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Garmin eTrex 30

October 24, 2011 By 36 Comments

Garmin eTrex 30

The Garmin eTrex 30 is the top of the line model in the new eTrex series, which brings a long-awaited update to this popular line. It offers paperless geocaching, new customization options and BirdsEye aerial imagery capability.

Quick links

More Garmin eTrex 30 reviews
Garmin eTrex 30 resources
How much does it cost?

I’ll get into all the details in a moment, but first let’s look at what separates the eTrex 30 from the other models in the series…

Related units

  • Drop down to the eTrex 20 and you’ll lose the 30’s triaxial electronic compass, barometric altimeter, wireless data sharing and Garmin chirp compatibility
  • The entry level eTrex 10 has a monochrome screen and no ability to add maps
  • To see how the eTrex 30 stacks up against other models, check out my Garmin handheld GPS comparison chart

NOTE: Much of the following is adapted from my hands on review of the eTrex 20.

Garmin eTrex 30 hardware

ButtonsGarmin eTrex 30 side

There are six buttons on the eTrex, three on the left, two on the right and one on the front (see image at top of page):

  • Zoom in and zoom out buttons – These are on the left and can also be used to navigate menu lists a page at a time
  • Menu button – (Also on the left side) Brings up a context sensitive menu; double-tap to access the main menu; press and hold to bring up the Find menu
  • Back – On the right side; moves you back a step in the menu structure
  • Power/Light – (Also on the right side) A short tap brings brings up a screen with date/time, battery and GPS status; additional short taps toggle between 0, 50 and 100% backlight; press and hold to power down
  • Thumb stick – Located on the front of the device, you can toggle it side to side or up and down to navigate menus and pan the map; press down to enter a menu command or select a map point; press and hold to mark a waypoint

Display

The eTrex 30 has a bright but small display that is easily visible in sunlight or with the backlight engaged.

Garmin eTrex 30 interface

When you power up the eTrex 30, you’re taken to the Main Menu (below at left). You can change the order of items by pressing the menu button. If you select another screen (e.g., map) and then press the menu button, you’ll find a context-sensitive menu (shown below at right).

Garmin-eTrex-30-menus

Garmin eTrex 30 features

GLONASS on eTrexGLONASS

The one item found on the new eTrex series missing from all other Garmin units is the ability to use GLONASS as well as GPS satellites. There is an option to use GPS only, but no option for GLONASS only. Theoretically, GLONASS will improve accuracy. This may be especially true at northerly latitudes and in urban (and natural) canyons. I’ll talk about this a bit more in the performance section of this review.

More new features for the eTrex series

Many of the features found on higher-end Garmin handhelds are now available on the eTrex 30. These include…

Paperless geocaching

This gives you the ability to view description, hints, log, etc., in the field. The eTrex 30 also allows you to filter caches, letting you search by size, difficulty, terrain, etc. I’ll have more to say about geocaching in the performance section of this review. Some screenshots:

eTrex-30-geocaching-screens

BirdsEye aerial imagery and topo maps

The eTrex 30 is fully compatible with Garmin’s BirdsEye products, including their aerial imagery and topo maps of the US and Canada. Each runs $30 for a one-year subscription; imagery you’ve downloaded during that period can still be used, even if you don’t renew. While the images below weren’t captured on an eTrex, they should give you an idea of the capabilities…

BirdsEye aerial and topo

BirdsEye aerial imagery is particularly useful for urban cachers, outdoors lovers in the open landscapes of the American west, and for boaters. I find it less useful under the dense canopy of the eastern US.

I absolutely love the BirdsEye topo product. There is nothing quite like having the map on your device look exactly like the USGS topo in your hand.

Advanced track navigationeTrex-30-track-nav

I have written before about advanced track navigation, but basically it will give you the best of both worlds when it comes to following a track or route. Simply choose a track to navigate and it will construct a route of waypoints along the track, add in high and low points, and give you the actual track mileage to each point, as shown at left.

Garmin custom maps

Now that we have BirdsEye Topo, there isn’t as much need for custom maps, but hey, you can put a PDF park map on your eTrex, and that’s pretty sweet.

Calendar

The Calendar displays dates when  waypoints and tracks are saved, and it also displays geocaches that you’ve logged.

Profiles

Profiles allow you to save different groups of settings; you can have one for geocaching, one for mountain biking, one for road riding, etc. These are discussed more below under “Customizing the Garmin eTrex 30.”

More eTrex 30 features of note

Route, Track and Waypoint management

The eTrex 30 has excellent route, track and waypoint management tools, including:

  • Waypoints – The ability to project a waypoint, average location, set proximity alerts, and to reposition a waypoint at your current location
  • Tracks – You can choose to hide or show multiple tracks on the map, view an elevation plot, and give them a custom color (17 colors are available); the color of the active track may also be changed
  • Routes – You can view a map of the entire route, edit the route, reverse it and view an elevation plot

Ability to add free maps

One of the great things about Garmin handhelds is the ability to add free maps to them, and the eTrex 30 is no exception. GPS File Depot is an excellent source of maps for the eTrex.

Customizing the Garmin eTrex 30

Main menu item order – You can customize the main menu item order by pressing the Menu button while viewing the Main Menu.

Accessing pages via the back button – Use Setup > Page sequence for this, but be aware that these pages will disappear from the main menu.

Profiles – The eTrex 30 comes with recreational, geocaching, automotive, marine and fitness profiles. You can switch profiles by selecting Profile Change from the Main Menu. Or create a new one by going to Main Menu > Setup > Profiles > Create Profile. Select the new profile to edit the name. Any changes you make in menus or other settings will be retained in that profile. So start changing things! Want track up when geocaching and north up when biking? No problem. How about a separate profile that just shows USGS topos or aerial imagery? The possibilities are nearly endless.

Data fields – You can change data fields on just about any screen that has these; usually you just press Menu > Change Data Fields.

Dashboards – Instead of data fields (and in some cases in addition to), you can select a dashboard for the map, compass and trip computer screens. Choices (depending upon page) may include automotive, stopwatch, small or large data field, recreational, compass, geocaching or elevation plot. I’ve included screenshots showing a couple below. For the trip computer and compass pages, you access this via Menu > Change Dashboard. For the map screen, choose Menu > Setup Map > Data Fields > Dashboard. The one downside here is the small screen on the eTrex series; using a dashboard can significantly reduce map real estate.

eTrex 30 dashboards

Unique to the eTrex 30

Let’s go over the features found on the eTrex 30, but not on the 20:

  • Triaxial electronic compass – Having an electronic compass means the eTrex 30 can point to your destination while standing still; triaxial means you don’t have to hold it level like other electronic compass models; the downside is that you will have to calibrate the compass after each battery change
  • Barometric altimeter – This will give you more accurate elevation readings and allow you to see an elevation plot of your tracks
  • Wireless data sharing – The eTrex 30 is capable of wireless data transfer with other compatible Garmin units; you can transfer waypoints, tracks, routes and paperless geocache details
  • Garmin chirp compatibility – Adds a new dimension to geocaching

Garmin eTrex 30 tips

I imagine there are more, but here’s a few tips:

  • Use the zoom buttons to jump a full page in a menu
  • When entering a name, the zoom buttons will switch between keypads
  • You can create a custom startup message (e.g., if found, please call…) by connecting it to your computer and editing the Garmin/startup.txt file
  • You can check the battery level by briefly pressing the power button; you may also dedicate a data field to battery status.

    Garmin eTrex x0 series performance

    The following refers to tests done on the eTrex 20:

    Battery life

    With the eTrex set to record a track point every five seconds, I left the device on, sitting stationary, under light canopy, powered by a fully charged set of Eneloop NiMH rechargeable AA batteries. With the backlight set to remain on full, batteries lasted 10 hours and 17 minutes. The backlight off test is still running, but I wanted to go ahead and post this. I’ll update that info later today. UPDATE: With the backlight off, the eTrex 20 ran for an amazing 23 hours and 29 minutes before shutting off.

    Tracks

    Tracklog accuracy was tested with the eTrex 20, GPSMAP 60CSx (with SiRFstar III chipset) and a GPSMAP 62s mounted on the handlebars of my mountain bike. All units were set to record track points every five seconds. Tracks were collected on out and back runs and then  analyzed for track separation errors. The idea here is that, ideally, the track recorded on the way out should match perfectly with the one recorded on the way back to the trailhead. Of course no unit ever meets the ideal.

    The 60CSx performed best, with less errors in general and a maximum track separation error of about 80’. The 62s had significantly more segments with easily visible track separation errors, maxing out at around 120’. The eTrex was worst, with more visible errors that tended to be separated by a greater distance, maxing out at around 125’. I find it interesting, but not surprising, that the oldest unit with the most mature firmware performed best, while the newest unit with the least mature firmware performed worst. Here’s an image of an eTrex 20 track (you should be able to click on it for a larger image)…

    eTrex 30 track

    It gets more interesting when you look at the geocaching test results…

    Geocaching

    Caveat: I’ve yet to come up with a good way to test geocaching accuracy. There are just too many variables – accuracy of the cache coordinates, satellite constellation variability, terrain (multipath effects), etc.

    So having said that, here’s a very unscientific test. After becoming familiar with the unit, towards the end of my testing, I made some cache runs. I set the units down on top of the cache one at a time and recorded the reported distance to cache in feet. The results are shown below.

      GPSMAP 62s Oregon 450 eTrex 20 with GPS+GLONASS eTrex 20 with GPS only
    Cache 1 6 14 16 6+
    Cache 2 20 49 10+ 15
    Cache 3 36 29 13 48
    Cache 4 30 37 26+ 44
    Average 23 32.25 16.25 28.25

    Not bad, and you can see that GLONASS appears to result in some improvement. The plus signs indicate cycling, where the distance to cache would cycle from a low number to a higher number over a period of a minute or so and then repeat. In this situation, I used the lower number in the charts above. The eTrex 20 seems to suffer from the malady that affects all new Garmins, where the firmware is far from perfect. This cycling was also seen in early firmware versions of the GPSMAP 62 and Oregon series.

    Lags and redraws

    I noticed some slight lags when navigating menus, and a bit of a delay (a second or so) on map redraws when panning the map. I noticed no map redraw delays while mountain biking with the unit though. Some users have reported map redraw delays with raster imagery such as Garmin’s BirdsEye products, though I believe these reports have been limited to map panning and not delays on the moving map.

    Garmin eTrex 30 pros

    • Bright display
    • Small size
    • GLONASS for improved accuracy
    • Paperless geocaching capability
    • BirdsEye aerial imagery and US/Canada topo compatibility
    • Advanced track navigation
    • Garmin custom maps capability
    • Customization options (dashboards, profiles, etc.)
    • Excellent battery life
    • Triaxial electronic compass
    • Barometric altimeter
    • Wireless data sharing

    Garmin eTrex 30 cons

    • Small display
    • Distance to destination cycling and tracklog separation point to immature firmware

    Garmin eTrex 30 conclusion

    Despite some early bugs, I like the new eTrex series, and think it will be a good unit for all sorts of outdoors lovers. My quibbles with it are pretty minor, and Garmin has a good track record of fixing significant issues (although it can often take awhile). The track separation issues aren’t bad enough to cause most folks navigation problems, though the distance to destination cycling could prove frustrating to geocachers. The extensive feature set, including paperless geocaching, GLONASS support and BirdsEye aerial imagery capability, is very nice. The eTrex series is lightweight and has extraordinary battery life, making it an especially choice for backpackers.

    More Garmin eTrex 30 reviews

    I’ll be posting more hands on GPS reviews as they appear, but in the meantime, here are some…

    Other Garmin eTrex 30 resources

    Compare prices on the Garmin eTrex 30 at these merchants:


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    About Rich Owings

    Rich is the owner, editor and chief bottle-washer for GPS Tracklog. Connect with him on Twitter, Facebook or Google Plus.

    Comments

    1. Oz Measure says:
      December 15, 2011 at 6:05 am

      Very informative review. Graphics,layout,content very professional and pertinent,IMO. Your review convinced me to return the 20 and get the 30. The electronic compass is the real deal in the woods at night, and to have it available in the Etrex series is large. Great value at under $300. I purchased mine at Overstocked.com for $256.00 no shipping or handling charges, and got it two days later. I understand from their website that the 30 is on backorder as of 12-15-11; at that price, no wonder! No other site was close.

      Reply
    2. Oz Measure says:
      December 15, 2011 at 6:21 am

      Just checked the Overstock site and they jacked the price up to $275.00 since I got my unit on Tuesday.

      Reply
    3. Geoffrey Sherwood says:
      December 22, 2011 at 8:09 pm

      Amazon has the etrex 30 at $250, and the 20 at $183.

      Reply
    4. Q.M. says:
      February 6, 2012 at 11:42 pm

      So here’s a question that might be useful for folks, like myself, new to mapping GPSr’s: I could use a little disambiguation on the map types available. (i get raster v. vector, I just don’t know what the GPS can do with them) What are the different kinds of topo’s this unit uses? I see the USGS birds eye topo, ($30) and of course there is the Garmin 24k topo, purchased by region. And for comparison, there is the topo offered for the Earthmate PN60. Are the USGS maps that can be interpreted by the unit as terrain, or just dead images like the aerial views? It seems like the GPS can do more with some types, and less with others! Thanks if you can help, and if not, thanks for great site anyways! Q

      Reply
    5. Rich Owings says:
      February 7, 2012 at 8:11 am

      The advantage of BirdsEye Topo is that they are the same maps as USGS topos.

      The advantages of the 24K topo is that the maps scale better as you zoom, and they include routable trails and roads.

      These posts may help…

      http://gpstracklog.com/2011/05/garmin-birdseye-topo-us-and-canada.html

      http://gpstracklog.com/2011/06/garmin-topo-us-24k-review.html

      I’m not sure what you mean by “Are the USGS maps that can be interpreted by the unit as terrain, or just dead images like the aerial views?”

      Reply
      • Q.M. says:
        February 7, 2012 at 9:56 am

        I can certainly see ( and want! ) the advantage of USGS topo’s, and I get how you can zoom in on computed curve (vector) vs. the finite detail that is offered by pixels. Again, I’m new at this, and haven’t had hands on time… What I don’t understand is what the units can do with them. For instance, the elevation profiles of a planned route you show; it seems like the GPS couldn’t get that info from a raster image of a topo, and that it would need something like the Garmin 24k topo, which seems like more than just a vector image, but something the GPS actually can interpret, and can generate a elevation profile from. This one might be better posted in the forums…

        Thanks!

        Q

        Reply
        • Rich Owings says:
          February 8, 2012 at 8:30 am

          These models come with a worldwide digital elevation model (DEM), but you will get much more detail in terms of the elevation profile if you have one of the newer Garmin topo products installed, though it does not need to be enabled to take advantage of this. So you can display only BirdsEye topo (without the vector lines showing up from Garmin’s 24K product) but still get detailed elevation data from the latter. Hope that’s clear enough.

          Reply
          • Q.M. says:
            February 12, 2012 at 10:25 pm

            I think so. The DEM is the key part for me. Understanding that a DEM doesn’t come with the BirdsEye/Topo is the critical fact. The DEM coming with the units would be not so detailed as the DEM that would come with a 24K regional ( required to be useful I think). And a DEM wouldn’t come with the BirdsEye/Topo imagery, even though the info would be there for me to eyeball, but not there for the machine to work with, to say, generate an elevation profile between two points. So, unless there are other sources for 24k Dem’s (GPS file deopt?) it looks like I’ll have to get 2 regionals ( I live on a border area) plus one for the national park trip upcoming. Or, just live with digitized USGS paper maps for 1/3 the price. So, more or less, I think I get it. Thanks!

            Q

            Reply
    6. M.Agellan says:
      February 8, 2012 at 4:45 pm

      Bought an eTrex 30 2 weeks ago – I’ve never bought anything more disappointing since “sea-people”. It hangs, crashes, turns itself off, the CPU is so slow that I can ride off the screen with a bicycle and the device doesn’t manage to keep up with the map scrolling, the magnetic compass is a bad joke and the altimeter is extremely complicated and both work like something you found in a surprise bag. Using OSM maps makes it even more crashy, routing fails and when I settled with using it as a GPS-logger, it didn’t even manage to do that without hanging up and turning itself off. It’s a horribly unsettling thought that the same company that put this bunch of malfunctioning everything is making aircraft avionics!

      Reply
      • Rich Owings says:
        February 9, 2012 at 8:48 am

        Sounds like you have a lemon. If you can exchange it where you bought it, I’d do that. If not, call Garmin support (works better than email).

        Reply
        • Homer J. Simpson says:
          March 11, 2012 at 3:00 pm

          Thank you for your comment! You may be right, though gathering reports from the net, mine is obviously not the only one turning off by itself etc. and meanwhile I discovered a nasty RFI-vulnerability, device gets shot off reliably by a cellphone mast when get near to it from 3 different directions, RFI is crashing the computer part, not the receiver chip… I’m sorry, I hate that I have to assume this because all I wanted was a MTB with Garmin GPS (old dream I had in the early 90s), but even if my example is a dud, the device design is a dud, too. Just did another tour and the eTrex 30 turned off twice and couldn’t be reactivated despite removing the batteries etc., recently I was standing in the middle of nowhere and there was just no way I could get the routing going – it’s the worst bunch of gawd-awful I’ve ever bought..

          Reply
      • Tobias says:
        April 2, 2012 at 5:32 am

        While I haven’t had your turning-off issues, this device has serious other issues, most of which I think can be boiled down to software, and in its current state I cannot recommend the 30 to anyone.

        Sticky issue – No comment – There are lots of videos of this on Youtube and software v2.70 didn’t fix it. It’s still really bad once you get below a certain speed, the coordinates will just stick for tens of meters. Geocachers beware.

        Magnetic compass a bad joke? Yep. Fully agree. Perhaps usable during fifteen minutes after a calibration, then it becomes a dud which oscillates randomly 180 degrees during walking. Strange thing that the compass in my $100 GPS-enabled smartphone had to be calibrated once, and has since worked. This is really really bad for intended navigational equipment and seems to be not only my device.

        Altimeter a bad joke? Yep. Fully agree. The combination between GPS and altimeter (barometer) seems to be some sort of simple linear tuning once the discrepances are high enough between GPS alti and barometric alti. Generally it just makes the readings worse and I disabled the barometeric input. While it is good to have a barometer on board to keep track of weather, using it as an altimeter with the current software is no good. The garmin software team must read up on Kalman filtering, not use an algorithm which a summer worker could have written in two hours!

        Map drawing slow? Can’t really agree, quite racey in fact, but POI searching on maps is! An actual alphabetic search can take FIVE MINUTES to run on a small terrain map! It seems the search works terribly slow on especially older maps!

        And oh, the D-ring on the back broke after just a few battery changes. This was however replaced swiftly by the reseller.

        All in all I would have returned my 30 for a refund if it was possible – Don’t buy it with its current software. After several months of tedious efforts from the software team, then maybe…

        Reply
    7. Oz Measure says:
      February 8, 2012 at 9:42 pm

      I’d take M.Agellan a little more seriously if his name was different; is this so-called critique for real or just someone amusing themselves. Hell, I own five or six Garmin Products and never had any problems at all. Sounds like the dude dropped his 30 thirty times.

      Reply
      • Homer J. Simpson says:
        March 11, 2012 at 2:50 pm

        What random name pulled out of a nose would you deem more “serious” then? :confused: Unless you have a working eTrex 30 and something to add to the discussion, please keep your fanboy-ish insults for yourself Mr. Wise Guy!

        Reply
    8. Steve says:
      February 29, 2012 at 2:57 am

      Painfully slow panning and zooming. In paper it is 62s in a small box with small display. I changed my 62s to the etrex 30 for its size. Big mistake!
      VERY SLOW, sometimes tha map freezes. Moving the map (with the basemap activated only) is as “fast” as on my 10 year old monochrome Gpsmap76. Garmin did not make a big progress in terms of speed during the last 10 years…
      Routing is also slow. If I miss a a turn while navigating, it does not finish the rerouting until the next intersection, so I shoul stop for waiting, which is not always possible.
      For hiking it’s ok., but for Mtb or motorcycle is too slow.
      I guess the CPU is slower because of the lower power consumption, but the working time with one charge not much longer that the 62s. (which has both bigger display and faster CPU and consumes more energy.

      Reply
    9. aksello says:
      March 6, 2012 at 1:51 pm

      Hi, i wonder if i chose to “navigate to waypoint x” and by default the blue line “as-the-crow-flies” comes up. Is there a way to get the unit to construct a route towards the waypoint based on terrain, roads, paths etc? if they are available in the loaded map of course. Thank you!

      Reply
    10. Oz Measure says:
      March 11, 2012 at 3:29 pm

      Hey Homerboy, let m.Agellan speak for himself. Read the beginning of this thread, I started it.

      Reply
    11. torobala says:
      May 6, 2012 at 7:22 pm

      Hi!
      You’ve mentioned the possibility to load PDF files to the GPS. Could you tell me some detail about it? How should I do it with “GeoPDFs” or GeoTIFFs/digital raster graphics (DRGs) downloaded from the USGS/governmental sites?
      Thank you!

      Reply
    12. Steve says:
      May 20, 2012 at 8:33 pm

      I just ordered one at REI for $219 with free delivery. I was in the market for a handheld gps in the summer of 2011. I waited for it to be released in September, the price to drop down from $300 and the initial bugs to get worked out. I regret that I am unwilling to wait longer for a larger screen, thermometer and personal location beacon (plb) to find its way into the product, but I’m happy with my decision. The Dakota 20 is tempting to buy with its larger screen and touch-screen capability, especially for typing notes for <= price,…. but…., I'd rather have the purported 10' pinpoint accuracy that some report they get and attribute to the extra satellite points. This will be my first gps unit so I'm a newbie with this, but I do try to do my homework. More experienced users may have a more insightful opinion.

      Reply

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