Anyone heard of a merigreen GPSr?

Mind Socket · Post by **Mind Socket** » 15 August 03 12:13 pm

My buddy/neighbour/geocacher to be is looking at buying a "merigreen". I'm guessing this is a magellan meridien type model, but can't find any decent info, especially whether he's likely to get value for money. Can anyone offer some insight/info on this product, including what one might expect to pay, and whether it's any good?

Cheers,
- Rog

swampgecko · Post by **swampgecko** » 15 August 03 2:16 pm

I think you will find that a merrigreen is just the base model meridian in the green case since they(Magellan) have supposively stopped the yellow case production.

dags · Post by **dags** » 15 August 03 3:19 pm

Yep, the Merigreen is the same as the Magellan Meridian which I thought these days is Yellow in colour. Anyway it is the base model in the Meridian series and I paid $698.00 at Dick Smith's but got them to throw in an extra two years warranty ($50.00 worth I think).

I was at Gowings in the City (Sydney) the other day and they were having a huge sale and you could get a Magellan Platnium for 25% off the $1000.00 so $750.00 for that unit was excellent value I thought. The 25% was accross the whole Magellan range although I am not sure if the sale is still on.

Regards,
Dags...

Lt. Sniper · Post by **Lt. Sniper** » 03 December 04 4:30 pm

Did he get it, its the American version of the Yellow(thats sold here) and hence it comes with the US basemap. There is no AU basemap that can be swapped in for this model.

All the Meridian models above Gold can have there basemaps swapped and changed by the user.

It would be a good unit except it would have no basemap.

Papa Bear_Left · Post by **Papa Bear_Left** » 03 December 04 9:37 pm

The MeriGreen only has 2MB for basemap, but there _is_ an Aussie basemap of that size available! You have my email address if you want more details, Rog.

I have one of these and I like it.

Pros:
SD card: big, big pro! Have detailed maps available, save tracks and waypoints, and (biggie for GCing) quickly load the latest GPX data from GSAK via a card reader. Have multiple datasets on hand (e.g. I routinely carry "All South Island caches" for completeness and "All unfound SI caches" if I want to reduce screen clutter)
Mapping: add the detailed maps and you can call up a street and follow the arrow / look at the approaches
Waterproof and it floats: for those slippery creekbed moments
Configurable screens: Turn off screens you don't want and change what's displayed on the ones you do. I have three screens: map, satellites, magic arrow (with EPE and speed displayed usually)
4-way controller and a few buttons: much easier and quicker than the basic yellow eTrex to enter or select stuff. Still one-handed, too.
Auto-averaging: while you're looking under rocks, it's getting a more and more accurate fix on the cache. Also good for placing caches.

Cons:
It's big: no way you can pretend that this is cellphone! OK in the hand, but 50% bigger than an eTrex.
Slow to update: just an impression, but my wife's eTrex seems to get close to the waypoint on approach whereas the Magellan overshoots a bit. Eventually, it's almost always more accurate and less prone to wandering off.

There's a good Meridian FAQ around that's worth looking at. If you can't find it, drop me a note and I'll send it to you.

Lt. Sniper · Post by **Lt. Sniper** » 03 December 04 10:27 pm

Yeah, I am an active member of the Magellan_Meridian group too. Theres no 2meg basemap that you can load in, well no Aus one anyway. Only US and EU.

They havnt been able to extract the basemap out of an 2meg AU basemaped unit so there are non floating around on the net. Only the 8 meg basemap for the gold and above. It still dosnt stop you using the unit, you can load it with DAST but you will be missing some of the things that DAST dosnt include like lake, creeks etc...

PMed to discuss further..