fbrahic wrote:
I'm considering buying a GPSmap 96 or 76s as my starter GPS. It will be
used exclusively for soaring, initially, near my home airport of
Hollister, CA and later for developing my cross country skills.

Does anyone have a GPSmap 96? If so, could you share some thoughts on
using it as a navigational aid for soaring?

Thanks!

If you search on "GPSMAP" in R.A.S., you'll find a number of threads
on this topic. To summarize one line of thought, the GPSMAP 76
provides everything you really need for initial XC and limited
competition flying (regionals and OLC) for a street price of under
$200. From there, you can:

a) Interface to your used glide computer (e.g. LNAV, LX, other) if you
have one.
b) Add a PDA running Winpilot, Glide Navigator, etc.

There's a lot of misinformation (such as the posting somewhere in this
thread) about what the GPSMAP can't do. Among other cool things, you
CAN:

- Upload turnpoints, waypoints, landpoints, etc.
- Assign different icons to different kinds of points.
- Create tasks
- Create arrival radius
- Log and download flights
- Give glide angle to a point
- Lots of other stuff that may or may not matter to you

However, it doesn't provide speeds to fly and some other important
features. It really depends on how much you want to spend; there are
some compormises.

Regards,

Erik Mann
LS818 P3