PSYS

My fiance got me a Colorado 400i for my upcoming birthday on Friday. Played around with it for the better part of the afternoon and a few hours last night before going to sleep...

I opted for this unit after doing some research due to its functionality. I wanted a unit I could utilize in the boat while fishing, hiking the trails inour state park as well in my vehicle for getting to/from a new location. I did register at myGarmin and performed the latest firmwate update available. Sorry in advance for the newbie questions...

I scoured the Internet and the owner's manual and I swear - I'm not certain I fully understand the "Where To?" function or perhaps it's because I need additional mapping...? Not sure how within the OPTION setting that searching near a waypoint, current location or map point is helpful? What exctly am I missing?

Just for fun, I downloaded a few various geocaches to the unit... is there an exact science to locating a particular cache? Aside from the obvious purple line that the unit is advising I follow, is there a particular map that requires purchasing aside from the one preloaded on my unit...?

Another question... for those who have this unit or are familiar with it, is there a way to actually type in an address and be routed to it? Perhaps with the City Navigator mapping?

Andy

If you get City Navigator you'll be able to enter addresses and have turn-by-turn routing. It may do some turn-by-turn routing now on the basemap but not on the minor roads. I'm guessing the Where to function will be more useful if you had City Navigator maps for entering addresses and searching points of interest. The search near a waypoint, current locatin, or map point would let you look up POIs near a specific waypoint or near a point on the map you select instead of always showing that information based on your current location. Normally if you search for a POI it always bases the search on where you are now. But if you wanted to look up say a coffee shop in a town your not in now, you'd use that function to search for it.

PSYS

thanks for the reply.

I placed an order on the official Garmin website for the City Navigator SD card. By entering the card into my Colorado 400i... is this going to be able to allow me to now begin entering addresses in my GPS unit? Is this an option is enabled once the GPS Unit the city navigator card has been inserted?

With as many features and capability that the unit has, I slowly realized it's not very functional without any sort of mapping installed. The base map is very generic and very vague and isn't really very useful at all, IMO.

Andy

Yes once the card is in the Colorado you'll be able to enter addresses. I agree the basemap doesn't include much. Be aware the one disadvantage of using Garmin's preloaded memory cards is the fact you can't load the map data onto a computer to plan routes, etc. You have to get the download/DVD version to do that. But the memory card can be moved from device to device unlike the downloaded/DVD versions which are locked to one GPS' serial number.