I must own this new GPS by callaway

[sillywilly]

http://www.golftown.com/gtcommerce/s...-P11664C0.aspx

wow

[marcf]

I had it demo'd to me by the Callaway rep a couple of weeks ago and I must say it is really impressive and easily better than anything on the marketplace (opinion). If you are a blackberry/i-phone/smartphone type of person, you will really like this unit. Acutally, it will appeal to everyone.

Price point is similar to the SkyCaddie product.

[sillywilly]

how does the mapping work for it? credits? manual mapping? and details?

[Michael]

how does the mapping work for it? credits? manual mapping? and details?

Basic mode is free, if you want the pro mode (course flyovers, etc) they are 10 bucks each or you can buy a package of courses for a discount.

http://www.uprogps.ca/

[Hacker]

A lot of the courses around here don't have a pro mode mapping done.

I meeting with someone who has one and said that if he had to do it over again he'd save his money this year and wait until more of the pro mode mapping are done.... as for pro mapping costs, he paid $100 for 150 credits - each pro mapped course costs you 3 credits.

[sillywilly]

i'm gonna wait until more courses are mapped

[davevandyk]

in my opinion, as much cool things as you can do with this unit, it still uses satellite mapping for the courses unlike Skycaddie.

Yes Skycaddie has the annual membership, but you are paying for a person to physically walk your course.

I don't think there is a comparison of any model to the Skycaddie. Satellite imagery is inconsistent and often inaccurate.

[sillywilly]

its just a cool toy to have. Intelligolf is still the best bang for your buck

[hoolio]

Satellite imagery is inconsistent and often inaccurate.

I can see how satellite coverage could be inconsistant, but how could it be inaccurate? It's an actual picture of what is there, not just some dude with a backpack hitting a few buttons and saying "Front of Bunker". Unless there was an issue with the actual satellite position coordinates when taking the photo, it should be bang on. The issue is the Satellite photo coverage.

Courses laying in, or close to urban areas, will generally have the most detailed photos (Eagle Creek for Example). Courses in rural areas (Whitetail Golf) run a higher chance of having older, and likely less detailed photo coverage, making them hard (or impossible) to create course maps of.

As more and more detailed satellite footage becomes available, we will see more and more of these types of devices. Not only do they allow companies to map more courses with less cost, given the right software, it allows companies to let the consumers do some of the work for them. Imagine the owners of these products trying to one up each other and make the better maps than the ones already posted (with ratings/rankings).

[Ruskie]

They say that they use a combination of satellite and aerial images... hopefully that makes it a bit more precise. Besides, there're different kinds of satellite images and I doubt they use the ones we see on Google. I've read a couple of comparative reviews of the unit, and they all say it's as accurate as SkyCaddie.

As for courses covered, they seem to do it pretty quickly. I called them in April to inquire about Canadian courses - they had none, and no specific plans when they'd start (which was why I bought SG4). Today, they have a LOT of courses mapped, not quite as many as SkyCaddie, but I'm impressed with the rate of mapping.

So, anyone want to buy my SG4?

[Sakuraba]

I played 2 different courses in Phoenix in March with the same guy who had the upro. everyone else had the skycaddie. He'd just gotten the upro, and its readings were identical almost every time (when it was out, it was only 1 yard) to 2 other skycaddies (an sg2.5 and an sg5) In fact, the same variance occurred between the 2 sky caddies.
The upro didn't have the intelligreen, which is a very useful tool on the skycaddie.

[sillywilly]

what is intelligreen?

[Ruskie]

The upro didn't have the intelligreen, which is a very useful tool on the skycaddie.

Doesn't it have "intellicourse" (to coin a name)? It's supposed to show you the course from your angle of play as far as I understand...

[Sakuraba]

what is intelligreen?

hard to get a description of it from the skygolf website... it gives variable readings to front, middle and back depending on your line in, and if you move the pin close to its actual position on the green. Its very handy on unusually shaped greens.

[spackler]

what is intelligreen?

Skycaddie maps the perimeter of the green, so that you have front back and centre yardages no matter your angle of approach. Most other gps units only mark front and back from the perspective of the middle of the fairway. Skycaddie also allows you to move the pin around on the green to give you a more accurate pin yardage. To me it's what sets the Skycaddie apart from all other gps units.

That said, I can't imagine as satellite photos and mapping software get better, that other units won't be able to do this remotely, as opposed to hand mapping it like Skycaddie does. Just not sure how quickly it will happen.

[marcf]

They say that they use a combination of satellite and aerial images... hopefully that makes it a bit more precise. Besides, there're different kinds of satellite images and I doubt they use the ones we see on Google. I've read a couple of comparative reviews of the unit, and they all say it's as accurate as SkyCaddie.

As for courses covered, they seem to do it pretty quickly. I called them in April to inquire about Canadian courses - they had none, and no specific plans when they'd start (which was why I bought SG4). Today, they have a LOT of courses mapped, not quite as many as SkyCaddie, but I'm impressed with the rate of mapping.

So, anyone want to buy my SG4?

When I had the deviced demo'd to me, The unit had all kinds of Canadian and local courses. I know a lot of people like Stonebridge, that was on it. Hunt, Royal, Greyhawk, Marchses, Creek, and more ( I was quite impressed by the amount of courses he had on the unit) ...Also told it only takes approx a week to get a course mapped if requested.

Check this link out for more info...
http://www.uprogps.com/

Hope this helps.

[Rocket Man]

the Callaway uPro is only $299USD down in the states....a lot cheaper than what GT is selling it for

[jeffc]

I can see how satellite coverage could be inconsistant, but how could it be inaccurate? It's an actual picture of what is there, not just some dude with a backpack hitting a few buttons and saying "Front of Bunker". Unless there was an issue with the actual satellite position coordinates when taking the photo, it should be bang on. The issue is the Satellite photo coverage.

Courses laying in, or close to urban areas, will generally have the most detailed photos (Eagle Creek for Example). Courses in rural areas (Whitetail Golf) run a higher chance of having older, and likely less detailed photo coverage, making them hard (or impossible) to create course maps of.

As more and more detailed satellite footage becomes available, we will see more and more of these types of devices. Not only do they allow companies to map more courses with less cost, given the right software, it allows companies to let the consumers do some of the work for them. Imagine the owners of these products trying to one up each other and make the better maps than the ones already posted (with ratings/rankings).

I have worked in the geospatial satellite and mapping business for 20 years. There are various distortions inherrent to imagery, which need to be corrected for using some specialized software. The data on google has varying accuracies, resolutions and sources. It is quite easy for it to be inaccuate. I don't know the sources of all the data for these devices but it may or may not be accurate to the level required for these devices. I am not saying it isn't but sometimes it is difficult to tell. With my rangefinder, I always know it is accurate and don't have to rely on a course being mapped or the accuracy of the data it contains.

[sillywilly]

I have worked in the geospatial satellite and mapping business for 20 years. There are various distortions inherrent to imagery, which need to be corrected for using some specialized software. The data on google has varying accuracies, resolutions and sources. It is quite easy for it to be inaccuate. I don't know the sources of all the data for these devices but it may or may not be accurate to the level required for these devices. I am not saying it isn't but sometimes it is difficult to tell. With my rangefinder, I always know it is accurate and don't have to rely on a course being mapped or the accuracy of the data it contains.

20 years to tell us it may or may be accurate?? Let us know when you come down off the fence

[Michael]

the Callaway uPro is only $299USD down in the states....a lot cheaper than what GT is selling it for

That is with the current 100 dollar rebate being offered in the US. I e-mailed Callaway asking why this 100 rebate was not available in Canada, here is the response:



In response to your inquiry, at this time Callaway Golf's $100 uPro GPS rebate is only offered in the United States. We have no information regarding the possibility of it being offered in Canada. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

[marcf]

That is with the current 100 dollar rebate being offered in the US. I e-mailed Callaway asking why this 100 rebate was not available in Canada, here is the response:



In response to your inquiry, at this time Callaway Golf's $100 uPro GPS rebate is only offered in the United States. We have no information regarding the possibility of it being offered in Canada. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

Not a shock, every company offers varying and different pricing and marketing campaigns in the US or Canada.

[jeffc]

20 years to tell us it may or may be accurate?? Let us know when you come down off the fence

well, I don't work for the company that makes these, don't know the source of the data and don't know if it has been corrected properly or not.

Fact is you can have an image that is a somewhat accurate or very accurate. Since I have no idea about this imagery I cannot give you an answer.

Imagery has distortions in it, which have to be corrected for, and if done properly you can get data that is very accurate (sub meter). If not it can be 5, 10, 20 or more meters off depending on the resolution of the imagery and what kind of processing was done to it. Take Google for example. The accuracy on those images is all over the place and no one really knows since there is no metadata to accompany them. It works great for the general public for mapping, etc. as things don't have to be bang on. Now if I were going to use it for a golf gps, I would want to know that the imagery is as accurate as possible. 5 yards/meters makes a big difference on an approach shot.

I guess what I am getting at is, just because the pictures are pretty and have a lot of detail doesn't mean they are necessarily accurate.

[stevek]

I was at Marshes last weekend and we had two carts side by side at a tee-box (one of the Par 3s on front) and the two GPS units read 13 yards difference.

Does anyone else find there are inaccurancies in the devices and which ones are most accurate? Does the spec give a +/- yardage.

[FIRM PUTTER]

i'm gonna wait until more courses are mapped

Just to let you know, I was on the Callaway site and from what I can see I would say over 90% of the courses are available in Pro-Mode.

[Michael]

I am giving one a demo tomorrow, will let folks know how it is.

[Ruskie]

Just got my uPro and played my first round with it. It certainly beats SkyCaddie in terms of amount of useful info it gives you. Being able to see the whole hole is nice, especially on an unknown course, so is the ability to plan layup shots. However, I found that in the normal course of a round on a familiar course 90% of the time I just needed the green view and front-center-back distances, and in that it's a little more cumbesome to use than SkyCaddie since it always aims at the center of the green.
Battery life is a little weak too, so it has to go into standby mode between shots. Since I was playing with it a bit more than usual, the battery was almost drained by the time I finished. I'd suspect it would last two rounds under normal use, but just barely.

All in all, it's a great little device, but if SkyCaddie didn't have the stupid membership requirement, I'd probably stick with it.

[Michael]

I am giving one a demo tomorrow, will let folks know how it is.

Played with the demo version this morning and really enjoyed it, went back to Golftown and bought one.

I played the course in pro mode and a couple of the features are very good. I liked the ability to drag the pointer where we thought the pin was on the green for almost exact yardage data, not that it helped. One of my normal playing partners had his new Sonocaddie out and all distances between the two devices were always the same. The flyover mode is quite good, I will charge mine up tonight and I am sure there are more things to learn but I enjoyed using it. Just left it in my pocket the whole time, did not notice it at all when swinging.

[sillywilly]

Played with the demo version this morning and really enjoyed it, went back to Golftown and bought one.

I played the course in pro mode and a couple of the features are very good. I liked the ability to drag the pointer where we thought the pin was on the green for almost exact yardage data, not that it helped. One of my normal playing partners had his new Sonocaddie out and all distances between the two devices were always the same. The flyover mode is quite good, I will charge mine up tonight and I am sure there are more things to learn but I enjoyed using it. Just left it in my pocket the whole time, did not notice it at all when swinging.

dragging to the pin.. you can do that with all the SGs

The best feature i hear about this thing is of course the fly over and also the ability to drop the point to your layup distance and then see how far to that point. its great! i might have to get one of these when someone puts one up used on the forum

[Hacker]

Played with the demo version this morning and really enjoyed it, went back to Golftown and bought one.

I played the course in pro mode and a couple of the features are very good. I liked the ability to drag the pointer where we thought the pin was on the green for almost exact yardage data, not that it helped. One of my normal playing partners had his new Sonocaddie out and all distances between the two devices were always the same. The flyover mode is quite good, I will charge mine up tonight and I am sure there are more things to learn but I enjoyed using it. Just left it in my pocket the whole time, did not notice it at all when swinging.

What do the Pro Maps cost? I can't seem to get that info for the Callaway site

[hoolio]

http://www.uprogps.ca/features/

On the bottom of the page it says "ProMode™ requires a one-time per course download fee." It doesn't show the costs for the credits however. I read somewhere that for one course it was pretty pricey, but you could buy a pile of credits and it brought the cost per course down quite a bit.