GPSMAP 79sc, Marine GPS Handheld Preloaded with BlueChart g3 Coastal Charts, Rugged Design and Floats in Water

Unit had the latest software loads including system software and BlueChart loads. Very quick delivery. Nice! This was purchased as a backup unit for one bought a year ago. Still learning how to use the routing and recording features. It has not been completely intuitive but the manual full download helps. Accuracy & startup time are excellent. Predicted battery life of 19 hours seems accurate but wish it was 24 hours…. A very solid unit.

I bought this as a backup to the main navigation unit on my boat. It's packed with a lot of features, but marking waypoints and navigating to them is just a couple of clicks. I turned off my primary plotter yesterday while fishing offshore and used this to get back to port. The compass navigation mode is the better of the two IMO. The charts are detailed enough to use this unit as a main GPS unit if you also want the ability to use this in other environments such as camping. However, you'll probably find the screen too small when there's bigger units available.

Absolutely horrible tech. I’d expect this level of technology 20 years ago. Actually the titanic probably had better tech. Zero intuitive effort in its menu design. STILL. After all the complaints from previous models they did NOTHING. No touch screen on a screen the size of a 1990’s cell phone so I guess it makes sense. Lags like nothing else I’ve seen before. The $100 hiking versions and their watches are worlds better but you’re walking. Or biking. I mean you’re on a boat. You need quick updates and fluidity no pun intended. Oh yeah, no inland water maps. No lakes. No rivers. About $100+ a year for that luxury. Uses AA batteries for better or for worse. If you still use Garmin to drive around this device is for you. I know this isn’t a replacement for dedicated nav, but for casual boaters, club renters, and kayakers who just want a mobile nav device for unfamiliar areas this thing fails. Get T-Mobile with Starlink on a used waterproof phone or get a case and download an APP. Most of them give you about everything you need for free but no more than about $50 a year for the good stuff and updates. How is Garmin still in business with this crap???

Garmin has never been good at describing features or how to use them on their GPS systems. It is certainly the case for this very capable handheld GPS device. One must learn by scrolling through the menus and getting your device to do what you want it to. I got this Garmin GPSMAP 79sc to replace my 76Cx which, after years of using, had a simple battery compartment issue I was unable to fix. I had set up and used my old Garmin to, among other things, communicate NMEA streams of data to my autopilot on my sailboat. I shopped online, even at the official Garmin site, and looked for this feature among GPS handhelds with no luck. I even went into a retail store to talk with knowledgeable salespeople as to what product would do this. No luck. But while having the 79sc in my hand, I noticed it had the Garmin round plug port for power and I/O which wasn’t even mentioned or shown in online descriptions. The Quick Start booklet which came in the box said nothing about the port, and the owner’s manual, which I had to download, had little. I took a chance and bought it. Turns out I could get this working like my old device by exploring the menus. Not much help from any written direction provided by Garmin. It must be a legacy feature not used by many today. The 79sc has many features, some useful to me and some not, but it is very capable. It determines position faster than my old, almost instantaneously. The compass feature is handy and works by some technology alien to me. Probably magic. And the unit I got, being preloaded with coastal charts, is nice. Display is nice. The scrolling buttons are a bit touchy. I’ll wait to test out its waterproof and floating capabilities until I accidentally drop it overboard. So, if you want a very capable handheld GPS, try the Garmin GPSMAP 79sc. Just be patient, explore the device, and get to know each other together.

The 79SC is a quality product but, for me, too similar to the 78SC to be worth doling out $380.00. I have owned the 78SC for years and am in the unique position to be able to compare every feature in the marine category. A difficult learning curve for sure if this is your first experience so get ready to sit for hours fiddling with it until its memorized. I decided to stick with the 78SC and returned 79SC. I think the 78SC is discontinued and for the or the record if I had to get a replacement I would buy the 79SC. By the way, the daylight (bright sunshine) screen brightness is exactly the same in both models. The indoor brightness is a bit more in the 79SC. The marine Bluechart details are very similar in both models. My advise? Get the unit, buy a canoe or kayak and enjoy. Use it to mark your hot fishing spots so you can go back.

The user’s manual is written in multiple languages…all of which are only marginally useful! I’ve used fixed Garmin navigation systems aboard boats for many years, and so had a general familiarity with how such instruments work: without that experience I would have been totally befuddled. Once the mystery of how it functions has been solved, the unit works quite well. But I would hesitate to recommend it to a neophyte unless there is an experienced friend nearby to give a tutorial on how to use it

This product is awso.e and does everything I need it to

Excelente GPS marino, debes dedicarle tiempo para manejarlo bien Muy recomendable

I could have or should have bought a cheaper version with all the same features. It didn’t come with the BlueChart maps loaded as advertised.

Was not as described did not come with the maps that I needed it I sent it back

Excelente equipo y calidad inigualable