Originally Posted by
HobbesOnTour
As for the detailed maps..... If I need them, I'll use my phone
, but for Navigation, I don't need anything more than a breadcrumb trail. Even in a city it's enough.... for me.
I tried the Garmin touring. Disaster. Detailed maps, yes. But very difficult to read at a glance. Incredibly slow at turn by turn. A real disaster in a city. And crashed. Often.
The only advantage of the Touring over the Elemnt is the fact that when you go off course, Garmin lets you zoom out and see exactly where you are. You can't do that on the Elemnt (at the moment).
The Touring appears to be kind of flaky. The other units likely work better (the ancient 800 certainly does). The Touring lacks a few navigation features too (I don't recommend it).
One learns how to read the maps. I have found the maps (and being able to zoom/pan them) very useful while riding. I also have a smartphone with loaded maps (it's much easier seeing the maps on the phone and much faster).
Originally Posted by
HobbesOnTour
I hear you on the batteries. But there is nothing new that uses AA batteries. That's another thing with the Garmin - it acts strangely running off a dynamo. A big factor when the battery life is much less in practice than advertised.
Dynamos turn on and off and provide widely varying amounts of power. Many complicated electronics might not like that. The Garmins work fine on a "cache" battery (which is probably less harsh on the electronics.