Zumo 550 are they worth it?

The maps are already installed on the zumo.
If you do not want to view them on the PC then you do not need to do anything.

If you want to view them on the PC;
MapSource is the program to view the maps and transfer waypoints, routes and tracklogs to and from the GPS. The maps are viewed in this program.

Your box should have 2 versions of MapSource City Navigator.
Just install the later one (City Navigator Australia and NZ NT 2010) on the burnt CD and then enter the unlock code.
Then install the OZtopo DVD and enter the unlock code.

In the top left drop down box you should have City Navigator, OZtopo Roads and OZtopo contours.
Select the one you want to display.

I don’t have a c60, so I don’t know for sure what the differences are.
The Zumo is bigger, larger screen and has Blue Tooth capabilities which I don’t use.
I can operate my Zumo as I ride with my gloves on. I have it suggest point to point routes all the time when I am in unfamiliar territory. Also it is easy to share special routes with other riders
I find my Zumo a lot of fun and very useful.

I love the 550 Zummo. Works Flawlessly. Also, I plugged in the XM Satellite antenna into it and can listen to 170 radio stations! It can also handle phone calls, too.

Officer023

XM radio in australia?? :huh

Choice did a write up on the Zumo last month. I would love a zumo but don't have the shekels so I bought a Go Cruiser from ALDI for $149. It works really well too. Very accurate with every trip I've planned. It holds music, video and pics. I just wish it had a plug for the earphones rather than use radio to talk to you.
Still and all for $149 you can't complain.

me thinks he's in the us of a....

I bought a Zumo 550 last year and love it. Not only can you use the satellite radio (which I don't use) but you can also load MP3s on it - either on the internal memory or an external sd card (just like the ones used on cameras). Overall I would say it's a great piece of equipment

Zumo - dont bother unless you need its extra features.

I use a Garmin Nuvi 500 - its is waterproof and heaps of features/ capabilities. About $400.

How does the screen size compare?

I really like my 550, it connects to all my phones (mostly Nokia) and my Cardo scala-rider Q2 with ease.

It had a lot of problems with the NCom hardware for my Helmet but I fixed that by giving away the NCom hardware to someone and using the Cardo gear. It would disconnect if I moved around on the bike and sometimes even if I turned my head sideways.... no-one could fix it so I simply gave up.

The Bluetooth connectivity is mono and so the audio is reasonable but I have quite a level of Tinnitus and the result is that I don't hear a lot of highs... this means that I can hear the navigation quite well but not all the music.

I have had two occasions (both in a deluge) where the 550 has reset itself but other than that, so far, it has been great.

Here in Australia the indexing of the voice prompts for announcing directions is off at times so I get weirdly pronounced street names but I can live with that (Garmin have not been successful at solving it at this time).

I am about to experiment with linking my Yaesu VX-8R to the Zumo - it should work.

I bought a Pelican 1015 case to mount my phone, on the bars, in because sometimes a phone call will 'go astray' and I need to be able to see if it has been left connected by accident as it has on a couple of occasions.

I looked at the Topo maps but didn't think that they were worth it for me..... and haven't used Shonky maps although I might try it in the future. If I wanted something so fine I would probably get a Pelican case for my S80 Navman and with MioPocket loaded simply leave it running as well as the 550 as so far I have found all the dirt roads/tracks I have ridden on have been covered by the existing mapping (I am not a true dirt rider.... more like a 'Saturday - find a dirt road to travel down to get a cuppa and then come home the following day' rider).

For me the 550 is everything I need.

Tony

I love mine too, I had a big off October 08 and totaled my beloved VFR, the Zumo came out with out a scratch.

As soon as I can walk I'll be looking at The Yamaha Tenere or the Kawasaki KLR650, just hope the Zumo will mount OK. :)

i have a 60csx and i think it is a great unit. I am now looking at moving to a zumo because it can autoroute with oztopo? i am not a 100% sure but have been told that with city navigator and oztopo loaded it will autoroute using a combination of the two mapsets! pick a point in the scrub, hit autoroute and see where it takes you.
burnie is this correct?

The 60 unit will autoroute too. It will also do a 3D heads up display.

Neither the Zumo or the 60 will autoroute with version 2.x of oztopo, as the map software itself is not autoroutable. Version 3.x of oztopo is meant to autoroute and will do so on either unit.
Autorouting with 2 concurrent mapsets is nonsense. The units use one mapset at a time (with the single exception of transparent overlays, used for topo sometimes). CN (city navigator) will autoroute, but neither unit will autoroute you off the autorouting mapset, so you can't autoroute on minor forest tracks in oztopo, because CN doesn't know about them.
For non-autorouting mapsets like oztopo v2.x, shonkymaps, tracks4australia, use TRACKS instead, they are the duck's guts when offroad. Does the Zumo do tracks? No, it doesn't.

In navigating terms, the 60 series units will do everything the Zumo does, and more.
The Zumo's are a road-based unit, with some non-GPS functions like bluetooth, spoken names, photos, mp3's, touchscreen, etc, but for GPS functionality the 60 series handheld units beat it hands down. It has near identical functionality to the 276C units, try and prise one of those out of the hands of an owner.

It all comes down to what you want from a GPS. If you want non-navigation bells'n'whistles, and don't hardly stray much off the beaten track, buy a (stupidy expensive) Zumo. If you need to navigate off the beaten track, it's a 60 series unit every time.

I have Copilot on my HTC/Android phone, and this does a reasonable job of routing in towns, finding fuel etc. Of course the phone also plays MP3's, holds ebooks, takes photos, syncs contact info with my pc, sends and receives email, posts to Facebook, and sometimes can be used to call people. Google Latitude will log my location and allow my family to see where I am when I'm travelling if I want them to (only when the phone has service). Basically it does all the pretty stuff that a Zumo seems to do and then some.

So for the rough stuff I'm thinking of getting a 60 something to use on back roads and tracks. (So phone in jacket for road riding, Garmin on bars for trail riding). This will also give me a backup GPS in case one fails.

Does anyone use a 60 series Garmin with only Shonky maps or Tracks4Aus? I have Mapsource and have had a look at Shonky maps and it looks very thorough, is there any value in purchasing the Garmin maps if I am only going to use it on tracks (ie no routing needed)?

"Does anyone use a 60 series Garmin with only Shonky maps or Tracks4Aus? I have Mapsource and have had a look at Shonky maps and it looks very thorough, is there any value in purchasing the Garmin maps if I am only going to use it on tracks (ie no routing needed)? "

At a basic level, there will be little value in buying Garmin maps where Shonky will do most stuff that most folks will ever need.

However (there's always one of these ) The Garmin topo for Aus will autoroute (but I don't know if it discriminates between the CN-type roads and dingy tracks for this purpose) and will have lots more detail.

I find Shonkymaps to be pretty good for most things, the exception being when you hit an urban area, it has no street-level mapping, just shows towns as locations and main roads. Tracks4Australia is a bit light-on for coverage, but you know the tracks were public at some stage (as it is user-contributions) and it has the singular advantage of allowing you to zoom right out and not drop detail, meaning it is invaluable for orienting yourself in the outback. Other products like CN, OZTopo, and shonky, simply drop all detail after around 3k scale, leaving you with a blank screen if you're not near a main road.

Tracks4Australia and Shonkymaps is enough to get you pretty much anywhere.

The Open Street Map Project can give you pretty good routable maps for around town for free.

@ http://advrider.com/forums/showthrea...=634897&page=4

The Zumo is too expensive, I agree, although at retail prices $429 for a 62S plus $189 for CityNavigator comes to $628, so another $190 odd for the extra features of the Zumo (esp. bluetooth) doesn't seem too bad.

Lack of track support seems to be a major -ve, but can't you turn autorouting off on the Zumo and just follow a preloaded route as you would a track? GPSBabel will convert tracks to routes and vice versa.

Another question - if I did want to run CN on the 60 series, how do I get the spoken directions? Is there a headphone socket on it? I want spoken directions, not visual - if I'm in a strange town/city and don't know where I'm going I need my eyes on the traffic (I rarely look at the Copilot screen when I use it in the car, on the bike it's in my jacket pocket and directs me via earphones.) The only visual cue I sometimes use is what Copilot calls Safety View, which is a black screen with a big yellow arrow showing the next turn, plus the next street name and distance to it. The whole 3D colour map thing is an unnecessary distraction in my opinion (on a bike anyway).

However, if you don't need CN and you can pick up a 60Csx for $260 landed from OS , the 60csx seems far better value than the Zumo. I know this isn't a Zumo vs 60csx thread, but I'm about to order a 60 csx and would like to make sure I won't later regret not putting the $260 towards a Zumo...
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"can't you turn autorouting off on the Zumo and just follow a preloaded route as you would a track?"

No, essentially. A route will need the underlying mapset to have the route in it's database, otherwise it simply won't show up or will straightline to the next routable point.

60's don't do spoken directions. They do beep when you are approaching a turn though, and have a nice heads-up style 3d display when routing.

I use mine in the car and it's easy to look at when required, I usually set it up at 200m in urban areas. On the bike it's still easy to sneak a look when required, I haven't had a problem in that regard. It's not much different than checking your instruments really, although I do understand it is a matter of personal preference. Hope this helps with your decision.

The price of CN is an outrage here. $200 bucks roughly. I can buy a new Garmin GPS with CN installed for $160 or less.