User Review: DeLorme Earthmate GPS PN-20

DeLorme Earthmate GPS PN-20
Above: The current Earthmate GPS PN-20, which may differ slightly from the version reviewed.

Reviewed December 16, 2008 by Rex

Rating:
Price Paid: $230

I stumbled into buying this unit after purchasing a very disappointing Magellan Triton 400 and National Geographic Software package. It turned out to be a marriage from Hades, so I carried it back and purchased the PN-20 packaged with Delorme's Topo 7.0.

This was a wonderful marriage compared to the Magellan Triton experience. Software worked great and allows all kinds of possibilities with downloading maps, aerials, NOAA charts, you name it! The unit is built very well and I am very pleased at the quality for the price.

The only negative things I might add is that the display is small and the learning curve is a little more than average to get up and running the way you want it with the features you want.

This unit is an excellent and economical choice in my opinion if you have already owned and played with prior GPS units. If you are new to purchasing a handheld GPS unit, you may become very confused, very fast. It just offers so much that a new person might easily become confused. On the contrary, if you have owned and played with maps and GPS units in the past, you will find that this is one powerful unit!

As of this writing (12-16-2008), I suspect they are getting ready to stop making the PN-20 and continue with their PN-40. The price continues to drop each week. From what I can tell, the PN-20 will not accept SD cards larger than 2 Gig while the PN-40 will support SD cards up to 32 Gig. This affects the amount of map details and areas you want in one package but hey, for the money....if you don't mind maybe downloading areas from your software into your GPS as you go on some different trips.....The Delorme PN-20 and Topo 7.0 are wonderful products! The receiver by the way, works very well.

Save & Share