I use a Garmin GPS126 ( bought second hand on ebay for £100) on the dash board.
It isn't very sophisticated and doesn't take maps but the lap top will do that. What it does do is give me a big display that tells me where I am, speed, eta, altitude distance to waypoint, distance traveled and being a nautical model deviation from course and a bearing to get back on track as well as a bearing to you destination which is very useful when the track disapears. It plots my track and allows you to retrace if needs be. It may have been superseded now but it does all I want - the receiver picks up fine through the windscreen and feeds through to the laptop for all the clever stuff via fugawi/touratech QV etc.etc.
Chris Scott sumed it up for you - a basic gps to tell you where you are, paper maps as big as you can get and all the rest is great fun to play with but not essential - except a compass  with the knowledge to use it.
Don't be scared of the technology - they are really easy to use, work in all languages, miles or kilometers and map systems as well as basic latitude and longitude. They also tell you sunrise and sunset
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Chris
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"Never have a stupid argument with an idiot - he gets a lot more practice than you"
there I go again
not too hard really
Last edited by silver G; 5 Oct 2008 at 19:23.
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