I can’t seem to pull the trigger on buying a GPS unit, but Rebecca has no such reticence. She has an in-depth collection of first impressions of the new Garmin Colorado 400t GPS unit. Among them:

The 400t model includes 1:100,000 scale basemaps for the entire US pre-built into the GPS. This is great – no more spending money on accessory software and uploading regional maps every time I go backpacking – they are already there for me. This is a huge time saver in my trip preparation – with my old GPS, sometimes it took me as long to prepare and upload maps as it did to pack for the trip.

…

So far the unit seems quick to respond, the buttons and click wheel are crisp and responsive, and the screen looks great. My 24 hour impression is entirely positive. I hope it stays that way as I’m able to dig deeper into what the Colorado has to offer.

The whole post is rather long and involved (Rebecca is a Backpackgeartest.org tester, after all) but it will provide clues to those of you interested in picking up one of these. She also noted it has lots of functions for Geocachers. And there was this cool link: A map of the parks in Santa Clara County (note: it works only with GPS units).

Here’s another review at GPS Magazine.

(These trinkets are not cheap by any stretch at $599 list, but you have to admit they look to be packed with sexy features.)