GPS for Oman Offroading

Hi,

For those of you who went off-roading in Oman, I want to ask for your opinion using GPS.
Which brand/system is the best one to use? Do I need one? Is it a must? Were you able to secure one from your rental car company? If not, did you rely on physical print maps? Thanks in advance for your insight.

There are two ways you might want to use a GPS for off-roading:
1. To have a base map of existing roads etc for visual navigation purposes, which you would be able to rent from a car hire company. These systems are designed for in-car use, and assume a level of stupidity which means that you cant normally get useful things like coordinates out of them, and are only really a visual display.

1. To use as a proper navigational tool where there are no roads. If you plan to use an off-road guide like the Explorer books, then this works on coordinated way-points. An in-car GPS cant do this, because you cant input coordinates, only named locations, roads etc. If you want this, then you need a navigation hand-held GPS. You cant generally rent these and will need to buy your own. Garmin is the best brand (IMHO).

Oh, and they're not compulsory. But they are incredibly useful, and make life a lot easier and a lot safer. I would recommend that you have one. They dont need to be expensive - an Etrek is only a couple of hundred dollars.