Water-Resistant Magellan eXplorist 300 GPS for Hiking Review

This little guy is great at helping me get back to where I started on my boat. The instruction manual is small but I figured out how to use it and I'm not a computer genius. Great for what I bought it for.

I was just driving from Fresno to Sacramento and noticed that the 300 has only major highways and absolutely no road map. If you're looking for a basic sat nav to get you back on the freeway if you're just running around town, this is fine, but for getting out into the country and using it to hike or bike? Probably not - just not enough detail unless you just want to go back to where you came from. Maximum detail is about 100 feet (to scale). I'm looking at 300/400 as you can get detailed…

Last review if anyone had read and studied the product carefully they would not have been fooled. I'm in the Army ROTC program and we fly a lot overland in the middle of the forest. He has a good compass. Lots of great features detailed and everything I need I'm still figuring out what it can do. It's very durable and can take a few hits if needed, but I wouldn't throw it off a cliff. I was driving from Arkansas to Kansas and used this GPS device to keep me informed and know which cities were…

The eXplorist 300 is a good device that far outperforms basic GPS. It has a very readable screen with excellent 2-level backlight that consumes good battery life quickly. The menu structure is intuitive and simple. The electronic compass is a real plus for this device, but it needs to be kept level for accuracy. I found the built-in map useful, but not without labeling mistakes. Just don't expect a lot of detail below the main road. The device takes a bit of time to get maximum accuracy on…

Megellan's "customer service" is by far the worst we have encountered. In our experience, Magellan's customer service tactic is to hold the customer for a long time in the hope that they will hang up, always force the customer to call back and never agree to a call back or email. and make false promises. I accept everything with the intention that at some point the client will simply give up. Not only does Magellan not endorse their product, their customer service reps are obviously trained to…

It has worked well and I often use it when hiking or cycling to new places. Disposable batteries last 2 to 4 days depending on how you use them. I took batteries. They don't last as long as disposables but save a lot of money as I can charge them when needed. I always carry extra batteries with me when using the device.

My son spent his hard earned money on this in January. He liked how it worked when he used it. He put it away for the "dead" time of year, and when he took it out last night to get ready for this weekend's hunt, the LCD stopped working. It glows, but it's so bright you can't read it. I should have known not to let him buy a product with only a 90 day guarantee. In our experience, it's not "durable," but a $180 paperweight. Is there a way to fix this?

I'm in the infantry and we use what's called a plugger. It's huge, slow, and useless. In Iraq I used the Garmin E-Trex. The front panel is cracked but still works. When I got home I bought a new GPS. We switched to DAGGER, another terrible and unfriendly military GPS. I don't have time in the field to use the 12 steps to work on a product. Therefore we rely on civilian GPS devices. This model worked fine when I used the in-store demo, but I had to wear gloves when doing it. I often wear either…

I have had an eXplorist 300 for a long time. Up until over a year ago I had a Garmin eTrex Legend Es fell off a cliff while hiking. I'll take care of that later. Of course, this review will include a comparison of the two devices. They're in the same class and price range and the devices and company are great. First, if you want a PC interface, the eXplorist 300 doesn't have one (but the eXplorist 210, 400, 500, etc. do). . If you need detailed street maps (the eXplorist 300 only has major…