text is fairly small, potentially making reading a chore for those with strained eyesight; software response is somewhat sluggish; very basic features means this is a no-frills geocaching device which, while perfect for newbies, may not be satisfactory for more experienced (or wealthier) geocachers who are looking for more “bells and whistles” in their geocaching device; as mentioned earlier, in order to get the maximum benefit of this device, you will have to fork over either a $30 annual fee or a $10 three-month fee for premium geocaching membership services (IMO, totally worth the extra cost for the premium features).

All in all, considering its terrific price point and what you get right out of the box, the Magellan eXplorist GC Handheld is strongly recommended for newbies or those on a tight budget.

Magellan ExploristGC, July 23, 2010

A decent GPS for geocaching. It comes with street maps for the entire United States and Canada and base maps (major highways) for the rest of the world. In the US and Canada you can navigate (it does NOT auto-navigate) yourself to a geocache by watching the mapping screen and choosing a route.

Included is a 30 day premium membership to Geocaching.com. In order to fully utilize the features of this unit you MUST be a premium member. Paperless caching, pocket queries and bookmarks, uploading field notes all require maintaining a premium membership ($30 per year).

I have been geocaching more than 7 years and have experience with Magellan, Garmin and DeLorme GPS units. I attended a C.I.T.O. event in San Francisco earlier this year and won an ExploristGC in a drawing at that event. My thanks to Magellan.

The unit comes with an (abbreviated) User Handbook packaged in the box. For the complete User Handbook you will need to access MagellanGPS.com and either read it online or download the Adobe acrobat file to your computer. It is one of the better user handbooks that I have seen for GPS units. Learning to use the unit (for me) was relatively easy and quick.

Cons:

Small text. Hard to read while bouncing in a car.
Transflective screen. Hard to see even in bright sunlight. I needed to use the backlight most of the time.
Battery life. About 10 hours for rechargeables (because I needed to use the backlight most of the time.)
Position Update. Most of the time pretty good. Occasionally VERY slow (up to 2 minutes).
Switching between screens. The Map screen and the Dashboard screen are used extensively for geocaching. It is not possible to rapidly switch between these two screens.
Awards. The unit is preprogrammed to “award” you for 10 miles traveled, your 1st, 10th, etc. cache found. No way to turn this off.

Pros: (with Geocaching premium membership)

Making field notes and uploading those notes to Geocaching.com
Paperless caching (including viewing any photographs and graphics from the cache pages.)
Memory capacity. The unit will hold the information for thousands of caches.

I would give the ExploristGC another star if the position update was faster and more reliable. It is VERY irritating to be 10 or 15 feet away from a cache and not know which way to go. On numerous occasions I have walked past a cache by 30 to 40 feet before the unit updates my distance from the cache and the arrow swings on the compass to point toward the cache. (I see this problem listed on some other reviews but not all, so this problem could be limited to some but not all units.)

Upgraded to the Magellan eXplorist GC, June 30, 2010

I upgraded from a very basic GPS to the eXplorist GC because I only use my GPS for geocaching. After looking at the reviews of other products I chose this one because it kept billing itself as the GPS solely for geocaching and it was paperless. I really enjoy the whole paperless feature. I have found a dozen or so caches in different terrain. Here is what I’ve noticed so far.

PRO:
I love the fact the hints, descriptions, and a couple logs are all in the unit. (I guess that would be true with any paperless geocaching unit.
I love that I didn’t have to pay for a unit that provides the sunrise/sunset times, tides, or detailed topographical information.
I love having the roads and rivers/lakes show up on the display.
I like the USB connection.

CON:
The unit takes a bit to get a signal.
It doesn’t come with a real manual. You have to go online to get the PDF file.
There is a little bit of a learning curve, especially when it doing multi-caches and puzzles.
I haven’t been able to upload my field notes.

All that being said I am glad I bought this unit. I’m still getting used to the unit, but I love the paperless aspect. I’m able to find plenty of help online, so the lack of an actual manual hasn’t really been a problem.

Good basic GPSr for geocaching, June 5, 2010

The Magellan eXplorist GC is a good basic GPSr that is specialized for geocaching vs. general navigation, although general navigation is possible with the unit. It works very well for geocaching, storing extensive cache information (descriptions, logs, etc) for easy access in the field (i.e. paperless geocaching). Positional accuracy is equivalent to the more expensive Garmin Oregon 300 that we also own. The eXplorist GC is easy to use, making it ideal for beginners or those who are not technologically sophisticated. The unit is small and light, making it easy to carry, and appears well built (e.g. water tight seals, etc). The screen is bright and easy to read.

My only criticism is that entering logs/field notes requires using a Thinkpad-like joystick and moving from letter to letter on a letter board displayed on the screen (a tedious entry method), but this is the same on the Garmin Colorado (the Oregon uses a touch screen, which is much easier to use, though you still won’t be writing War and Peace in the field!).

Magellan was practically out of the game for geocaching, having released some very clunky units in the last couple of years, but the eXplorist GC is a great little unit that should make Magellan competitive again. I’d recommend the eXporist GC as a relatively inexpensive GPSr that is designed specifically for geocaching!

Great GPS for caching., August 23, 2010

I just started geocaching recently with my kids. I looked at various reviews and was thinking of getting the GP-40 based on various information, but decided against that. I wanted a GPS that was purely for caching. I tried the jr Explorer, but the device was really lacking (did work however). I ordered the Magellen, loaded the batteries, powered it on and was ready to go. No need to plug it in to the PC or anything. Activated my trial membership and was able to send caches directly to the GPS without any issues. I have used it for about a week in different terrain. It is very accurate, has a lot of useful information about the cache, and feels very durable. As for logging your notes on this device, no way. I just use a notebook and log them when I return (as well as upload photos).

I didn’t have any problems with the software, was able to update the firmware with ease, and really have nothing to complain about. Going from cache to cache is simple on this device and I recommend it to anyone interested in caching.

A bit quirky, June 21, 2010

I wish I had the same great experience that the other reviewers seemed to have. Now, before I start, let me disclose that I am new to Geocaching, so keep that in mind. Perhaps that would explain some of my difficulties.

The good points:
The unit is small and very portable.
I found the display easy to read and the graphics were adequate. (hint: it helped quite a bit to look at the satellite images on [...] before heading out for more detailed information.)
In areas without trees to interfere with location, the accuracy of the GPS unit was great.

The not so good points:
The GPS eats batteries. It takes 2 AAs and I’d guess that I have got about 2 1/2 – 3 hours of power from each set I have put in.
When in a park with heavy tree cover, the accuracy of position isn’t good or consistent. You could stand in one spot and get a reading of 25 feet away from the cache. Then if you move about 2 feet toward the cache indicated on the screen, you might get a reading of 43 feet away. Take a couple of steps further and you may get a reading of 29 feet away. I’ve tried several treed locations and had zero success. Disappointing since my hope was this would be a great motivator for more nature walks.
The software…very frustrating. Now, I’m not technologically challenged, but this has been frustrating. I have tried creating a list of searches from [...] and then checking the boxes next to the caches which I want to download. Then I should simply be able to click on the Download icon and have the info transferred to the GPS unit. Doesn’t work. I tried creating a pocket query and downloading that way. Again, I had problems. My workaround has been that I can go to each individual cache that I want and download them one at a time. It works, but what a pain.
Slow to update position – The unit doesn’t display real time data consistently. I have 2 regular GPS units (Garmin Nuvi and an older Garmin). I have never experienced a lag with them (no matter how fast I may drive). The Explorist GC has displayed the same screen on multiple occasions despite the fact that I’ve moved 50 – 100 feet. I’ll wait for a couple of minutes and it still will not update. Sometimes turning the unit off and on will cause it to recalibrate, sometimes not.
My last complaint is the Heading function. I prefer the Heading Up display. However, even though I had set it to that function, it still seemed to show North up.

To sum it up, sometimes it works, sometimes not. Is it a faulty unit? It it because I’m new to geocaching? I’m not sure which. When it works (parking lot P&Gs are a breeze), it’s great. When it doesn’t (parks – boo!) it’s frustrating.

Megellan Explorist GC, June 13, 2010

We are very happy with our new GPS. Especially going paperless. We used to print all the logs for each cache just to make sure that when we searched for the container, we’d have additional hints in the logs. If we do print anything – it might be maps.

One suggestion: I had no use for the thousands of cache that had been downloaded on to the GPS. It was just confusing the issue for me.

The main reason we purchased this GPS is because we were heading to Kauai Hawaii and we didn’t want to have to print info on cache. However, when the GPS arrived, there were no cache downloaded for this are we were going to be visiting.

I went ahead and deleted ALL of the cache that were in the GPS and downloaded my own.

It’s worked for us.

It would be cool, though, if it had included a setting for the GPS to download caches that would be useful to us. For instance, I’m from Las Cruces, NM… say I was going to ABQ, NM… I could request for the GPS to download any cache coordinates along the route within a 5 mile radius from the main interstate, etc. I have been told that there is a GPS especially with this feature, so at a later date when one of the 3 GPSs that we have croaks over, we’ll replace it with the one that offers this feature.

Long story short… we are very happy campers.

Decent choice for beginners., June 9, 2010

The Good:

* Easy To Read
* Lightweight
* Rugged shell that should defend from precipitation
* Decent Battery Life with battery-save option(auto sleep)

The Bad:

* Cannot be doubled as a regular GPS device

The Bottom Line:

This is a beginner’s review. I had no idea what geocaching was until I received this device. In a nutshell, for those that never heard of geocashing: As surprising as it seems, there are hidden treasures hidden everywhere(geocaches) that were hidden by fellow treasure hunters and with this GPS you can locate them. This seems like a pricey device, so I wouldn’t consider this a toy, but this could be a family adventure type of thing. This works just like any other GPS, but it will only work for geocaching. It would be nice if they would to include a regular GPS in this device, but that wasn’t the case. Don’t expect this device tell you how to get from your house to Walmart, as it will only work for locating geocashes. Other than that it has a good, easy-to-read screen, fits into your and very lightweight, so it won’t slow you down out there.

A great geocaching navigator, May 14, 2010

The speed of satellite lock and the accuracy of the device is very fast and it works nicely. If there was any problem I encountered it has to do with the selection button which seems a bit too small and moves from selection to selection too fast. That said, I have to acknowledge that I do have very big hands. My wife didn’t find this to be a problem so I assume that anyone with “normal” sized hands would also find it to be acceptable. The screen has great color resolution and it functions very well. I am using it to replace an older Garmin device and between the two there is no comparison…. faster, lighter weight, more accurate and really made for geocaching. Based upon all these factors and the cost, I don’t think anyone would be disappointed in the Magellan eXplorist.

Happy so far, July 22, 2010

Mostly happy with the unit, it is fairly easy to understand for a couple of newbies to Geocaching (myself and the 11 year old). My biggest complaint is the loss of accurate signal when slowing down. Like the ease which I can download pocket queries.