GarminForetrex 401 Waterproof Hiking GPS

I got this to go through a training course that involved patrolling through the woods and trying to find bad guys. Before we were allowed to start using GPS, it was difficult to accurately navigate wooded, hilly terrain using a compass and pace counts. We would often approach our objective from the wrong direction or have to search for it. Once we were allowed to start using a GPS, I brought this. No guess work at all. I had it hanging from my flack or on my wrist in the hot, cold, wet, dry, everything. This is great!Ease of use: It's a small computer on your wrist, it'll take a evening of tinkering to get used to all of its features. Once you take the time to understand it, it is so easy to use in the field. Push a button and find your current azimuth, push a button and see how far you are from your next point, push a button and get an instant 10 DIGIT GRID!Battery life: It'll last you a full day of continuous use. I left this thing on and hanging from my flack when we were driving vehicles through trails in the mountains all day for 10 days. I was the navigator and this is the only reason we made it back every night! I'm stubborn and don't always read instructions and toward the end of those 10 days I realized there is a place to plug in a charger rather than replace batteries all the time. It's safe to say its covered well and inconspicuous.Durability: When I hang this from the front of my flack and run, it bounces against the flack constantly. It doesn't break, it doesn't malfunction, it just does its job. Whether it's in the 30's and raining/snowing, or really hot outside and dry, this thing does its job. I recommend buying a screen protector to prevent scuffs. That's what I did and mine is still looking great. I have no fear of simply throwing this thing in my pack and heading out. I'm not concerned it's going to break in my pack or anything weird like that.Versatility: I've used this on the east coast and it was great. I got to Japan, changed the grid zones, and it was still great. I guess that what "Global" means. . . Need to find a place out in the woods? Punch in a grid and it'll take you there. It'll give you an arrow to follow, you follow it, you find the place you're looking for. Need to let someone know where you are? One of the screens give you a constant 10 digit grid. Need to follow a route? Take the time to insert points using grids, then select which points you want to visit and in which order. Then just follow the arrow. You can even label the points with words and icons. What elevation are you at? Yeah, it's on the screen all the time if you want it to be.I'm done typing. . . just buy this thing already!

I was able to download Alaska State Park maps onto my computer, import them into Garmin's Basecamp software, then convert the tracks (trail maps) into routes. Those routes can then be uploaded to this wonderful little device in seconds along with all of the waypoints (trail heads, campsites, ranger stations, etc.). In essence, it works as a true GPS with maps, despite its perceived limitations. At each trail juncture or fork, I create a waypoint in Basecamp that indicates the name of the respected splitting trail. Should I take that trail, I simply switch to the necessary route which I have also uploaded. It is nearly seamless. Topography is a no-go, but if you can't see the topography and don't have a map, you shouldn't be out there anyway.Me and my buddy were on a hike and the trail was overgrown and riddled with newly felled trees. Thanks to this device, I could tell which tree to scoot under to regain the trail because of its ability to handle rudimentary map/trail info from my computer. A few hundred yards up and there it is, the vista we were looking for.Tip: Turn on the WAAS GPS mode. It is accurate to 3 meters (only available in North America) and makes a huge difference in terms of raw accuracy.I will never hike without this. Especially in the Alaskan wilderness, Anchorage backcountry or what have you. Waterproof, rugged, accurate, efficient (battery life), and smaller than you think. Additionally, it takes light AAA batteries, so recharging, even days out on the trail is never an issue, as you would find with the "fancier" and more expensive Garmin Fenix line.No maps is a myth... See what you can find and link it up with Basecamp.

I purchased this item a year ago and used it extensively in Afghanistan. For virtually any situation, it is, in my opinion, the perfect GPS. The beauty of this unit is that at all times, with zero waiting, you have a 10 digit grid on your wrist. If it only had that feature it would be well worth the price. But it offers a lot more.It is extremely lightweight. I regularly wear it during runs now that I'm home, and do not notice the weight on my wrist at all. Durability is excellent. I have worn this in 120+ degree heat, sub freezing cold, and pouring rain. I smashed it in an armored door about halfway through my deployment, resulting in a darker spot on the screen, but it is still perfectly usable. The dust, which destroys electronics over there at an alarming rate, had no effect on it. I had heard that the foretrex series had a horrible wrist band, but that must have been fixed with the 401. I wore it constantly, and it got knocked around a lot, with zero issues.Battery life with lithium batteries is amazing, and good with others. Signal reception is very good, I never had an issue getting a signal inside armored vehicles which is often a problem with GPS units. Offers a very impressive list of functions, which can be customized to give you various types of information. The compass feature, when used with programmable waypoints, is nothing short of amazing. Land navigation is made idiot proof. It has the ability to transmit its waypoints to other garmins, but I have not used this feature.The only downsides I can think of are that the backlight is really a bit too bright, and because of the small size, and therefore few buttons, programing multiple waypoints can take some time.Overall, I can't recommend this enough. By far the most useful piece of gear that I have purchased.