Furuno 1971F
Submitted by Woodsy65 on Mon, 2019-02-04 08:50
Looking a purchasing a new sounder and am interested in the Furuno 1971F touchscreen combo.
Wondering if anyone here has one and what their opinion of them is. I have had Lowrance and would prefer to try something different. Any info/advice would be appreciated.
Woodsy
Mooseknuckle
Posts: 86
Date Joined: 14/05/13
Also interested
Also interested - have looked at online reports but nothing better than actual people that have used and not trying to sell.
Spoke to Taylor Marine and they still recommended the 588 as a pure sounder.
Apparently (only via online searching) there is still an issue with the chirp.
D_d_001
Posts: 1488
Date Joined: 09/03/13
IF only a sounder you are
IF only a sounder you are after have a look at the Simrad S2009. think these look like the best value for money on the market.
Money doesn't buy happiness but it pays for my fishing so ...I may be wrong there.
BlueKiaser
Posts: 63
Date Joined: 22/04/15
Had one for a few months
Short story: I'm ok with my purchase, but don't feel I can give a fair review because I still have it paired to an old 15 year old (600W) transducer (so no chirp info sorry).
I lose sounding signal when going quick (but that's probably transducer pairing. I also lost signal when paired to my old FCV-582L ... but now it's worse, a 1kW upgrade may fix that ... I'm not convinced).
The built in GPS does lose position now and then and I have had to power off and on the unit a couple of times to fix screen refresh problems but nothing really annoying.
Long story:
My old Furuno FCV-582L had a dodgy/broken transducer connector on the back. My Navman plotter had charts that were a decade too old, so I took the punt and got the GP-1971F about 6 months ago.
I'm finding I'm still using my old Navman plotter and the GP-1971F mainly for sounding (fish finder). I like the 9" screen for sounding and my old navman as a seperate screen, running the GP-1971F in split screen for both charting and sounding reduces my sounding display too much for my liking. But if you are looking for a good small form factor combo, then you'll probably tolerate that more than I do.
I've got a 22" Ali that kidney slaps in the slop, so I was concerned about going to a touch screen. That hasn't been too bad, unless travelling harsh, but then I used to struggle even with my old 582 in those sort of conditions.
And I now pretty much only move the depth on the touch screen when travelling and bumping about.
Anyways, from what I could see, the technical specifications of the GP-1971F for sounding was the same as the latest 588. I wish I had a 1kW paired up to it to give you a more confident review of it.
Only fished <50m depth so far (with GP-1971F), but it's finding me fish well when slowly sounding an area (got me a 61cm Dhu yesterday on a solo run ... double header actually ... 56cm went back, less than 6mile out).
Feel free to PM me if you want more info (or mbl# for a chat).