Handheld GPS (Lowrance and pocket flymap)

[ock1f]

Hi All,
First if this has already been covered my apologies. Here is my choice.
Im heading to the US shortly and intend picking up a handheld GPS.
My choice is the lowrance 600c or the pocket flymap(i know its only available to purchase in europe)
I have the user manual for the lowrance and it appears to be a handy piece of kit but is it designed and optimsed for the USA eg,the airspace maps for uk and eire might not be as good? the pocket flymap appears to be excellent but is very expensive compared to the 600c. Is the flymap worth the extra just to confirm where you are on the paper map?

And if any one actually owns one or both of these your views on how user friendly they are and any other quibbles (eg screen hard to read, unstable gps signal reception,poor/good battery time or anything at all fire ahead)

If Genghis the engineer reads this - hows the flymap working out?
And finally the unit purchased will be used for only vfr flying in a number of different aircraft so portability is a big issue and so is mounting / securing the unit in each plane.If anyone feels that im ignoring a particular product feel free to recommend but please state why. Thanks in advance

[LDG_GEAR _MONITOR]

if you have a pda have you tried pocket fms ? i have that - it also means i can run tomtom on the pda, it has wifi built in for emails does word etc has my log book on it - all in one box. you can even use the wifi to download the latest weather straight into pocketfms - taf's at your finger tip - wind vectors overlaid etc - clever piece of kit - worth a look

[dublinpilot]

Another vote for www.pocketFMS.com (http://www.pocketfms.com)


Bear in mind that the charts that you will be looking at in FlyMap are not the ones you'll be using in Ireland (unless you use the Jeppesen charts).

If you like to fly track up, rather than north up, then all the text will be upside down in FlyMap. PFMS rotates all the text and frequencies so that they are always displayed the right way up, even when flying track up.

I haven't seen flymap working, but I've heard that the charts are only clear on one or two different zoom levels. One you zoom out a little, they get blurred due to the limitations of trying to squish a image. Again, no such issues with PFMS.

Are you intending in using your gps in the US? If you intend to use it outside Europe, you'll need something with wider geographical coverage than FlyMap. PocketFMS has worldwide coverage, at no extra cost ;)

dp

[High Wing Drifter]

I'm finding PocketFMS to be a bit too flakey on my Mio P350, it seems to crash since the latest update, especially when doing a a direct-to. Could we be more to do with the PDA rather than the software. Still diagnosing.

[ock1f]

Thanks for the replies all very interesting. As for the pocket fms i had looked at it and read thru their website and forums and people generally cant say enough good about it but...and here is the but ....im terribly inept at anything technological so i prefer something that comes ready to go that requires a minimum of fiddling to get it to do what i want it to do.
The pfms is a bit too tech for me and it involves adapting a piece of hardware(pda) to run the fms software where as the pocket flymap and lowrance or any of the others you pay your money at it all comes ready to go.
Guess my deliberations will continue for the time being but the views , opinions , thoughts coming.

[jabberwok]

Slight divergence on the subject but has anyone tried PocketFMS or Memory Map on a slate PC or UMPC yet? The PDA is fine but a tad small for viewing and a laptop/tablet PC is a bit unwieldy.

[Basil Smallpiece]

I've used Memory Map with an IPAQ pocket pc for 3 years and can thoroughly recommend it.

Last year I bought a Samsung QI tablet pc running Windows XP, I run Memory Map and/or whatever local topographical charts are available. Some people talk about hard discs failing but I regularly go up to 14'000ft and never had a problem. With the optional power pack it runs at full brightness for over 6 hours. It's fixed to the panel with quick-lock tape.

http://i38.photobucket.com/albums/e143/scalesoarer/IMGP2080.jpg

http://i38.photobucket.com/albums/e143/scalesoarer/DSC04252.jpg

I now have 'SeeYou Mobile' on the IPAQ, it gives me voice airspace and danger area advance warnings, altitude (hypoxia) reminders, all the navigation info you need, distance, eta etc., terrain collision prediction plus aerial cable and Flarm aircraft collision warnings.

I have 3 independent gps nav systems, you'll probably find it overkill but I used to fly Airbus. It relieves me from the chore of preparing, using and interpreting paper maps, so I'm always looking out with only short glances down at the screens; I think I can honestly say that I usually see others before they see me.

[jabberwok]

Excellent Basil - that's ideal for what I want.

I've used Memory Map with an IPAQ pocket pc for 3 years and can thoroughly recommend it.

I would second that - it's a brilliant combination.