Delorme Earthmate PN-20 Handheld GPS (with Topo USA 7.0 & 1-GB SD Card & Reader) Review

Prior to ordering the PN-20 the only GPS I had used was the navigation in my wife's car. I selected this unit so I could do some geocaching and, since my wife sells real estate, I thought it would be nice if we knew her signs were on the right property. Based on reading reviews, I was expecting a capable device, a poor instruction book, and a fairly steep learning curve. I was not disappointed in any of these areas.

Yesterday, after loading some maps we took it around Hood Canal and went up to Port Townsend. We had the top down on the miata. If you zoom out a bit the unit did a pretty good job of tracking where we were, with useable maps that let us see where we were. As others have said, you don't see very far down the road like in a road navigation system, but you get lots of contours, points of interest, and things to talk about along the way. Although I have made the trip many times, I can't believe how much I learned new about the area we were travelling through. The battery lasted about 10 hours.

Now about the instructions. There should be a card telling you to go to Delorme dot com and click on technical support. Then you need to visit the forum and read the stickies on how to install the SD card, how to install the Topo disks, how to get around the endless frustration you will experience if you hit the software cold like I did. There is a wealth of material in the forum that can lead you out of the frustration you will be feeling if you embark on your own to figure out this device.

It is ironic that a device that is intended to provide guidance is packaged by people who can't create a simple route of instruction to get you up and going. But the good news is that if you go to the forum you can learn to do some amazing things. I have located my first geocache and I have learned how to get corners of property coordinates into my pn-20 to the point that we can better assess where the property really is and that the sign is probably in the right spot.

In sum, I think the Pn-20 is a bargain and plenty capable of meeting my needs.

Buy it here now!