Thread: Software for laptop navigation

I still use nRoute because in my opinion it has some charateristics for long trips which I prefer over Mobile PC. Garmin nRoute also apparently works with the older Bluechart maps.
There is also another problem with it which I have become recently aware of.
I use a Garmin 60CSX and the USB output from the GPSr to a laptop with nRoute.
The 60CSX and a number of other GPS units used the SiRF III chipset. This chipset and the GPS firmware allowed data from GPS to laptop. On the last production runs of the 60CSX Garmin changed to a Mediatek chipset. This new chipset unfortunately "broke" the ability for the 60CSX to comunicate with some software including nRoute. This may be a problem with other more recent GPSrs if they use the Mediatek chipset. On a 60CSX you can tell what chipset you have by the:

Software ver. 4.20 / 4.00
GPS SW ver. 2.40m / 3.00s

You can get this info from your 60CSX by entering MENU>MENU>SETUP>SYSTEM>MENU. Choose "Software Version".
After doing some research on the internet I discovered that the new unit with the "m" in the GPS SW ver.utilizes a MediaTek chip while the old unit has a SiRF III chipset designated by the "s".
That may explain some of the communication problems.

Originally Posted by mullerh

I still use nRoute because in my opinion it has some charateristics for long trips which I prefer over Mobile PC. Garmin nRoute also apparently works with the older Bluechart maps.
There is also another problem with it which I have become recently aware of.
I use a Garmin 60CSX and the USB output from the GPSr to a laptop with nRoute.
The 60CSX and a number of other GPS units used the SiRF III chipset. This chipset and the GPS firmware allowed data from GPS to laptop. On the last production runs of the 60CSX Garmin changed to a Mediatek chipset. This new chipset unfortunately "broke" the ability for the 60CSX to comunicate with some software including nRoute. This may be a problem with other more recent GPSrs if they use the Mediatek chipset. On a 60CSX you can tell what chipset you have by the:

Software ver. 4.20 / 4.00
GPS SW ver. 2.40m / 3.00s

You can get this info from your 60CSX by entering MENU>MENU>SETUP>SYSTEM>MENU. Choose "Software Version".
After doing some research on the internet I discovered that the new unit with the "m" in the GPS SW ver.utilizes a MediaTek chip while the old unit has a SiRF III chipset designated by the "s".
That may explain some of the communication problems.

As the 76cx superceeds the 60csx I would tend to agree with you, it may be an incompatibility issue, after spending hours on the internet it appears that nRoute does have connectability issues but they were not clear as to what gps or os was being used, so no luck there.

Did you actually try a newer 60csx, and did it give the issues I am experiencing?

Great post by the way.