posted 06-14-2009 10:18 PM ET (US)        

Getting close to purchase - Humminbird 77X, 78X, 79X leading the pack.

posted 06-15-2009 08:36 AM ET (US)            

GPS is GPS, every one will tell you where you are and they all have pretty much the same set of features.

Chart plotter is a discriminator, what chart packages are available and what do they cost? I have a Lowrance XOG that I use in my car that takes an SD card. I got the Navionics Gold SD card of the entire Great Lakes; it has all Canadian and US charts from Nova Scotia to Duluth in it. Used it last weekend on the Lake Michigan Whaler Run. It had all the bridges and bouys on the Grand River and the Milwaukee rivers in it, plus the shipping lanes in the middle of the lake.

posted 06-15-2009 09:12 AM ET (US)            

I estimate that I have used a GPS and SONAR for over ten years. During that time I have never had a reason to call the manufacturer because of some defect or malfunction. The various units have been in operation for perhaps 1,000 hours. To decide on a new unit I would consider that my ratio of time in use to time calling the manufacturer is greater than 1000:1. Therefore, if some salesman told me he had to wait on the the telephone to speak to his manufacturer, I would discount that influence in proportion, that is, it might weigh on my decision about 1/1000th as much as how the unit performs.

If you want to buy electronics on the basis of who answers their telephone the fastest, please go ahead. But I think it is something of a nutty new world when that is how you gauge the performance of an electronic device.

As I said before, these new marine electronic devices are far more sophisticated than most of the people using them. This might account for a high volume of calls to customer support.

posted 06-15-2009 11:22 AM ET (US)            

I am sure you can also find several folks who can rebut my good experiences with Lowrance. Heck, I have a buddy up in NJ who installed a new Raymarine C80 system with radar on his 22 Guardian. The unit failed in 13 months. He has had nothing but poor service from the manufacture who blames it on the distributor who installed it. After 6 months of back and forth, he ended up getting only several hundred dollars off a new replacement dome. This same person had a Lowrance unit on his previous whaler. It had a display issue and was well out of warranty. He called Lowrance, the gave him a RA#, he paid a flat $185 repair fee and within a month he had the unit back on the boat as good as new with no hassles.

posted 06-15-2009 01:26 PM ET (US)            

Without mentioning specifics let's say that many of the charter boat crews and serious salmon trollers are not saying nice things about Lowrance. I have determined that consensus, bases on my non-scientific interview/survey and casual Q&A methodology is specific to Lowrance products over the last four or five years. Apparently they had significant complaint history with the first internal antennae combo units (model 334??) a few years back. There seems to be a correlation to marginal to poor customer service and product support that is reportedly unresolved. That said, my plan, as I narrow down to two choices, is to call their support humans on the telephone and ask specific and hard questions. I have direct experience with those post purchase resources from my days in critical care medical devices. Those calls came to my desk, ultimately.

There is no getting around the fact that in West Mich, Lowrance is not always recommended by hard core users. However, that HDS stuff is very interesting and attractive. These guys seem to like Humminbird first then smaller Raymarine for boats like ours. Price point is indeed a serious issue but I want it to work great and be cool. One local retailer promised if I had problems he'd replace it from inventory and agreed to indicated that on the sales receipt.

posted 06-15-2009 04:01 PM ET (US)            

Let me know what you decide.

posted 06-15-2009 07:23 PM ET (US)            

Keep it coming

posted 06-15-2009 08:28 PM ET (US)            

As far as GPS accuracy, it would surprise me to learn that one GPS receiver was fantastically more accurate than another. GPS receivers are almost something of a commodity these days. You can get an extraordinarily good GPS receiver for $35. They all use the same satellites, the same precision fix augmentation system, and the same mathematics to deduce their position.

GPS receiver sensitivity has become phenomenal. Receiver sensitivity specifications of -156 dBm are now common. This is a real performance specification. You might ask the salesman at Cabela's about the GPS receiver sensitivity in dBm. That would be more informative than knowing his job required him to call Lowrance and sit on the telephone on hold for a while. In an open boat, or a boat with a canvas top, or a boat with a fiberglass top, the radio signals from the GPS transmitters will pass through to the GPS receiver without much attenuation, and it is possible to get good performance from an internal antenna. I get good GPS receiver performance in my living room, sitting under a roof and an attic with foil backed insulation.

One distinguishing aspect of GPS performance is speed to acquire a fix, and speed to acquire a precision enhanced fix. Some really hot new receivers can acquire a fix in less than a minute, and add WAAS precision augmentation very quickly afterwards. Other receivers take longer. I'd ask the salesman to demonstrate acquisition of a precision fix from a completely cold start, and time it. That would be a good metric for comparison: time to precision fix, not time on hold with customer service.

As for what salesmen like to sell, I should also mention they like to sell what they have on hand. If the back room has a certain brand of product in boxes stacked to the roof, you can be reasonably sure that salesmen out on the floor will be mentioning that brand and that product. They might perhaps even steer a customer toward that product.

As for measuring the value of an electronic product by how fast their customer service telephone line gets answered, this might be more important for a salesman who needs to reach the manufacturer frequently than it will be for a boater who is out in the middle of some strange water and wants to know the depth or his position. As a boater, I am more interested in hearing about how the device performs, not about how long the salesmen spent trying to get his question answered in the customer service cue. It is more important to me that the device finds the bottom, shows strong echoes from fish, has good GPS performance, comes with charts, and has a bright color display.

posted 06-17-2009 04:50 AM ET (US)            

What I liked about the Lowrance was the same electronic wizardry is in the HDS 5 unit as the 10.

What more do you want from a +$500 unit

My HDS5 was shipped 5 days ago from the US, still waiting to be delivery here

posted 06-17-2009 07:49 AM ET (US)            

So far on the list are Humminbird 780 or 790 series (I'm starting to like that side imaging for lake fishing - D&R Sports near Kalamazoo (home of Kevin Van Dam) are all about Humminbird especially for lakes and walleye fishing.

Next is Raymarine A50 - on sale w/ rebate at West Marine - Tom G, who I respect, is all about Raymarine and says it's a mini-me unit like the big one on their Tiara 36.

and Lowrance HD series probably the 5.

Bonus plan for me would be unit that is preloaded w/ maps including Hot Maps - Fi Fi loves to fish for her bluegills and yellow perchies

Thanks - keep it coming.

It's not the destination!

posted 06-17-2009 09:35 AM ET (US)            

quote:

---

As for measuring the value of an electronic product by how fast their customer service telephone line gets answered, this might be more important for a salesman who needs to reach the manufacturer frequently than it will be for a boater who is out in the middle of some strange water and wants to know the depth or his position. As a boater, I am more interested in hearing about how the device performs, not about how long the salesmen spent trying to get his question answered in the customer service cue. It is more important to me that the device finds the bottom, shows strong echoes from fish, has good GPS performance, comes with charts, and has a bright color display.

---

In your opinion, does the knowledge the tech support person has of their product and how they can help you fix your issue have any value?

I have no knowledge of Lowrance's tech support, but since they are now one with Navico, there might be some correlation to Navico's other offerings. After dealing with Northstar's horrible tech support (and the included documentation), and the fact that calling 3 times with the same question will yield 3 separate, and totally unrelated answers (and none were correct) will make me never again buy a Northstar product for that reason alone. The unit(s) I have had might have good GPS performance and strong echoes from fish, but if I am unable to to discern this info from the documentation or tech support..what does that leave me with?

My point here is tech support is important--perhaps more important than a bright display.

posted 06-17-2009 10:18 AM ET (US)            

Based on current day practice, if you call a 1-800-telephone number for technical support for most products, particularly products which are made in large volume and are intended for use by the general public, you will reach what is generally known as first-tier technical support.

First-tier technical support generally consists of people who know exactly the same information as the manufacturer has already provided in the instruction manual. Their function is to answer questions from users of the product who cannot read or will not read the instruction manual or cannot comprehend the instruction manual. On occasion the printed manual may not reflect the latest information, and most companies now have on-line updates of their manuals, so a first-tier technical support person is someone who also has read the latest version of the manual. If you read the manual yourself, you'd know everything they do.

Some manuals are not very well written, and although they contain information, it may be hard to find it. And many customers are very poor readers, particularly of anything remotely technical, and just lack the skill and comprehension needed to learn by reading a technical document.

If you have a problem with an electronic or software product that is beyond the knowledge of the first-tier technical support, that is, requires knowledge that is not available in the instruction manual, your outcome varies. Some companies, again large ones in general, may have a second tier of support available. Your inquiry will be escalated to the second tier. At the second tier you can obtain information that may not be in the instruction manual, or may be in the manual but be quite obscurely placed or hard to find, or perhaps needs elaboration.

posted 06-17-2009 03:36 PM ET (US)            

How accurate do you want it ?

I'm not sure you are spliting hairs trying to deduce which of these 3 modern units are more accurate for GPS postion.

If your that concerned it's going to cost another 500 for a gyro compass to make sure your in the right direction let alone position.

FYI:

100 meters: Accuracy of the original GPS system, which was subject to accuracy degradation under the government-imposed Selective Availability (SA) program (turned off in 2000).

15 meters: Typical GPS position accuracy without SA.

3-5 meters: Typical differential GPS (DGPS) position accuracy.

< 3 meters: Typical WAAS position accuracy.

Regards
Steve

posted 06-17-2009 07:44 PM ET (US)            

--the display is smaller
--there are no soft keys
--the GPS receiver is internal to the display.

See my comments about the CP300 in

http://continuouswave.com/whaler/reference/CP300.html

posted 06-17-2009 08:16 PM ET (US)            

There is something bombproof about Raymarine and I think it will jazz up the boat.

I also heard from highly placed sources in the industry that Lowarance is having failures with new HD series - Displays are leaking. It is a rumor from an industry source. I hope it is wrong but with some history of failure modes of Lowrance I am rejecting those units. Strong second for me is Humminbird 78x or 79x which have positive reviews.

I will post my final decision.

posted 06-17-2009 10:41 PM ET (US)            

I understand very well the risk and potential ramifications of quoting "unknown sources" as well as hearsay. As a former regulatory professional in the medical device industry we were compelled by the FDA to "investigate" complaints or reports of x,y,z or the likelihood of x,y,z. Field reports specific to our products that were confirmed were given priority for possible investigation. Those reports, including rumors from known or unknown sources were documented and trended for possible action. Those files were monitored closely and if they hit a certain number we presumed that we had a real issue or problem at which point the trended reports or rumored incidents would become an active file for possible investigation or corrective action.

Now most of us don't really know each other except from the time we have spent on this forum but I have seen, over the years, similar anecdotes or reports from the Whaler crew out in the field that were unconfirmed or likely.

I assure you, what I heard about Lowrance today was from a reliable source. I might even call their customer service people and ask the question about the specific report. If they are awesome they will implement corrective action for those units affected - recall.

posted 06-18-2009 04:35 AM ET (US)            

As Pete has already opted for the Raymarine A50 I won't post any pic's etc, unless someone has any other specific points

Regards
Steve

posted 06-18-2009 07:27 AM ET (US)            

Perhaps there are legions of boaters who have purchased new Lowrance units and had problems already with water ingress, but I do not recall reading any first hand reports from them about this. I have had a number of Lowrance products in the past ten years, and to the best of my recall I have never seen any sign of water ingress into their housings. Based on my own personal experience with Lowrance products, and their long history in manufacturing marine electronics, I am not inclined to think that Lowrance suddenly has lost the manufacturing skill to make a device that withstands the marine environment in normal use.

Anyone who has purchased a new Lowrance HDS series product which has permitted water to enter into the housing is encouraged to reply and let us know. I would find this sort of first hand report more persuasive than the suggestion that I ought to call Lowrance and require them to defend themselves against rumors.

posted 06-18-2009 11:06 AM ET (US)            

quote:

---

Looks like you got a Yamaha F350 on the back of that rig.

---

posted 06-18-2009 01:38 PM ET (US)            

I did have to call Raymarine Tech support to figure out how to display seawater temp on the unit and they answered on 2 rings and were very helpful after I went thru the auto attendant to reach tech support.

I remove the unit when I leave the boat for the week and the wire management system has worked out well. I do have the Navionics Gold card in it and overall am very happy with the features and performance.

posted 06-18-2009 03:06 PM ET (US)            

(Note I bought this unit on spec from the US as we don’t have the same access to marine stores here)

The casing feels very nice and pleasantly sculptured not just for injection molding purposes. It would seem a reasonable amount of thought has gone into the appearance.

The screen cover is more than just a push fit with extra recesses clips to hold it in place.

The rubberized buttons feel nice and have a reassuring click when depressed.

The SD slot is on the front so allowing close mounting to other items, if flush mounted. Although the magnetic catch and rubber seal looks not as robust as the normal slide in holder bay type cartridge, it appears a small drainage channel is provided.

The front bezel unit to gain access to the flush mount screw holes is easy to remove and also has additional sticky strips. (4 mounting screws are provided).

The back of the unit with 4 ports (power/data, sonar, ENET and NMEA 2000) are substantial. Two covers are provided for the ENET and NMEA 2000, should you not use them.

The rear casing has 12 screws holding it to the front, so if there is water ingress it could only be via the screen/keyboard IMO.

The gimbal bracket is nothing special. You would have to drill the base should you wish to pass any cables directly down as shown in the installation manual. It appears the base of the gimbal has a recess to mount a horizontal swivel but no attachments are provided other than the 4 long mounting screws for the flush fit option.

The power data cable has 2 cables from the plug. One for power/earth and wake up, the other for NMEA 0183. All the ends terminate in simple soldered loose ends, no connectors are provided. A separate waterproof in-line 3 amp fuse is provided with similar loose ends.

The 83/200 sonar transducer is nicely rounded unlike some of the puck type units I have had previously. The cable seems thick yet supple.

The transom bracket complete with 4 rubber washers, 2 s/steel washers and bolt with lock nut seems over complicated to allow for ratchet like adjustment to the angle. (2 mounting screws are provided).

Plenty of leaflets and a disappointing black and white (apart from the glossy cover) operations guide are provided. The quick start guide in colour seems the best to keep onboard.

I ordered the NMEA 2000 interface cable for my ETEC. This is a bit short at 15ft and I’m still waiting on the extension cable to arrive.

The provided network tee looks a bit naff all in black compared to the blue/red ones and no terminators are supplied. The plug to the engine is not sheathed all the way and the 4 wires are exposed just as they enter the plug.

There is already a software update available so I need to get a separate SD card for installing this and for copying screen shots etc.

As this is a US unit it has the preloaded costal and lake maps. Not sure I will be able to access them here as it’s 6K away but will try later.

The platinum maps here don’t include ariel shot overlays else should be similar 3D stuff.

I noticed the internal gps receiver is only 1 second updates where the external would be 0.2 seconds.

When I get it mounted I should be able to compare with my Navman 5350 and my HTC touch diamond phone as this unit is only replacing my Navman 4350 sonar unit and the second GPS is just a bonus.

I will try and post some close-ups pics later to compliment my observations above.

I don’t think I will get it installed this weekend (Friday/Saturday) as I’m off to Emirates Palace hotel. I wanted to go on my whaler there but they don’t allow anything under 80ft to be moored :)

posted 06-18-2009 05:28 PM ET (US)         

Raymarine, 3" x 4" = 12 sq. in.
Lowrance, 3.53" x 3.53" = 12.5 sq. in.

posted 06-18-2009 06:27 PM ET (US)            

I truly appreciate all the information, sincerely.

posted 06-19-2009 01:09 AM ET (US)            

I had a quick look at the CPF 300i.

All I can say it appears not as polished as the others and with a few new features missing like NMEA 2000 and broardband sonar.

These savings has allowed them as you note to put a larger screen for only another $250

I would look in to the maps especially the base maps provided.

posted 06-19-2009 09:02 PM ET (US)            

If you intend to use the internal antenna then check it's update speed. Usually the external one is faster.

The spec for your external is only 1 second, I'm not sure what the internal one is.

The added screen size is nice and I intend to get another 5 or 7 inch display as this seemed better value than just one 8 inch one.

posted 06-24-2009 09:03 AM ET (US)            

http://continuouswave.com/whaler/reference/CP300.html

posted 06-27-2009 09:27 AM ET (US)            

I've got the weekend and it's a nice one here in West Mich.

posted 06-30-2009 06:40 PM ET (US)            

Transam I have only used the NT+ maps myself, not sure what the higher spec gives but I dont think it will match navonics higher end 3D maps used on the Lowrance/Garmin units.

Pete I would of like to give you some first hands on info on the Lowrance but failed to get it installed before my leave. FYI Lowrance just released a big update like Garmin maybe you were reading posts prior to this release

As you have gone full circle now just stick to your original aim on maxing value for money to suit your preferences, there are some great deals out there and I'm sure no unit will be a dissapointment

posted 07-01-2009 02:30 AM ET (US)            

Congrats, nothing like real estate when it comes to screen size.

I too had problems with flush mount size, 5" was ok 7" cut through 2 of my 2" dials and so the 8" would just fit over the existing 31/2" navman sounder hole and the lost 2" dials.

The price differance between a 5" and a 8" screen was not good value IMO and as I already have a 5" Navman plotter the 5" Lowrane HDS5 gave me the best option.

I did not really need the GPS in the Lowrance but considering the cost difference between the sounder only model it was not worth buying without, the Platinum maps is just a bit of over indulgance on my part and as you note the 3D is really a nice to have

Let us know what you think of the sounder

Regards
Steve

posted 07-01-2009 08:44 PM ET (US)            

Dave at Lockeman's went the extra mile for me yesterday, above and beyond, however he did not have the unit I wanted in stock - inland lake charts and lake/river 'ducer only. He and the crew there are awesome just as Jim and Buckda have said. Skipper Ellen wants the OR ready for the water this weekend - I think we're heading to Hamlin Lake.

I considered Trans Am's Standard Horizon unit but probably too wide for the console - great unit and less than I paid for 5.7 inch display.

posted 07-02-2009 02:53 AM ET (US)            

Congrats looks very nice with the 5 menu buttons at the bottom which is only on the larger Lowrance units.

Won't be able to play with my HDS5 for another 3 weeks, yet I did manage to start 2nd pull my old Johnson 5hp that has been left for 7 years in my in-laws garage.