[Az-Geocaching] Garmin Rino 530 review! (long!)

[Roping The Wind]

Well, after much thought and online research and finding answers to some of 
my questions and concerns... I finally purchased 2 Garmin Rino 530's! I 
ordered them from gpsnow.com and as usual, got the same great service I have 
had from them in the past. As it was just before christmas and considering 
the purchase was for more than $800 worth of GPS/Radio's, I went ahead and 
just paid for the priority overnight/Fedex shipping for $25 (its all a write 
off!). Well, the snowstorm in Denver and the midwest delayed them and they 
got here 2 days later anyways! But got them on Friday before christmas.

Upon opening the boxes, I found two nice shiny new Rino 530's and all the 
usual extras. There are a number of extra components to this unit with the 
battery pack, chargers, USB cable, etc. As usual, Garmin put together a very 
detailed and informative (and fat!) owners manual. I spent the better part 
of the afternoon reading the manual and learning about all the features of 
the 530's. I had read the entire manual online before ordering the units. 
But now with the unit in my hand, reading the manual much more familiarized 
me with the unit. Much like my 60C, the Rino is very similar, not quite as 
wide and a bit taller though. Very well constructed and heavy duty. The 
software is very similar and the 530 is very easy for me to navigate. There 
are a couple of new pages and features that I dont have in my 60c. The radio 
of course is one of them.

Alot of people say these Rino 530/520 radios are expensive, but they really 
arent. The 60CSX cost just as much as one of these so you are basically 
getting a GPS with a radio thrown in... and that is about what it is. More 
on the radios shortly. First off, battery life is killer awsome! The Lithium 
Ion battery pack was at about 80% out of the box. I charged them up to 100% 
the day I got them. Since then, I have used the units a few times around the 
neighborhood (getting used to the position reporting feature and trying to 
get a feel for the clarity of the radios and the range). I have made a 
couple of quick geocache finds with the units and I have done two balloon 
flights with the units and the battery life is still reading just about 
full!!! So definetly very impressed with the new battery packs and wouldnt 
mind seeing these types of battery packs on the 60 series. Although they do 
make the Rino's rather bulky to hold. I do, however, still find them 
comfortable to grip and hold onto. I purchased 2 cases for them of course to 
protect them and keep them clean. The cases are designed very nicely to 
accomodate all the buttons, thumbstick, mic, speakers, as well as a velcro 
opening on the back to be able to recharge the battery pack without taking 
the cover/sleeve off the unit. Not sure what the drop off curve will be like 
with the Lithium Ion battery packs though or how long they are suggested to 
last.

GPS: The GPS is very nice and I am very impressed with it. They lock onto 
satellites just as quick as my 60C. Most all the features of the GPS on the 
Rino 530 is just like my 60C. However, the additional features of the 530 
(that my 60c does not have, but a CS and CSX does have) is the barametric 
pressure sensor and altimeter as well as the electronic compass. First, the 
compass. I love it. I love having a true compass in my GPS unit. Prior, I 
had to be moving to see my heading. With the electronic compass, I can stand 
still and turn and see my new heading. It makes the map kind of jumpy when 
in map mode when standing still. If you move the unit every so slightly, the 
map really jumps around. But I realized the settings can be changed. So I 
set the eletronic compass to become 'heading' when at 1mph or faster for 
more than 45 seconds. If I am moving less than 1 mph (or standing still 
practically) it switches back to the electronic compass. The compass is 
great for ballooning as the unit also features a sighting mark on the top of 
the unit and the unit can be used as a sighting compass. This is very useful 
for pre flight ballooning. I no longer have to carry a compass with me. The 
altimeter is of course awsome as well! I love having the 'true' altimeter 
reading and not just an elevation reading. The normal elevation reading on 
my 60c is not that much off of my aircrafts altimeter, but this altimeter in 
the Rino 530 was dead nuts on to my altimeter in my balloon on both flights. 
Also, the unit has a rate of climb/descent feature which I also found to be 
extremely accurate to my vertical speed indicator on my instrument cluster 
in my balloon. So I am very impressed overall with the GPS unit. Of course, 
a new Garmin 60csX would also do what this Rino does (the rino does not have 
a SD card to add memory like the csX but does still boast 56megs of internal 
memory which is the same as my 60c, which is plenty for me).

Now to the radios: so far, not very impressed. I will not say I am 
dissapointed in the radios yet, but I am so far definetly not impressed with 
them. The first opportunity we had was during the rain and storm last week. 
I gave a radio to a family member who stayed here at the house while I 
walked around with the other unit. I walked about 1.6 miles all around my 
neighborhood. We were using the GMRS at 5 watts. I never was more than maybe 
.30 mile or so from the house at any time though. The clarity I thought was 
plenty nice and communication was generally clear and clean. The position 
reporting feature is kick ass cool! Each time either radio 'keys up', it 
sends a position report to the other rino unit. This allows me to see where 
my other rino is at any time by simply looking at my color map display on my 
unit. As I moved around the neighborhood, the other unit at my house was 
displaying my new position with each update! When I got home, I compared the 
tracks on both units. The other unit had my track log right on it! There was 
a slight difference in that the track log on the house unit said I walked 
1.4 miles when my actual unit said I walked 1.6 miles. The track was just 
about complete. But did show me cutting a few corners (which I did not, the 
unit just doesnt complete my track if I dont update my position often 
enough). A really cool feature to see my track on another GPS unit! The next 
day was christmas day and I went for a quick geocache close by, about 2.5 
miles away. These radios advertise a 12 mile range. Well, I wouldnt expect 
to get that and really didnt expect ground-to-ground to get 2.5 miles 
either. But figured since most radios only advertise a 2 or 4 mile range, I 
figure these Rino 530's with 5 watts would perhaps have the ability to reach 
from my house to this geocache 2.5 miles away. Well, the rain made it very 
difficult to get the signal out very far and I lost communication at about 
1/2 mile away from the house (on the other side of the freeway as well, so 
not even line of sight). I kind of expected that though and that would be 
expected of a 'bubble pack' type handheld FRS or GMRS radio.

The first balloon flight had me staying pretty close to my chase crew on the 
ground. They were never very far away. Reception was great and communication 
went fine. I did think it was a bit scratchy at times and the clarity not as 
good. But didnt notice it too much that it bothered me any. No problems 
communicating on this whole flight and the position reporting feature was 
simply awsome. I am impressed with this feature. But I do wish it could do 
more. Its nice being able to look down at my GPS map and see where my ground 
chase crew is at! The same for them as they can see me (in relation to my 
location on the earth) in the balloon. On the second flight, the atmosphere 
was very moist. No fog, but there was a very high moisture content in the 
air. So that will downgrade a radio signal a bit, I believe. My ground crew 
stayed at the launch site while I flew off. I got about 3 miles away and at 
about 3,500' and while we could communicate and understand each other, the 
clarity sucked. There was a time when I was almost straight above my crew at 
about 1,500' and the clarity again sucked. So not sure that I am very 
impressed at all with the radios. I found my 15 year old Motorola VHF 
handhelds to be MUCH clearer and a MUCH better range. I have talked over 30 
miles line of site clear as a bell with my 1 watt VHF radios! I am still not 
sure about range, but I am not confident these Rino 530's at 5 watts will do 
very well at all. The first flight we were close together the whole time, 
the second flight the atmosphere was very wet, so maybe I havent gotten a 
true sense of what the GMRS radios are capable of yet. I do know that VHF 
radios can handle these conditions MUCH better.

All in all, I am half and half on whether or not I really like these units 
for my application. The GPS is awsome and very impressed with it. But I 
could pay half this much and get a 60CSX and have all the features that I 
like about the 530 GPS (electronic compass, altimeter, barametric pressure, 
sighting compass, etc). The position reporting has a downside as well, they 
DO NOT have an auto sending feature to automatically send your position. You 
do have to key up to send a new position report. Almost makes this feature 
worthless. Unless you keep talking (or keying up), you will not know where 
the other rino unit is, only its last known position. The FCC used to not 
allow data transfer thru GMRS frequencies, but Garmin somehow pulled some 
strings with the FCC to get the position reporting feature into the Rino 
units. However, the FCC would not allow data to be sent on a continuous 
basis (which is understandable, as it would perhaps jam the frequency). So 
the unit only allows a position report to be send once every 30 second and 
only manually. Personally, I dont see any harm at all in just allowing the 
units to auto send once every 10 minutes. I think 10 minutes is perfect 
spacing for position updates. As it stands how, I think they are going to 
find rino users keying up MUCH more frequently just to send an update of 
their positions. I did see on the Rino users group on Yahoo that someone 
made a little gadget that plugs right into the mic jack of the Rino unit 
that will allow the unit to send regular updates of your position every 45 
seconds or so. This would technically be illegal of course. But someone has 
instructions on how to make one! It is rather cool. Someone also made a mod 
to a Rino 110 to improve on the antenna to make it accept an external 
antenna!

Anyways, we will continue to test the Rino for a couple more flights along 
side my VHF radios to see which is truly a better radio. At this time, I am 
not impressed with the radio feature of the 530's at all. But maybe we just 
have not had good atmospheric conditions yet to see what they are capable 
of. FRS/GMRS radios dont generally have very good range at all if conditions 
are not perfect. Still, we are line of site from balloon to ground vehicle, 
I would expect better of a 5 watt radio. Again, clarity generally sucked as 
well. I am not sure if altitude is good for the radio range either. I had 
better communication when flying low. Something else interesting to note: 
The Garmin Rino 530 has a weather radio on it. There are 7 channels. I have 
one of those weather radios at home here. With the home unit, I can 
generally clearly pick up Phoenix and Gila County stations, and only on 
occasionally pick up Tucson. I cant ever get northern AZ/Flagstaff. With the 
Rino 530, I can pick up all 4 of these channels clearly... every time! The 
GPS side of the unit is of course right up to what I would expect from 
Garmin... a great GPS unit.

All in all, the investment for 2 of these units was over $850. For about 
$450 or so, I could have a 60csx and have all the great new features of the 
530 in the GPS that I now am in love with and is awsome for my application 
(ballooning). As it stands now, I really like the Rino 530's in that they 
are truly a 3 in 1 device. Rather than carrying a sighting compass, a radio 
and a GPS in my balloon... I have all three of these devices in one and 
right in my front shirt pocket and right handy when I am flying. Actually, 
it is almost like a 5 in 1 unit as it has my altimeter and my vertical speed 
indicator as well! With that said, I have mixed emotions about the 530's. I 
really like all the great GPS features as well as the position reporting, 
but simply just not impressed with the radios. We will try them out on a 
couple more flights in better conditions and see what results that brings 
and make a final decision on whether I stick with these GMRS radios or go 
back to my old VHF radios. Communications is very important with my balloon 
operations and we cant expect anything less than perfect with it. If the 
radios on the Rino's simply dont meet my standards, I am definetly going to 
be picking up a 60csx to have all the great added features that I now simply 
must have!!! :) Then perhaps sell the Rino's and maybe seek out a higher 
watt VHF radio! :) (always in search for something better!!!!)

Scott
Team Ropingthewind

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