An Excellent GPS

I have had my GPSMAP 76 for about a year and a half now and used it in any possible situation, i.e. on a boat, in the car and while hiking. Since I had previous experience with Garmin GPS products, I knew the quality was hard to beat and this unit was no exception: it just feels solid and sturdy. The fact that it is watertight and floats makes it sweeter and give additional comfort.

The many functions of the unit are easy to learn and to apply. With the WAAS correction and without external antenna I had accuracy down to under 10 feet, and with my low-profile aux antenna under 8 feet.

I used the pre-loaded marine database while navigating around Long Island Sound marking my favorite fishing holes. I like the screen that shows the route sort of as as "road" so you steer your boat like it's a car down this virtual road until you arrive at your destination. When I used it in my car, I had MapSource data for my state loaded and was able to find anything I needed to (MapSource has a function to find street addresses and will suggest the best way of getting there). In other words, those who need a GPS that can be used on sea and the next minute in your car, this one is hard to beat (well, unless you want to spend an additional $200 or so for a color display). The many accessories available (external antennae, mounting brackets etc.) make this an all-around great product with many exciting features. Hooking the unit up to the PC and "swapping" information between the GPS and the PC is downright simple with any of the MapSource Products. 8 Megabytes internal memory are enough to load the GPSMAP 76 full with data of an average U.S. state.

I can only recommend Garmin products, I've had a GPS 12, GPS76, GPSMAP 76 and now a GPSMAP 76C (yes, I love color :) and never had the slightest problem with any of them.