Garmin Montana 680, Touchscreen Hiking Handheld, Gps/Glonass With 8 Megapixel Camera

Garmin Montana 680, Touchscreen Hiking Handheld, GPS/GLONASS with 8 Megapixel Camera

• See Your Surroundings - Includes a 1-year Birdseye Satellite Imagery subscription1
• GPS and GLONASS - With its high-sensitivity, WAAS-enabled GPS receiver, Hotfix satellite prediction and GLONASS support, Montana locates your position quickly and precisely and maintains its location even in heavy cover and deep canyons
• Track Manager - Ability to organize and navigate through waypoints/routes/track logs (easily start/stop recording track logs)
• Capture The Moment - 8 megapixel digital camera for higher quality images and better resolution; geotagged with coordinates automatically, allowing you to

Buy Now : Garmin Montana 680, Touchscreen Hiking Handheld, GPS/GLONASS with 8 Megapixel Camera

Brand : Garmin
Category : Electronics,GPS, Finders & Accessories,Sports & Handheld GPS,Handheld GPS Units
Rating : 4.3
ListPrice : US $549.99
Price : US $459.95
Review Count : 652
ChildASIN : B014QN4ZP2,B014QN4XUO

Garmin Montana 680, Touchscreen Hiking Handheld, GPS/GLONASS with 8 Megapixel Camera

• I have a lot to learn about the garmin. Use it primarily on dirt bike rides. Wish it came with some useful programs already downloaded
• Came as described in every way.very pleased.
• The seller was Amazon. I paid 479 bucks.My old GPS is a Garmin GPSMAP 76S. That was my first GPS, and I\'ve had it since 1999. It is now slow to find satellites, sometimes forgets where it is (and needs to be reset using \"new location\" even within the same State), and sometimes freezes. It has served me well, before these problems.GPSI have to say that I really liked the way the 76S was setup, and the info that it provided me, and HOW it provided me with the info (i.e., screen organization, menu organization). I also like that it put me in control.What I found with the 680 is that the Garmin GPS wants control. There are many presets like hiking mode, recreation mode, car mode, marine mode, walking mode, 4WD/off-roading mode, mountaineering mode, etc. etc. These various modes attempt to determine routes for me. That\'s not how I operate. I research a trip, I design the route on mapping software, I create the waypoints, and then I load the coordinates/routes/waypoints into my GPS, and my GPS tracks my progress and directs me to my destination.In order to use the 680 the way I want, I have to set the profile to \"direct control\" with all 3 features in that profile to be off or manual. Otherwise, when I load my routes/waypoints, the Garmin tells me that it will take a very long time to compute the route; or other times it also displays an error message saying that there is no road in the area.When I set the profile to \"direct control\", it works fine.GPS AND GLONASSThe quantity of satellites and speed of satellite reception are phenomenal.MAPSI compared the Montana 610, 610t, 680, and 680t. The \"t\" models come with 100K topo maps. But I already have MapSource from my 76S days, and Garmin still provides free updates for my old MapSource, which makes it current. MapSource is also 100K topo (1:100,000 scale).I also have the old National Geographic Topo software, which has 24K maps (7.5 minute, 1:24,000 scale). That is still my main mapping software.I tried to purchase the download version of Garmin TOPO US 24K North Central, but my DSL wasn\'t fast enough and/or Garmin\'s download process kept failing. After trying multiple times and 2+ hours on the phone with Garmin support, I gave up. Instead, I purchased the  Garmin TOPO US 24K North Central - microSD/SD .CAMERAThe camera on the Garmin 680 is weak. It has 3 photo size options: 2MP, 4MP, 8MP. It has only 2 features: zoom in/out, and standard/low light level. That\'s it. No pano. No flash. No timer. No special exposure settings. No other features of any kind. Very odd in this day of feature-rich cell phone cameras. DO NOT BUY THE 680 FOR THE CAMERA...AT ALL. Use your cell phone camera instead. I was hoping to leave my cell in my pack and just carry one device on the trail. Not with Garmin\'s featureless camera.SCREENThe touchscreen works great, and it looks good. It is very customizable (colors, moving apps around, different types of menu display options). Save the battery by turning-off the backlight during the day; the screen displays great under direct sunlight or in the shade.DASHBOARD DISPLAYI was disappointed in how large the dashboard icons/readings were. There are at least 2 kinds: large (which uses most of the screen), or small (which uses still way too much of the screen). The dashboard choices could have been a lot smaller, which would have meant more options to see at once (like distance to destination, distance to next point, odometer, elevation, etc.)MENUSThe menu structure is fine...just takes some getting used to.APPSI\'m really just interested in the GPS apps on the unit. Other helpful apps are clock, alarm, calendar, etc. But there is a lot of stuff that I just don\'t need. Thankfully, I can adjust the menu, so that I can put all of the unwanted apps to the back or remove them from the main menu altogether.==================================CONCLUSIONS==================================I returned the 680 and got the 610 instead. Why? Because the 680 camera was lousy. The 680 without the camera is really a 610. Save yourself some money: buy the 610 and use your cell for photos.I\'ll use the Garmin 24K topo on SD card, because I can\'t download the maps from Garmin. Until I\'m comfortable with the basecamp software, I\'ll continue to create my trips using my old National Geographic Topo software, convert the file to GPX using GPSBabel, and then send the file to the 610 using basecamp.
• Having a dedicated GPS unit instead of using a phone has its advantages. My Garmin 680 can last more than a day of continuous use without having to recharge the battery. I\'ve used my Montana in Hawaii, both as a pedestrian and as a vehicle driver. Used it in NYC and it helped me navigate unfamiliar streets at night and get me back to my hotel and to the nearest subway station. I rode the Amtrak train from NY to Miami and it was interesting to watch the map the entire way, and i could zoom into the maps for further detail. Used it in Miami too, the device hasn\'t failed me. I\'m back in Honolulu where i live and I still use it, for both navigating, exploring new areas I\'m unfamiliar with, and as a photographer, saving GPS waypoints of areas I want to return later. The Garmin Montana was one of the best purchases i made this year
• Preface: First I just want to say Garmin makes a good product with rugged materials and job specific features that help navigate.Okay, so that out of the way, using a Garmin product is like using 15 year old cellphone technology. It\'s the Blackberry that ignored innovation in key areas of user experience such as web browsing, excellent cameras, etc. And while duh, that\'s not what the GPS is supposed to do, I still say there\'s ample room for user experience improvement.The 380T has a nice size screen and excellent back lighting, great storage capacity. The powered/locking mount combo with the RAM mount were brilliant. Battery life was great. It comes with cables and lots of instructions - all great. None of those things failed me once. It doesn\'t come with a case (Really Garmin? - that\'s pretty cheap of you not to include a case or bag at this price)Where it lacks however, is in it\'s hesitant map loading, it\'s incongrous zooming (page moves from your location as you zoom), screen sensitivity was so touchy as I\'m trying to finger move the page the gps is popping up unwanted waypoints.I spent 18 hours in the rugged backcountry of the Cascades in Washington and I swear it was A) 50% wrong on forest/fire service roads - no updated info for dead end/unmaintained roads (that\'s probably a data quality issue from the data source). Because the scrolling/zooming were so arduous it was incredibly difficult to work with the 380T in the field to find alternate routes. As an example, Garmin plotted me a course from forest service roads down through a campground and into the trees down a barely maintained foot trail, apparently because it connected to a road 2.5 miles away. Let\'s just say it was a one way trip of hope and fear that I might have to figure out how to ride my bike back up a brutal path. Luckily it ended well and on the bright side, I know I can trespass my way out of the hills on foot if ever needed.This is a good unit overall. It feels and acts like 15 year old cellphone technology. Plan your back country trip in advance using Base Camp, Buy the Hunt View chip and the 24K chip for your area so you can have sat image as well as routing.User Recommendation: If you\'re a back country motorcyclist, you may be better off simply downloading Google maps for offline gps use on your smart phone.Garmin Recommendation: Go buy your self a Samsung Galaxy S9 and pay attention to the user interface on Google Earth/Google Maps and ask yourself, could we improve our HH GPS units to be even better than the are today.

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