Waypoints: How Many Do You Have?

[+Milbank]

How many waypoints do you have loaded into your gps at one time?

 

Do you back-up your waypoints to a cd or some other type of media?

 

I have been using my gps at work the last couple weeks to mark waypoints of homes I go to in the rural areas.

 

I save my waypoints from the gps to a file on my desktop, but I have been thinking maybe I should also save them to a cd too.

 

Anyone know what hand held gps holds the most waypoints at one time?

 

My legend holds 1000.

Is there a hand held that holds more without having to load them from a memory card as you need them?

[+twilliams]

I find any more than 50-100 is a pain for most gps's to navigate through unless using nearest waypoints filters. I'd rather keep them on the computer in logical bundlings and just load the wpt and route sets I need for the week/weekend I expect.

 

However, on my Treo which has a touch screen and keyboard, using CacheMate I keep about 600 loaded a number which is only likely to go up.

 

-t-

[+Renegade Knight]

My GPS holds 500 and that's how many I have in it. My PDA can have between 500 - 2000 depending on how much traveling I'll be doing.

 

I use the GPX files as my method of storing them as those are easy to generate and are readable by the programs I use to cache with.

 

Since I'm never searching for a cache I'm not "nearest" to and I know the vicity from my maps, it's no biggie to have all the waypoints my GPS can hold. At worset I have to search for the first waypoint of the day on the GPS, then I'm near all the rest.

Edited November 6, 2004 by Renegade Knight

[+Prime Suspect]

I never save 'em. That's stale data. Why go searching for something that may not be there anymore. I load a fresh list from that day's GPX file before I go caching.

[+Milbank]

I never save 'em. That's stale data. Why go searching for something that may not be there anymore. I load a fresh list from that day's GPX file before I go caching.

 

There are other uses for gps other then geocaching.

 

The waypoints I'm saving are ones I use for work.

I find that often the waypoints I search for (peoples house) are still there.

 

I also load freash waypoints when I'm geocaching.

Edited November 6, 2004 by Milbank

[+Milbank]

This post is starting to be a example of why I think a Everything GPS section would be good for the forums.

 

Everytime something is asked in this part of the forums, the replies are often geocaching related.

Even if the question was not met to be only geocaching related....

Edited November 6, 2004 by Milbank

[+Alan2]

Since adding a Pocket PC to my repertoire, I keep all non-caching addresses on it (as well as GPX SOnar) and use Mapopolis for autonavigating to them. That leaves my GPS to have cache waypoints only.

[+lakedawgs]

My 60C holds 1000 also.

I have a waypoint file that has locations of family, friends, businesses I use etc. I load this file to the GPSr then load my waypoint file containing the caches for the area next.

Lakedawgs

[+Warriorrider]

I try to keep the waypoints to a minimum that are active on my GPS. But I probably have a couple thousand stored on my sd card in the GPS. I break them down into smaller organized files for all sorts of things/places/geocaches,etc, that I can just bring up when needed while on the fly.

[+geoSquid]

How many waypoints do you have loaded into your gps at one time?

 

Do you back-up your waypoints to a cd or some other type of media?

 

I have a special waypoint file that I call "baseline waypoints" that includes things like home, work, assorted friend's houses, places I take my telescope to stargaze, partially completed multi-caches, etc. That gets loaded first every time I load waypoints. It's about 25 waypoints.

 

Beyond that I rarely store others in my GPS. I just get a new GPX file before I go caching and load that in.

[+graldrich]

 

Anyone know what hand held gps holds the most waypoints at one time?

 

My legend holds 1000.

Is there a hand held that holds more without having to load them from a memory card as you need them?

With any Meridian series gps you are only limited by the size of the sd card!So you could store 1000's of waypoints!

[+Milbank]

 

Anyone know what hand held gps holds the most waypoints at one time?

 

My legend holds 1000.

Is there a hand held that holds more without having to load them from a memory card as you need them?

With any Meridian series gps you are only limited by the size of the sd card!So you could store 1000's of waypoints!

I use to have a Meridian gold.

From what I remember I was only able to load 500 waypoints into the gps.

 

If you are searching for a waypoint that is on the memory card, will the Meridian find it on the card or does it only search the waypoints that are loaded into the gps?

 

I'm wonder what hand held holds the most because I started to use my gps for work.

I do a lot of work out in the rural area. I have been marking waypoints for the homes I go to.

 

I don't think it will be long befor I have more the 500 way points.

I hope 1000 is enough.

[+Fathergoose]

Using my meridian Platinum with a 256 SD card I am able to keep sets containing 1-500 waypoint. For caching I usually keep about 6-10 cities top 300-400 caches and for personal use I have several different sets of waypoint. They are always in the GPS so all I need to do is select the file I want depending on where I am. So bottom-line several thousand.

[+embra]

If you are searching for a waypoint that is on the memory card, will the Meridian find it on the card or does it only search the waypoints that are loaded into the gps?

The Meridian will not search thhrough waypoints on the SD card, only the ones loaded into active memory--as you surmised.

 

Usually this is not a problem, because there is typically some logical way to group waypoints into files. Then one need only erase the existing waypoints in active memory and load the desired batch from the card. For example, I have a smallish file of frequently-used waypoints, one file of about 450 geocaches, and about 2000 benchmark waypoints grouped by one of 4 counties.

[Neo_Geo]

I download my waypoints, tracks, map list every so often - about once or twice a month and save the data as a file. If I just returned from a special trip, I'll save the file as always, but I'll also put a copy of the file on a CD with photos from the trip.

 

If my computer blows up, I still have the important tracks preserved on CD.

 

I have my tracks from Ecuador (including Galapagos Islands), Las Vegas, and a trip to West Virginia I took to visit relatives' graves. If I ever get back to the Galapagos again, I can upload the waypoints from that trip and find the farm where the Giant Tortoises were found.

[+Kfam]

Depending on which GPS I'm using, I'll usually load either 475 or 950 caches.

 

I think it's a good idea to not fill your GPS all the way up. Save a few empty slots for marking your car and other places you might need along the way.

 

Before using GSAK to manage a database, I would set my PQ for 475 returns.

[Phoenix2001]

This post is starting to be a example of why I think a Everything GPS section would be good for the forums.

 

Everytime something is asked in this part of the forums, the replies are often geocaching related.

Even if the question was not met to be only geocaching related....

There are other message boards such as

alt.satellite.gps, sci.geo.satellite-nav, and yahoo groups

where geocaching wouldn't be the first item thought of.

[+Renegade Knight]

To answer the rest of the question.

 

My backed up waypoints include a Dredge in Ester Alaska, A hucklebeery patch in Ashton Idaho, and my own caches, especially the puzzle ones that don't have coordintes on GC.com.

 

So that's probably 20 that I've kept and don't change out with each new PQ.

[+Renegade Knight]

Reading this thread it sound like it would be a great thing to have a "Permanent Waypoints featuer" where you store the points that you always want to have. It's not so much permanent as it is, not in the normal waypoint memory for general manipulation. Rather like iPAQ's file store compaired to a PDA's main memory.

[Phoenix2001]

I have about 63,000 waypoints in one combined directory and maybe about 10,000 more elsewhere. Most of them are for hiking trails and organized by area. When I go out, I try to load no more than 300 into a GPS 76 that has a maximum of 500. I also have a GPSmap 76 that holds 1000 waypoints. I don't pay attention to the capacity of the map76 because I'm not likely to load more than about 500 waypoints for a fairly large area.

 

I limit the plain 76 to 300 because I want about 150 to 200 free slots for marking waypoints along the trail. These new marks could be a repeat of existing ones which I then average for better accuracy. For instance I have over 15,000 waypoints in the Collegiate Peaks Wilderness representing about 3,000 locations. I divide them up into sections (per file) such as NE, NW, SE, SW, north central, east central, etc.

 

Someday the hard disk on a computer will crash. I back up all important data to alternate hard disks and CD-R's and put some CD-R's off site in case of fire, etc.

[+NightPilot]

I use GSAK to store waypoints. I keep a separate database named, not surprisingly, GPS, and I periodically download the waypoints from my GPS into it. It merges the data, and I keep adding more. I also have many, many waypoints other than caches, and I don't want to lose them, so I back them up, just in case my GPS gets wiped out, lost, stolen, crushed, or whatever. It's a simple matter to send them back to any GPS from GSAK.

[+NightPilot]

I only hit the submit button once, but it posted twice, and since we aren't trusted to delete our own posts..............

Edited November 10, 2004 by NightPilot

[DavidBethany]

I frequently download waypoints I create to any of the many programs I use that communicate with the GPS. I can then edit the waypoint lists, add or delete points, then save back to the GPS. HD, or SD card. If yoiur waypoints are valuable, you may want to back them up in CD, just as yoiu would back up any other computer data.

 

The Meridian has a 500 WP limit in memory at any one time but I can store as many Waypoint files as an SD card will hold and load the files as needed. I have to keep the files to 500 WP's or less. The practical limit in memory is less when using Magellan's DirectRoute software for street routing as this software creates temporary waypoints on the fly when creating a route and will not create a route if all 500 slots are already filled.

 

If you need a lot of waypoints, and you are comparing this one feature of different GPS models, keep in mind the notes limitation also. For example, I think the Magellan Meridian will only allow 200 waypoints to have notes. It doesn't matter how abreviated or verbose you make the notes.

 

My old GPS-315 will also store 500 user Waypoints but more than 15,000 POI's (down from 20,000) can be imported from their Datasend software and other databases. This unit does have mapping so the internal memory has more room for the small WP and POI files.

 

David

[+geoSquid]

There are other message boards such as

alt.satellite.gps, sci.geo.satellite-nav, and yahoo groups

where geocaching wouldn't be the first item thought of.

Sadly, anyone who posts on usenet will almost certainly end up with the email address they post from spammed to within an inch of its life.

[+NightPilot]

There is no requirement to use a real email address on usenet. My standard email address for usenet is fakename@fakehost.com, and it works just fine for me. XNews will happily accept anything you put in for an address. The only reason to use a real address is for other people to be able to send you email; if I want email from other usenet posters, we can sort it out online first. If you really want to use a real email address, you can get one free from many places, and just abandon it when it gets spammed. My ISP provides Postini for my real account, and it filters out *all* viruses and almost all spam. A couple get through each week, maybe, but that's about it.

[+Night Stalker]

I download 950 waypoints each week to my 60CS. 500 from my home area and 450 from the area I am working in. This allows me 50 additional waypoints so I can mark my car (Always an important thing to remember), and so I can add additional waypoints for multi caches. Each week I download fresh information deleting all the obsolete information from the week before.