Garmin Colorado 400c Portable GPS System with Preloaded Coastal Waters Maps
Amazon.com Product Description–January 21, 2008
Whether youre sailing the high seas or hiking the backcountry, Colorado 400c is your all-in-one adventure guide. Preloaded with BlueChart® g2 coastal charts, Colorado is made with the saltwater mariner in mind. Packed with features, it includes a high-sensitivity receiver, barometric altimeter, electronic compass, SD card slot, color display, picture viewer and more. Even exchange tracks, waypoints, routes and geocaches wirelessly between similar units. Slim, lightweight and waterproof, Colorado is the perfect companion for all your outdoor pursuits.
Share Wirelessly
Share your waypoints, tracks, routes and geocaches wirelessly with other Colorado users. Now you can send your favorite hike to your buddy to enjoy or the location of a cache to find. Sharing data is easy. Just select “send” to transfer your information to other Colorado units.
Keep Your Fix
With its high-sensitivity, WAAS-enabled GPS receiver, Colorado locates your position quickly and precisely and maintains its GPS location even in heavy cover and deep canyons. The advantage is clear whether youre in deep woods or just near tall buildings and trees, you can count on Colorado to help you find your way when you need it the most.
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The Colorado 400c comes with built-in BlueChart g2 coastal charts and a worldwide basemap with imagery perfect for all your outdoor pursuits. Map detail includes includes shorelines, depth contours, navaids, harbors, marinas, port plans coastal roads for the U.S. and Bahamas. |
| Expand Your Horizons Colorado also accepts SD cards, so you can use Garmin preprogrammed SD cards to add maps that serve any and all of your outdoor activities on land or water. |
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| Streets | Inland Lakes | Terrain | 3D Terrain | |
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| Conveniently plug in optional preloaded SD cards for all your outdoor activities on land or water. Just insert a MapSource card with detailed street maps, and Colorado provides turn-by-turn directions to your destination. Add select topographic maps to take advantage of Colorados 3-D map view which gives you a better perspective of your elevation.
The card slot is located inside the waterproof battery compartment, so you don’t have to worry about getting it wet. |
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| Rock on. Find Fun | ||
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Colorado’s innovative Rock n Roller input wheel for easy one-handed operation and intuitive screen interface make it as easy to navigate the device as the outdoors.
Customize Colorado’s interface based on your favorite activity. Even show off photos of your excursions with its picture viewer. |
| Experience Paperless Geocaching |
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Colorado supports Geocaching.com GPX files for downloading geocaches and detail straight to your unit. You’ll have at-a-glance cache descriptions and details to aid in your search. |
| Get Your Bearings | ||
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Colorado has a built-in electronic compass that provides bearing information even while you’re standing still.
Its barometric altimeter tracks changes in pressure to pinpoint your precise altitude. View elevation data before you begin your ascent or descent. You can even use the altimeter to plot barometric pressure over time, which can help you keep an eye on changing weather conditions. |
Product Description
Saltwater mariners will love the built-in detailed BlueChart g2 coverage for the coastal U.S. and the Bahamas in the 400c. The chart detail includes shoreline,depth contours, navaids and port plans.
Buy Garmin Colorado 400c Portable GPS System with Preloaded Coastal Waters Maps at Amazon
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June 29th, 2009 at 6:15 pm
I’m a US Coast Guard licensed Captain and do, among other things, delivery work. I’ve tried several of the other charting GPS units recently to upgrade my 1995 era technology Garmin GPS’s. This is the best bang for the buck.
Pros:
1. It is WAAS capable, for extreme accuracy. More on this below.If you don’t know what WAAS is, look it up. You want it in a GPS.
2. Thumb wheels is fast and easy to use. it really is a one hand device. I didn’t believe that in the write-ups, but it’s true. I particularly like spinning the wheel to zoom in or out. To move around the charts, zoom out to see the spot you want to find, press on the edge of the wheel to move the cursor where you want it and zoom in a bit, refine your cursor, zoom more–all in all a very impressive method of moving around a chart. far better than other methods I’ve seen that were slower and more tedious.
2. Carbiner clip on the back. Great for securing the device to your person or anything else. That will stay on there permanently, except to change batteries.
3. Speaking of batteries–only two AA needed. Half of what I’m used to. however, there is no external power provision. But, given the super fast acquiring of satellites, who needs to leave it on? It acquires satellites so fast, that you will routinely turn it off after checking your position. My old Garmin, was so slow to acquire positions, leaving it on was the only practical option.
4. SD Card Option. So far I have found all the charts I need built into the device. It find it reassuring I can use a common CD Card to supplement the existing charts.
5. external Antenna option. It is there. I don’t think you will need it. This thing works indoors. i can see my track made while moving around inside the house. WAAS is truly amazing.
6. You can wirelessly pass waypoints to other similar units. I hope my friends who are Captains, get these so we can share waypoints. I often sail in areas with rocks. Now I can mark and update my digital charts with even more information. i love it.
7. USB connector. Works only with more current version of Windows like XP and above and MAC OS X 10.3 and above.
8. Topo maps are cool. At some point I’ll try it on dry land. It has a Compass and Altimeter–which need to be calibrated–useful I suppose for trekkers.
9. Trip computer is fun to play with on longer voyages. It gives you something to do on boring watches.
10. Few buttons= bigger screen. There are two menu buttons, the tilt wheel, the spinner wheel, and the hub button. Screen size is about 3″. Great for a device you can fit in your shirt pocket.
Negatives:
1. No external power hookup. Not a big deal for me. I’ll buy a fixed chart display if I want that ability. After further use, I really wish this had an external power port. IT IS THE MAJOR WEAKNESS OF THIS DEVICE. For example if you want to keep your track updated–useful if you lose someone overboard on the ocean–you can follow your track back only if you have the track stored–hence you need to leave it on all the time.
2. Display is a bit dark. I find it usable. I don’t need super bright. It works. It is visible in daylight.
3. Do not use rechargeable batteries in this device–check the manufacturer website for details.
4. Lithium Batteries last about one day if used frequently at night. The backlight kills batteries. For daydtime only use, I’ve gotten three 12 hour plus sessions out of one battery (no backlight used)
5. I would not use any other type of battery than lithium. Be sure to use the lithium setting to get an idea of battery life. Otherwise it shows good until it fails.
6. For trip planning I find this device hard to use. But for on the spot use, which is what I do, it works great.
The bottom line is this. If you are like me and always working on other peoples boats, or if you don’t have a boat and want your own GPS this is the one to get. Hopping from boat to boat, I rarely take the time to learn a new yachts navigational system. First, what good is it without pre-programmed routes and way points? Second, what a pain it is to always be on the steep part of the learning curve. I’d much rather bring along an accurate pocket sized GPS and add waypoints quickly and easily, or view routes I’ve built up, or particular buoys I use often. Racers will appreciate being able to whip this puppy out and call out a range and bearing to a fix navigational aid/mark.
It works great, it is fast, and once you learn how to use it, you will carry it with you whenever you are on the water.
June 29th, 2009 at 9:28 pm
Just throw out consideration of any others, the screen redraw is as fast as any commercial unit I have seen (in fact it’s better than the system on the Boston Harbour Ferry I drive). I bought it for my boat bag for the east coast, ended up in Los Angelis for a race around Catalina Island, marked the exact slip in Marina Del Rey I left from and found it on my return. Tide and current charts at your fingertips, played with it on the plane back (watched every marina in the country go by at 540kts) identified all the rivers enroute, bought the street maps for north america (~100 or so dollars) loaded all of north america onto a $10 2gig card and used it in Cali and Boston with out having to touch a thing. This 400c is the same price as the cheaper units after you buy maps for them and just blows everything else away performance wise. Just better than sliced bread. Plus its rugged as heck.
June 29th, 2009 at 10:32 pm
1.0 out of 5 stars
Outdoor viewing is useless
Having 15 years of using Garmin products, they clearly missed the mark with this one. The screen is useless when attempting to use outside in the sunlight.
June 30th, 2009 at 1:45 am
4.0 out of 5 stars
Useful, and yes you can plug it in
I was disappointed when I read the reviews and they said it couldn’t use an external power supply, but I attached the power plug from my Garmin Nuvi (mini-usb to car lighter) and…
June 30th, 2009 at 2:43 am
I just bought the Colorado 400c for use in marine navigation. The chart information and graphics are great but the device operates in a bizarre fashion. Unless I hold it absolutely horizontal and pointed in the direction of my movement the entire map rotates on the screen to the direction that the device is pointed not the direction that my boat is moving. This makes it almost unusable for a marine GPS device. I have never seen a marine GPS behave this way. I am returning it immediately and will find another, more sensible GPS for marine use.
June 30th, 2009 at 8:32 am
5.0 out of 5 stars
Rechargeable Batteries Are OK
I haven’t use this much yet but it is way better than my old Magellan Meridian Gold. Hope my 5 star rating remains after I test it thoroughly.
June 30th, 2009 at 11:43 am
4.0 out of 5 stars
Garmin’s Best
A must for every yachtsman. Simple single handed operation, large bright screen and packed full of features. Garmin has produced a serious instrument at a reasonable cost.
June 30th, 2009 at 1:00 pm
2.0 out of 5 stars
screen too dark
I had a Garmin 76CS for three years. I replaced it with this model. I kayak on the ocean. The GPS sits on my spray skirt.
June 30th, 2009 at 3:54 pm
2.0 out of 5 stars
Poor for navigation
GARMIN COLORADO 400C HANDHELD GPS WITH BLUECHART G2 LOADED
This unit has nice charts but does not dampen the heading and boat direction.
June 30th, 2009 at 4:28 pm
2.0 out of 5 stars
Garmin Colorado 400c
This was my first GPS device. I was dissapointed in the manual. It’s pretty useless and does not provide any information for actually putting the device to use.
June 30th, 2009 at 10:58 pm
4.0 out of 5 stars
Works great
Planning a vaction to the Abaco Islands of Bahamas and boating in a new area and a novice GPS user, I needed a reliable unit that would provide coastal information.
July 1st, 2009 at 5:54 am
2.0 out of 5 stars
really lousy screen ie unreadable and odd interface
very disappointed with the brightness level and size of the screen. What genius though of REDUCING the brightness of this screen versus the previous model just to save battery…
July 1st, 2009 at 11:07 am
2.0 out of 5 stars
Weak Use of Product Explanations
I am admittedly a total GPS novice. For such a person, I have to give Garmin very low marks on their Owner’s Manual and total lack of instructions on how to use the Garmin…