GPS advice

I have the 76CSX, effectively the same as the 60CSX but with some nautical features, and it floats.
And yes, they have fixed many of the problems in some of the early software release, I like the unit it very much.

It holds up to a 2Gig microSD card, thats the good news. As you fill it up it gets slow in panning the map (ie I loaded the entire western US, pan was a pain). Not a big deal, but very noticable if the memory approaches full. I typically only load only the area, plus surrounding areas I may be in, and it moves fast.

The display is as good as I’ve seen, and when run on lithium, I’ve gotten 30 hours out of a set of batteries.

The other killer feature is the SiRF III chip set. This ultra sensitive chipset means you’ll remain in SatLock when everyone else is lost. I’ve seen it work inside building.

It has a magnetic compass that works moving or not, but that does increase battery drain.

There are a fair number of maps that it will take either directly or with converter software.

If you get the 60csx or 76csx, make sure you get the latest software downloaded off the net from garmin.com, they do an excellent job with the updates.

I liked the 60csx, but ultimately picked the 76csx because of the button placement. I would suggest trying both out. They’re both around 8 ounces, but for the types of units you’re looking for, you may not get a significantly lighter unit.

Hope that helps.
MikeB

Garmin does make 1:24000-scale Topo maps, but only for National Parks. You can demo them on Garmin’s website.

Another source of (free!) 1:24000 maps is: http://mapcenter.cgpsmapper.com/.

If neither of these options has what you need, you can roll your own using freely-downloadable USGS data: http://home.cinci.rr.com/creek/garmin.htm