Using a hand held GPS unit

[davidk65]

For a complete novice, without spending an arm and a leg, how good are hand held gps units in getting you from A to B when walking? With the above in mind, I would welcome comments on the following:
1: With the right coordinates entered in to the unit, would they take you all the way to "X marks the spot" or just near enough?
2: If it knows where you want to go via the coordinates entered, would it also tell the user where they are currently?
3: Are such units stand alone devices or should they to be used in conjunction with other aids, if so what kind of aids?
4: How user friendly are such devices?

[ACtheTROLL]

they are all as accurate as each other - the US military introduce "wobble" to stop civilian gps being used to guide bombs.

the price difference is down to facilities, seek time and the number of sattelites used to triangulate (ok so this does affect accuracy)
the basic garmin (i still have one) is a gps compass - certainly not a mapped device. If you can navigate with compass and map - it's all you need (and I think more fun)

spend more and you can get Os maps ... and all the bells and whistles

the military band is spot on ... civilian can be up to (I think)30m out.

[fo3nix]

As above says, they're accurate to within a few metres.

I have a Tomtom car satnav device, which can be used hand-held too. The ones that are purpose made to be used hand-held are usually a bit tougher, made for backpackers.

They do work well, and will show your destination as well as where you currently are. But they may not be able to read entirely the correct route --- you still have to use your own sight and knowledge of the area to guide yourself to the destination.

Regardless of any of the above, still, don't go walking about using just a GPS device. Take a decent map and compass too.