Do yourself a favor and just get an Edge Explore 2, which can be had for just $250 if you wait for a sale.

I'm not keen on buying online, but my lbs has an Edge 530 on sale, quite a bit less than the Explore 2. Is that a good unit, especially for map quality and ability to take them from other apps?

You can compare specs at the Garmin website. 530 will have smaller screen but will add some functionality that you may not value.

It's a significantly smaller screen with no touch screen capability, so much clunkier to pan and zoom. You stated you wanted navigation and mapping in the OP as I recall, the 530 is not great at that. It will navigate and show you turn by turn, but less info on the map. It's a good unit for somebody wants the basic data screen with configurable metric information.

Christo613

I bought a Edge 530 a few years ago after having a Edge 500 for a dozen years. Push buttons worked well for the Edge 500's limited features. However the Edge 530 has a lot more nifty features that I'd like to use on the bike while riding. However, button pushes make getting to those features cumbersome and take too much attention while riding. I really wish I'd paid the little bit of extra for a touch screen model.

This.

I had a 530 Edge for a brief time, and found it a nightmare just to get data fields configured to my liking. Sooo many buttons to push in getting to menus, sub-menus, and sub-sub-menus. Yuck.

I've now got a 1040 Edge, and the touchscreen allows me to change data fields while riding. It's that easy.

I've had my Garmin 78s GPSMap for about 10 years now. It's a marine unit so it floats. I take it everywhere from wilderness canoeing, to city cycling to world trips. It's a good backup for when my Google Map can't connect and show that blue dot.

In another thread I discussed on line free open source maps that we use.

how about the Etrex 22x? It does take AA batteries which seems a great advantage for autonomy.

I spent a lot of time assessing that Oregon one. I will let someone that knows the Etrex answer.

As mentioned earlier, I use an Etrex 20. The newer Etrex 22 & 32 looks about the same as the former Etrex 20 & 30. The Etrex 32 appears ot have an altimeter, compass, & wireless connectivity. The previous 30 didn't have wireless I don't think, though it did have the compass and altimeter.

The screen images on the Garmin site (Etrex 22) look the same as my 20.

I'm sure they are both good units. I've used my 20 for 6ish years..no complaints. It always works and no surprises.

Do you currently own a GPS of any sort? If not you might just have to make a dive into it and then learn what they do a don't do for you and why you really should have gotten this other GPS instead.

Information overload might have you not realizing exactly what the differences are between the features you will get from a GPS unit made for cycling as opposed to the features you will get from a handheld GPS.

I am curious what you get from a cycling specific one that you do not get from a general recreation one.

A friend of mine asked why I did not get a real GPS (meaning cycling one). I asked why I should, he said it is really nice to be able to look at a map to see where you are. I said I had a cycling specific map, a topo map, an automotive map, I could choose from any of those. (Actually have a couple topo maps.) He stopped talking.

I am aware my GPS does not have blue tooth, does not talk to the ride sharing sites, but I do not care about that. Someone I know was talking about strava, I asked what strava was, he said it was software for cyclists, I said I do cycle touring, why do I not know about it. He said - I said it was for cyclists. Oops, foolish me, I thought that if you do cycle touring and if you do randonneuring, you are a cyclist.

I load (from my computer over a cable) the tracks I need to follow for randonneuring brevets into my GPS. Works great for that.

Since my Open Street maps do routing, I can do routing on my GPS too, although it often gives me some weird routes.

The only thing I do not like about my GPS is that the buttons are small, in cold weather my heavy gloves or mittens sometimes have trouble pushing the correct button. But I do not know if that gets better with a cycling one. Does it?

So, please tell me what I am missing from not having a cycling specific GPS, other than the lack of connectivity that I already know I am missing and have no interest in?

You pretty much answered the question yourself. Read this and tell me that there are not features a majority of cyclists would enjoy.. https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2022/06/...th-review.html. The fact that when you are touring and you need to haul a laptop around with you to get onboard routing kills it for me right there.

It's possible to use an Android phone to do this.

This is silly. Iride01 was addressing the OP.

Even the bigger cycling units aren't as big as what you use.

And the screen size is bigger and has more pixels.

GMap 64: 160 x 240 pixels. 2.6'' diagonal.
1040: 282 x 470 pixels. 3.5'' diagonal.
840: 246 x 322 pixels. 2.6'; diagonal. (The overall size of this unit is about half of the GMap 64,)




I'm surprised you didn't trot this picture out yet again.

(What you are doing is fine. But there are things that the fairly-popular cycling units provide that are useful to other people.)

I usually use my GPS, tell it where I want to go, tell it to use Tour Cycling for activity. If the route is really screwy, then I check other options like Automotive routing with my GPS. If I do not like that, Maps.Me Automotive routing on my Android phone. I can't transfer that route to my GPS, but I can pick a midpoint and tell my GPS to go there and that often solves it. If that option is not very good, I use Komoot on my Android phone (free version). That sometimes gives me crazy routes but often pretty good routes. That also is a route I can't transfer to my GPS, but I can pick points along the route and manually tell it to go there. If Komoot give me a crazy route, pick a midpoint and force it to include that. If I do not like that route, there is the old fashioned paper map.

Not on my last tour, but the one before, there were two occasions where the paper map gave me the best option, half the distance and a good road. I think it was because the GPS routing was not giving much importance to a local highway (county, not state or federal).

I did not realize I was not allowed to ask a question.

Size, you are correct., the cycling ones are smaller.

Screen size, you have me there too.

Other than the things I mentioned like electronic connectivity, I was hoping someone would say what things that the fairly-popular cycling units provide that are useful to other people since you only learn by asking.

Tourist in MSN Possibly things you and others may or may not care about. That's part of the reason there are so many choices and each has some features the other doesn't. Or that the features, though seemingly the same thing work a little differently.

• Does your handheld GPS upload your ride information automatically to RWGPS, Strava, Garmin Connect of other cycling oriented site for viewing ride data and track?
• Does your handheld allow you to connect or control speed, cadence, Varia radar, bike lights, power meters and other cycling accessories? Probably some, but not all. And it probably won't have the screens to display the data from some in the various ways that some cyclist want to see the data used during the ride.
• Does your handheld have group tracking so if you are riding with friends that have devices capable of group tracking, you can see where they are in relation to you if they've gotten out of sight for some reason.
• Does your handheld have incident detection which, if in cell service, can alert chosen contacts automatically if a suspected crash happens? In the good case scenario, it'll just be a false alert, but what if you are knocked unconscious and need help quick. At least your contact might choose to call 911 if they can't reach you on the phone.
• Does your handheld give you climb profiles for what's ahead?
• Does your handheld auto pause your activity when you stop for red lights or other brief times you stop and don't what that included as actual riding time?
• Does your handheld give you the ability to follow training programs with on-screen cues?
• Does your handheld give you the ability to connect your Di2 electronic shifting to it so you can manipulate the screens and answer basic pop up's by pushing the buttons under the Di2 hoods that are configurable for such things? You also get the ability to see info about what gears you are in in various ways as well as battery status.
• Does your handheld give you info about what that ride did for your training status, such as Low Aerobic, High Aerobic and Anaerobic benefits of that ride? As well as other training effects?
• Does your handheld easily fit in your pocket so you can stop for a while and go into a store and not worry that someone will remove it from your bike and steal it?

Probably more that I missed. Probably some that handhelds do to a certain extent.

For sure I don't use most of those things. But some might find them important. I use to think that automagically uploading the ride to the various websites was being lazy. It didn't take but a connecting of the cable and a couple clicks to get the ride off my very old Edge 500. However my new Edge has spoiled me and I appreciate not having to take it off my bike and the fact it's uploaded before I even get into the house with the bike.

None of those are going to be important just to ride a bike. We've ridden for years with nothing growing up. But once you've used some of them, you might find you don't want to do without them.

My point for the OP was that they need to think about what it is that they really want from the GPS. They seem to be waffling back and forth between a handheld or one made for cycling. There are advantages to both. But neither will do all the same things or show data in the same way. The OP also needs to figure out what stuff they'd do on a PC or Mac or phone prior to the ride and what they'd do with the device during the ride.

I'm not big on using my device for planning. Planning is done on the PC and very easily transferred to the device. The device is mostly for recording and getting info from the sensors. Some of which a handheld typically won't connect to. (AFAIK, since it's been a while since even looking at new handhelds).

This is "asking a question".

This is suggesting that what you know or do is somehow important. It's "asking a question" but in an arrogant and rude way.

Thank you for a well thought out response. I was not aware of most of those features.

Someone else on this thread says I was rude to you, If you felt I was rude, that was not intended and I apologize.

The Edges (the cycling-specific models) can produce turn instructions for tracks. I believe that's a feature that only the cycling (and, possibly, the motorcycle-focused Zumo models) have.

Other models can generate turn instructions for "route" files, which have a few waypoints.

The cycling models can't use route files. This doesn't make much sense to me (maybe, it's to make things less complicated for people).

I believe websites like Ride with GPS were created to serve the people using the cycling-specific Garmins.

for me Bryton good feature and price

I think an Garmin Edge Explore is the best option if you can find a good deal on it, but if you for example own a Gamin Fenix watch already for example, there are mounts to install it on the handlebar, any you can also use it for navigation off the bike.

Definitely this. I've had my Edge Explore 2 since April and I love it. I've ridden 7000+ km with it, including several long (290km+) rides using navigation from an uploaded route, and it's been fabulous.

When you are on a tour and you want to find a restaurant, a store, or an attraction:

With the Garmin cycling specific units, you can use your phone to search online for whatever location you need, and then immediately send that over Bluetooth to the GPS unit, which will then give you turn by turn callouts to get you there, including getting you back on track should you miss a turn. If you prefer to design your own route to the location instead of rely on the unit's built in routing, you can draw a route using whatever phone map app you prefer, and then similarly send that route to the GPS via Bluetooth.

It is incredibly handy for touring.