help on sounder/plotters. what to choose
Submitted by Dropbear88 on Fri, 2015-06-12 20:06
in the market for a new sounder plotter. My choices are humminbird helix 5, Garmin echo map 551dv or the lowrance elite chirp 7. I'm pretty impressed with the Garmin, but If anyone has any of these can you let me know what you think. Cheers. It is going on a 4.2m boat in broome. Mostly Bluewater but a bit of creek work.
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Dunsborough Outdoor Sportz
www.dunsborougoutdoorsportz.com.au
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z00m
Posts: 1086
Date Joined: 10/05/14
Maybe also consider a
Maybe also consider a Raymarine Dragonfly 6. There are some good pics in the sounder section of this site. I run an a78 which is the same sounder as the dragonfly just with networking connections.
Swompa
Posts: 3786
Date Joined: 14/10/12
For what it is worth, I have
For what it is worth, I have a dragonfly 5, on a 6m centre console.
The 5 inch screen is too small for detail in the plotter mode, making the split screen with plotter and either sonar or down vision also too small.
I find that I need to spend too much time squinting at the screen than being a responsible skipper.
Further I think it lacks a genuine GPS screen showing position lat and long, and details for when you are going to a waypoint.
z00m
Posts: 1086
Date Joined: 10/05/14
That's why I mentioned
That's why I mentioned dragonfly 6. The 7 would be better. As they say, size matters. On the a78, lat long can be set as a box at the top of the screen if you wish or touch the cursor at boat position and find the lat/long. Not sure about the dragonfly.
tot
Posts: 1150
Date Joined: 31/01/10
Dragon fly
I have the 7 and think it's very basic.
It should have bottom lock like the a series and the delay as it thinks about what it's doing when changing functions is annoying.
The pic when running as sounder is clear but I don't like the fact it only has zoom and a scope. Spose you get what you pay for...
Reverse cycle a/c supply and install - Ducted and wall splits
z00m
Posts: 1086
Date Joined: 10/05/14
There you go. I didn't know
There you go. I didn't know the dragonfly was restricted like that. Bottom lock is pretty essential at times.
Bryce Day
Posts: 812
Date Joined: 01/06/15
lowrance have really bad lag
lowrance have really bad lag on GPS
merdel12
Posts: 306
Date Joined: 19/07/12
The gen do you have? I know
The gen do you have? I know gen1 had lag but the gen 2 + 3 are much faster
RobertMc
Posts: 326
Date Joined: 19/01/09
My gen 2 lowrance gps is
My gen 2 lowrance gps is great, can't beat it I reckon, I run a 585 furuno sounder, but also have the lowrance with a 600w p66 transducer, its a good combo side by side in my opinion...
Pomerz
Posts: 1
Date Joined: 05/04/14
Garmin 95sv combo
You will be very impressed with the new Garmin range and the 95 sv is perfection when it comes to quality for the dollar spent,it's user friendly has some great features and guess what you only need one transducer for the unit and the most up to date charts built in,so if you go lowrance you need another transducer for sidescan so there's coin you don't need to spend if your going Garmin.Hope this helps but I've been impressed with this new combo as of recent and for 1700$ for a 9" screen easy install comes with enough cable for an 8m boat and a transducer Garmin have defo thought of outdoing there competition this year.