Problems with GPS and CJS Caches

[+vaetanone]

This is really weird.

On Saturday, (10/08/11) I was caching with my daughter, greykitties. While we were in MD, we attempted to go to CJS - Chapel Point State Park, GC2F43F. Three times while attempting to look at this cache information, her GPS (Oregon 500T) locked up. She had to remove batteries in order to get it working again. After the third attempt, she stopped trying to use it for that cache. Others would come up and behave normally. I tried to use my Droid to see if that would work and the description (text part) showed up on the phone in red (almost impossible to read in sunlight.)

 

TODAY, (10/11/11) on Tuesday, my husband and I were down the Northern Neck of VA and we were looking at GC2F41Y CacheCJS - Historic Urbanna. Suddenly, the GPS locked up (We have a Garmin 62S).

The screen went blank, it could not be turned off so he had to remove the batteries and replace them. When he turned the GPS back on, he went to that cache again and the screen went blank and the description would not come up. After again removing batteries, we checked on other nearby caches and they all behaved normally. I then again tried my Droid and again, the DESCRIPTION part of the information showed up in red print while descriptions of other caches appear in white print. Being CJS caches (and me being present) it seems that this is the only common denominator.

 

Any observations, suggestions, or comments?

[GOF and Bacall]

How are you loading the caches on the GPS? It sounds like the files are corrupted.

[+SgtSue]

I had a similar problem with my Garmin Nuvi, screen would just lock up. Nothing short of taking out the batteries helped. Really not good for a car gps when traveling. Called Garmin tech service and they had me reload the software. That was about 2 years ago and I haven't had that problem with it since. Cache series might just be a coincidence.

[+vaetanone]

As I said, the first incident was my daughter's GPS. We have nothing in common with the electronics. She used her computer, her GPS, etc. We just happened to be together to cache. Today, our GPS had been loaded from a query on our computer. (We do not live together so as I said, no electronics were used which belonged to the other party.)

[Keystone]

I am moving this thread from the Geocaching Topics forum to the GPS and Technology forum.

[+SgtSue]

As I said, the first incident was my daughter's GPS. We have nothing in common with the electronics. She used her computer, her GPS, etc. We just happened to be together to cache. Today, our GPS had been loaded from a query on our computer. (We do not live together so as I said, no electronics were used which belonged to the other party.)

Similar problem with Garmin, mine was fixed by reloading the operating system. This could or could not be your and your daughter's problem. Mine happened once then again then more and more. Had nothing to do with info from cache, in fact it froze several times when not caching but using for normal navigation. My GPS was relatively new when this occurred. Call Garmin see what they say.

[+Colonial Cats]

This is really weird.

On Saturday, (10/08/11) I was caching with my daughter, greykitties. While we were in MD, we attempted to go to CJS - Chapel Point State Park, GC2F43F. Three times while attempting to look at this cache information, her GPS (Oregon 500T) locked up. She had to remove batteries in order to get it working again. After the third attempt, she stopped trying to use it for that cache. Others would come up and behave normally. I tried to use my Droid to see if that would work and the description (text part) showed up on the phone in red (almost impossible to read in sunlight.)

 

TODAY, (10/11/11) on Tuesday, my husband and I were down the Northern Neck of VA and we were looking at GC2F41Y CacheCJS - Historic Urbanna. Suddenly, the GPS locked up (We have a Garmin 62S).

The screen went blank, it could not be turned off so he had to remove the batteries and replace them. When he turned the GPS back on, he went to that cache again and the screen went blank and the description would not come up. After again removing batteries, we checked on other nearby caches and they all behaved normally. I then again tried my Droid and again, the DESCRIPTION part of the information showed up in red print while descriptions of other caches appear in white print. Being CJS caches (and me being present) it seems that this is the only common denominator.

 

Any observations, suggestions, or comments?

Our GPSr locked up a couple of times looking for CJS - Preservation Virginia. Our GPSr has never locked up before.

[Wintertime]

This is an off-the-wall idea, but I looked at some of the CJS cache pages, and they're all written in Comic Sans, a typeface that I wouldn't expect GPS receivers to have built in. And there's no alternate font specified for systems that don't have Comic Sans. (Normally on HTML pages, one would say something like <FONT FACE="Arial,Helvetica"> so that a system that doesn't have Arial can use Helvetica instead, or vice versa.)

 

I downloaded the GPX file for one of the CJS caches, and sure enough, Comic Sans was still specified; Groundspeak's software evidently does not convert cache pages into standard fonts when creating a GPX file for download.

 

Has anyone here spotted any other cache pages that are written in Comic Sans or some other unusual font? If so, it would be an interesting experiment to download one of those caches and see how it affects your GPS receivers.

 

Oh, also, someone mentioned seeing the description in red text. The specified font color in those caches is "maroon." I can easily see a GPSr converting that to red. (I'm seeing them as blue on my computer; I don't know what that's about!)

 

Patty

Edited October 12, 2011 by Wintertime

[+vaetanone]

It seems that perhaps Wintertime's response is the most likely answer. Unfortunately, how do we deal with the situation? It was interesting (and reassuring) that at least one other person has had the problem (so I know it is not my "magnetic" personality!!!

Thanks for all responses. I hope that there is a solution forthcoming from somewhere too.

[Wintertime]

It seems that perhaps Wintertime's response is the most likely answer. Unfortunately, how do we deal with the situation?

If my theory is correct (and I'm still curious to know whether anyone has found another cache that uses a nonstandard font to try it), then three solutions come to mind:

 

* Edit the .gpx files to remove the "font face" attributes. (Be sure to save the edited file as a plain-text file with a .gpx suffix!)

 

* Write to the cache owner and ask him/her to change the cache pages to a standard font, then re-download the .gpx file.

 

* Write to Groundspeak and ask them whether they can tweak their GPX-generation script to test for nonstandard fonts and if found, convert them to something common such as Arial.

 

Patty