Not so good offroad | Magellan Crossover 3.5-Inch Portable GPS Road and Trail Navigator

Not perfect but does the job! | Magellan Crossover 3.5-Inch Portable GPS Road and Trail Navigator

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	• Magellan Crossover 3.5-Inch Portable GPS Road and Trail Navigator Magellan Magellan average customer review:based on 97 reviews view larger image
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Good GPS, bad service; How to xfer waypoints and tracks to PC and back

Internally this unit is known as Magellan Roadmate 2500T. This is important because if you want to purchase extra SD memory, vendors will typically tell you whether their memory is supported or not. The maximum SD card this GPS can handle is 2 GB even though the documentation says it it is "unlimited". It is very much limited, it also can not handle newer SDHC card. I have had luck with SanDisk 2GB *regular* SD flash memory.

T in '2500T' stands for Traffic, meaning it can be extended with a traffic updater if so desired.

Now the review:

-- The good:

Crossover has a really good satellite visibility, it can see the satellites from the house, from the tunnels, from inside the 27 story high office building, in fact from inside the elevator shaft of that building.

The automotive navigation logic is fine, it will get you from place to place, but it seems to recalculate things very often.

The prompter voice is Ok, you can't change it though, On the other GPS (Tomtom) I was able to set up Kim Cattrall's voice, this one is just one voice that sounds like airport lady.

-- Marine functionality: You need to get so-called BlueNav maps, they come in 2 varieties, downloadable and preloaded into secure SD card.
Both varieties are expensive, if you want those it is better wait for some sort of a deal, I was able to get mine on AAA sale event at a 25% discount.

Downloadable maps are more expensive, you get a single region but you can transfer it into as many SD cards as you want, as long as they are being used on the original device. You can obviously mix and match the regions as you go. The regions themselves are quite small, typically a state or sometime half the state. For example, Massachusetts region is from Ipswich Bay to Cape Cod Canal.

SecureSD maps are a better deal, the regions included are multi-state but: a) they don't have tide information and b) if you lost them you lost them, you can't burn the maps into a new SD media. Once you purchase them they are tied up not only to the GPS device but also to the SD card (that's why it is called secure) you can't make a backup.

--- The bad:

The software that came with the unit is useless. Compared to Garmin or Fugawi it is like stone age. Their better software (VantagePoint) can't work with Crossover GPS at all.

--- The ugly:

The unit comes with the automotive maps from 2006. Why are there maps from 2006 when it is 2008 ? Because they want you to buy the updated maps, they cost $80 and it is a download. This is just plain wrong. Tomtom allows you do upgrade everything the moment you connect it to the computer.

Also, customer support is in India, I had to call about the discount on maps. Weren't helpful at all.

Overall, mixed bag. The unit itself is quite good, but the services around it (software, support, pricing, company friendliness) aren't.

--- 07/28/2008

After long search I finally found a document on the net that explained how to transfer waypoints and tracks between this unit and PC.

Original document is at:

http://www.nextdestination.com.au/UserFiles/Docs/Transferring_data_to-from_Crossover.pdf

How to transfer waypoints/tracks/routes (trips) from the CrossoverGPS to
Mapsend Lite V2.

To transfer waypoints/tracks/routes to/from Mapsend Lite you will need to have a SD card reader.

Transferring to Mapsend Lite

1. To Transfer waypoints/tracks/trips to Mapsend Lite put the CrossoverGPS into outdoor/marine mode.
2. Push the button to goto the next page.
3. Select Options>Export Data.
4. Select what you want to export, Waypoints/Trips or Tracks.
5. Enter the name of your waypoint/trip or track. Then select OK.
6. Take the SD card out of your GPS and insert it into your card reader.
7. Start Mapsend Lite
8. To import Waypoints in MapSend Lite go to GPS Contents> Waypoints>Load from File and
select GPS Unit or SD Programmer. You should see this box open up
9. Browse to your SD card drive and go to the root directory of the SD card.
10. Select the file you want to import and select Open. All your waypoints/trips or tracks will now be imported into Mapsend Lite

Transferring to CrossoverGPS is exact opposite of the above process.

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To map waypoints into Google maps use I normally use combination of Tyre and GPS Babel

Tyre at: http://www.janboersma.nl/gett/index.php
GPS Babel at: http://www.gpsbabel.org/

Both are free

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Not so good offroad

I bought this wanting to use it on and off road. The NAV features worked well enough on road, but I found the detail very lacking on offroad trails for my 4x4 trips. Magellan has been saying they would provide new maps, but I haven't seen any. I also don't like the fact that the method they use for providing map updates is to require a special SD card be kept in the unit, meaning you can't have anything else in it at the time, like saved info, photos, or MP3's.

On the positive side, this unit came with a lot of accessories that other's don't, like a mount, cables, chargers, etc.

I ended up selling the unit at a loss and I'll wait for something better to come along for street and 4x4 use.

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Not perfect but does the job!

Pros:
1. multi-purpose, I wants one for auto-natvigation and one for hiking. I don't know why it's so hard for other auto-gps to provide electronic bread-crumps.
2. GPS sensitivity is pretty good, I can get signal in my house up to 10 ft away from the window. It's not great in downtown area though.

Cons:
1. Hard to get maps for other places (e.g. Europe, NewZealand, Asia regions..) it's much easier to download maps from other users if you own a GARMIN.
2. the track save option is buggy.. the time stamp is wrong after you exported to text file.. have to figure out a work-around myself..
3. the touch screen doesn't work well all the time.. sometimes no matter where I tap, it hits the letter "M".. a bit annoying.
4. a bit bulky and heavy..

still probably would buy this one again if I want an all-in-one unit

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The Magellan Crossover GPS is the world's first fully featured, crossover pocket size GPS. This new GPS guides you from point-to-point from where the road ends to where the adventure begins. It is designed with all the standard features made popular by the Magellan RoadMate family of vehicle products. Be confident while driving, hiking, boating, fishing, geocaching and more. The Magellan Crossover GPS is the world's first IPX4 waterproof, pocket-sized GPS built for driving the highways, hiking the off-road trails, sailing the open waters or fishing wilderness lakes. Color touch screen - 3.5-inch ultra bright hi-resolution anti-glare color touch screen. Multi-Destination Routing - Pre-program and plan upcoming trips with multiple stops QuickSpell - Intelligently sorts, searches and checks spelling with reduced keystrokes TrueView - Pop-up visual of next maneuver to clearly view the turn ahead SmartDetour - Automatically prompt you to route around heavy or stopped traffic on highways Auto-reroute - Automatically calculates a new route if you miss a turn Directions - Turn-by-turn visual and voice guidance Quick Release cradle - Easy removal from car to use outside of your vehicle Locate Button - Save current location to your Address book, up to 250 addresses Night View - Display automatically turns to night view based on time of day Sports Guard - The green rubber boot adds additional protection of the device, plus comes with a lanyard for portability Vehicle Nav - Routes to mapped street closest to a desired Outdoor Waypoint Trailheads - Route to waypoints using coordinates readily available on the Internet or guidebooks Marine - Take it from land use onto your boat and then enjoy you marine sport along with detailed underwater cartography Geocaching - Position coordinates may easily be entered

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