Hi all! I've been away from the forum and riding for about 6 years, since by daughter was born, and am looking at diving back in. Back then I had a Garmin etrex. I'm looking for a cycling GPS that will give me turn-by-turn, but will allow me to see or add many cycling-specific route maps. Sorry if this question gets asked all the time! Would one of the Garmin edge's fit my needs? Do those of you that have them, like them? Thanks!

welcome back. I have an Edge 800, which is a little dated. It displays maps and gives turn by turn indications. I'm fairly happy with it. All of these devices take some getting used to.

Check out the Magellan Cyclo! I have the Cyclo 505 and I love it!

For the USA they offer the Cyclo 315 and the Cyclo 505. The 315 is cheaper and the 505 offers more features.

As of right now however, maps can't be added. Adding other maps is supposedly going to come, but no firm indication as to when..

I have the Edge 510. Tt has turn-by-turn navigation with preloaded courses (built on PC and uploaded to 510), however no onboard maps to display during the course or offline navigation use. You need to step up to the Edge 810 to get maps.

Should also mention that the Cyclo 505 has a comparable feature set to the Edge 1000 but is the same price as the 810.

I have the 810 personally, and I'm still getting used to it Turn by turn works, but I'm still learning how to properly create courses in a way that it does turn by turn properly. Should also mention that the Edge units come with "Base Maps" which are pretty much unusable for turn by turn or any navigation (only has major roads). To get usable maps you will need to download free open street maps (will be trying that later this week) or purchase City Navigator maps from garmin (which I have, they are around $80 I believe).

In the case of my city of 190,000 people the base map contains exactly 2 roads.

Wait, if I spend a good chunk of change for a Garmin 810 for TBT directions and maps, the maps it comes with are not sufficient and I need to pay extra or download something free for maps that are useful? Why don't they include something useful with it?

how does the Magelen Cyclo compare on maps?

Do any of them have information about bike routes (primary, secondary), street grade, etc? What about bikepaths/MUPs?

The garmin city navigator maps appear to have some bike trails but I'm still futzing around with those. When I load a course on them through some MUPs it instead tries to route me around them and put me on streets instead which is weird. I suspect the Open Street Maps (free) may be a little better in this regard though, I'll let you know when I get a chance to test them this week

Can't comment on the map quality of the Cyclo, [MENTION=364583]raqball[/MENTION] had both the edge and cyclo at one point though so he might be able to help.

I think if you buy one of the Garmins that display maps and you don't have the Garmin City Navigator maps, you would be best buying the one of the SD cards sold by RWGPS ( Ride with GPS ) that have the OSM ( OpenStreetMaps ) already loaded and ready for your Garmin. I think they charge about $25 USD plus shipping.....or...you buy your own SD card and download the Maps off of OSM, either way.

This is actually the one I would recommend. It is dated, but if you don't care about being able to pair your cell phone with it for live tracking, it will do about everything you would probably want. Amazingly, the retail price for the 800 still hasn't dramatically come down, but you can find them on eBay fairly regularly at a pretty good bargain.

You can download and use the OSM (Open Source maps) on the 800 or 810. There are even a few youtube video's that walk you through the process.

Live tracking isn't the only feature, I'm personally a fan of automatic uploads to garmin connect right after your ride. That way I can just leave it on the bike all week and just charge it when it needs to be charged. Don't have to mess with manually syncing everything which is a PITA.

I also wrote a script to copy data from Garmin to Strava automatically, so it takes care of that too

The Cyclo 505 has WiFi and it will automatically upload your ride to Magellian's service and Strava when in range of known access points. The Edge 1000 also has WiFi and will automatically upload to Garmin connect. The Edge 810/510 only has Bluetooth (not Bluetooth LE) and will automatically upload to Garmin connect using your phone (as described above). The Garmin Edge 800 and 500 have no kind of automatic upload feature.

The Cyclo USA version comes loaded with OSM and TeleAtlas maps.. I've used both ( you can select which map to use in the settings ) and both are pretty much the same or at least I see no difference between the 2..

The maps are pretty well detailed for cycling and yes both maps on the Cyclo have bike paths, secondary roads ect. A nice feature of the Cyclo is that if you load a pre made route it will show you the distance to your next climb, the grade of the next climb ect..

I find the maps on the Cyclo to be very nice..

Even if you can get the maps for free, its annoying that the Garmin doesn't come set up with them by default and let a user change them if they prefer. If I got one and then had to do extra steps to set it up, it would mean it would sit in the box longer for me to do so.

Also disappointing to hear that the Garmin 510/810 do not have Bluetooth LE.

The more I hear about the Magellen Cyclo the more interesting it sounds. Don't have the $ either of them right now, but when I do the Cyclo 515 might be the winner (bluetooth smart sensor support is a huge bonus for me as well).

For navigation, it isn't dated all. (Yes, they take some getting used to.)

No, don't buy the ridewithgps maps!!

Look on dcrainmaker.com for how to get the OSM maps free.

You want current OSM maps and a 8GB microSD card is a one-time $7.

The OSM maps are very good.

nothing wrong with the 800 at all, but AFAIK it's not a current model

I agree with downloading the OSM maps, it was easy

I think you're missing the point. When you buy a Garmin I believe you have the option to buy it with maps ( City Navigator on an SD card ) or you can buy without an SD card or map ( for people who want to supply their own map ). Without the map it's going to be cheaper and since with OSM ( and your own SD card ) it's much cheaper, many people decide to go that route.

The Garmin 705 which I own I bought second hand. It came with an older version of City Navigator on an SD card. If I want I can go to the Garmin website and download a newer version of City Navigator but of course that would cost a bit. Personally, I'd rather just use another SD card with the OSM downloaded on to it WHICH is much cheaper and is a much more useable map ( IMO ). I haven't done this yet but at some point I probably will.

OK, that makes a bit more sense, and I can see buying it used that way but if you buy it new do you get the option of with or without maps? I have never seen it offered that way, at least for the 810 or 1000.

Garmin Edge 810, just the unit ($400): www.amazon.com/Garmin-Edge-810-Bike-Computer/dp/B00APBMNQ8
Garmin Edge 810 "performance bundle" with maps, speed/cadence sensor, HR sensor, and an extra mount (out front mount) ($600): https://www.amazon.com/Garmin-Heart-M...cm_wl_huc_item

Thanks for clarifying - I always assumed the sensors was the difference between bundle and unit only, but that they both would come with maps. Guess that is not the case - good to know.

I haven't used GC regularly in years because I got tired of it never working. Garmin does have software that's available for any Edge user that will automatically upload to GC using any Edge device, even my 705, which is old by current standards. But basically Garmin's hand here was forced by Strava, which has been offering that feature to premium users for a long time now.

Agreed - I had a FR60 when I used to run and garmin connect on the computer was a pain in the butt. Upload over bluetooth appears to work much better over my phone. Plus I never have to remove my edge from my bike except to charge

"Dated" suggests that it doesn't work as well as newer units. That isn't the case at all.

The newer models have more featues but the basic navigation stuff isn't improved.

I just picked up a refurbished 800 with a city nav sd card for $237, there are some deals out there.