If i was going to bury 80 million dollars in the New Mexico desert, would this device display the exact gps coordinates in degrees where the $'s burie

Caribbean island, sure! NM desert would be more dicey. :-)Seriously, though, it depends on what you mean by "exact." One of the fields you can display is "GPS Accuracy." Depending on weather conditions, terrain, satellite locations at the moment, and local EM interference, I've seen that number vary from 170 feet to as little as 7. Most of the time in my location and conditions it is 15 to 35 feet. If you stand in the same place for a while you will get a "splotch" of "tracks" as it keeps redetermining your location. The center average of a few dozen readings over the course of an hour should be pretty close, within a few feet I'd think. If you are in winding canyons, near steep mesas, or in other unfavorable conditions YMMV.

can I insert sd card in the 62 base unit to load data

No. The 62 does not have a slot for a memory card. The 62S does.

does this unit come preloaded with DETAILED topographic maps that include lakes, contour lines, rivers, roads etc etc.

This product came with several maps preloaded, including the TOPO U.S. 100K. I ordered the DVD separately for the Topo U.S. 24K because it has four times smaller resolution. It contains everything you mentioned. I believe the DVD for the 24K was about $100+ extra. Once I got the DVD I initially could not figure how to load/download it to the 62st. Fortunately the Garmin support pointed to free software that I needed downloaded to my PC before using the DVD. Once the software and DVD were installed I was able to select a portion of the 24k map and transfer it to the 62st. I was disappointed with the resolution of the 100k but the 24K is quite detailed. Overall this unit has cost me more than I was planning to invest and has been less than impressive to use and fairly hard to learn. It took me a couple of weeks to figure how to translate the deed description of my property to GPS coordinates and then translate it further into the modified format used by Garmin. I also used Google maps to attempt to determine the coordinates for my property but note that again their format is different for how minutes and seconds of an angle are calculated. I ended up with four translations before I got to an accurate mapping of the 62st - it was quite frustrating for a while.Good luck. Perhaps you are more experienced with this type of equipment. It is my first, but I'm quite skilled with a map and compass. Using the unit through thick brush where I could neither see very far ahead or walk very far in a straight line was quite disappointing. Finally to locate one of my property boundaries it was actually necessary to revert to a compass and step off about 1/4 mile. Again perhaps this says more about me being a novice user than the actual unit and map.

ASIN	B003IHV6Z0
Batteries	2 AA batteries required.
Best Sellers Rank	#353,802 in Electronics ( See Top 100 in Electronics ) #401 in Handheld GPS Units
Color	One Color
Connectivity technologies	USB
Customer Reviews	4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars (773)
Date First Available	June 2, 2010
Department	mens
Human Interface Input	Buttons
Is Discontinued By Manufacturer	Yes
Item Weight	9.6 ounces
Item model number	GPSMAP62ST
Manufacturer	Garmin
OS	Windows
Other display features	CE
Product Dimensions	1.4 x 2.4 x 6.3 inches
RAM	500 MB
Scanner Resolution	160 x 240
Special features	Explore the Terrain, Get Your Bearings
Whats in the box	Garmin GPSMAP 62ST handheld navigator, USB cable, and user manual

Garmin GPSMAP 62St Handheld GPS Navigator

Details

Description

Specifications

Common Questions