The Gear:
Magellan's new eXplorist GC is a GPS unit designed specifically for geocaching hikers. The palm friendly unit is compact and ready to go out of the box. The eXplorist has a ton of hiker friendly features that include paperless caching, waterproof design, and an easy to transport weight of only 5.2 oz.
The Test:
From geocaching.com, we were able to easily pick out the caches we wanted to find and download them in an instant from our computer to the GPS. The unit stores helpful information like hints, cache descriptions, and recent logs. My daughter and I took the eXplorist GC out on several hikes, including Hamilton Mountain and Herman Creek.
The eXplorist is small enough for young hikers to easily hold. Though we took turns, my daughter did most of the official navigation. One very helpful feature for hikers in particular, was the dashboard. We were able to track our current speed, average speed, trip distance, and ETA.
We found the units accuracy to be dead on. Of the 10 or so caches we have located using the unit; we were usually lead to within a couple of feet of the cache.
The Bottom Line:
The eXplorist GC is an easy to use, accurate, and durable GPS unit perfectly designed for the geocache hunting hiker. The unit does not have an internal compass, so it will only know which way you're moving, not necessarily facing. It's not the best choice for true backcountry endeavors, but that's not its intended use. As a standalone geocaching tool, Its compact size, paperless caching system, and ease of use for all family members, have made it a must have for our hikes.
Other features include:
- Seamless Connection to Geocaching.com User Community. Perform “Send to GPS", create and sync Pocket Queries, and upload.
- Free 30 Day Premium Membership to Geocaching.com - Download GPX files, create your own Pocket Queries, and get tons of other premium membership features.
- Pre-Loaded with the Most Popular Geocaches in the World.
- Paperless Geocaching - Download and view more than 20 unique characteristics of each cache and view, search, filter on the device. Details include name, location, description, hider, size, difficulty, terrain, hint, spoilers, and last 20 user logs among a number of other details.
- Easy to Navigate Menus and Rich Graphics.
- Sunlight readable color screen - A vibrant 2.2" color transflective screen provides the best readability in direct sunlight.
- Store up to 10,000 geocaches on the device - Load a new GPX file for each trip or all the locations you love to geocache so you'll have data on board when you need it
- High-sensitivity SiRFstarIII GPS with 3-meter accuracy - Most smart phones provide 20-meter GPS accuracy, which will get you close to the geocaching, but will it really help your find it? 3-meter GPS accuracy will put you on top of the cache and make the find that much easier
- Picture Viewer - Whether the log has a pic of the last person to find or the hider attached a spoiler image to help locate a well hidden cache, a picture is worth a thousand words.
- Worldwide Basemap - Orient yourself to nearby streets, rivers, lakes, and parks to help in your treasure hunting expedition
- Suspend Mode - The goal is to conserve battery life by putting the device into an advanced power saving mode. Suspend mode will turn off everything expect for GPS tracking. Wake up the device with a single click.
- On-board user memory - Loads of space to add up to 10,000 geocaches and tons of photos and personalized backgrounds
- Create and Store 500 Waypoints - Whether you mark your car, campsite, starting location, or places to re-visit, waypoints are a common and useful feature in all outdoor GPS devices.
- Trip Odometer - Keep tabs on distance traveled, average speed, and other useful statistics
Physical:
Size 2.2" x 4.4" x 1.4" (56mm x 111mm x 36mm)
Weight 5.2oz (147g)
Screen Size 2.2"
Antenna Type Multi-directional Patch
Operating Range 14F to 140F (-10C to 60C)
Performance:
GPS SiRFstarIII
Acquisition Time Hot: 20 seconds, Cold: 60 seconds, Initial: 2 minutes
Coordinate Systems Yes
Power:
Battery Life 18 Hours
MSRP:
$199.99
For more of Adam's writing, reviews, and photography, visit AdamSawyer.com
Comments
Great review. Sounds like a cool unit.
Today's technology is great!
Great review - this looks fantastic.
National park system needs one like this to locate GPS on in situ historic objects and record at least 500 site GPS and down load using a wire (USB Port?) quickly into computer data-base or WORD document? What do you suggest Adam? Our equipment is antiques!
Relatively new to the world of GPS, Adam. We are just starting to get into Geocaching here in the Central Valley of California, with our Scouts. Thanks for the good info.
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