Short Wave Sportfishing wrote:
On Sun, 24 Jun 2007 16:27:13 -0400, HK wrote:

Short Wave Sportfishing wrote:
On Sun, 24 Jun 2007 08:12:28 -0400, HK wrote:

Anyway, I'd like to get a dialogue going about specific
GPS/Chartplotters. You mentioned last week you had heard some "horror"
stories about Lowrance. We are gravitating towards that brand and
towards a Standard Horizon. Both companies have 7" horizontal units that
sell for well under a large, seem not overburdened by silly features,
and seem to work smoothly and almost logically.
Please understand that anything I say is strictly anecdotal based on
conversations with owners and a couple of dealers I know. I have no
direct personal experience with Lowrance's newer units.

The problem as I understand it is that Lowrance quality is hit or
miss. When they work, they work fine, when they don't, it's a
problem. You send the units back, reportedly fixed, get it back on
the boat, it's still broken. Parts mixups. DOAs. Lost units.
Customer support from Lowrance reps isn't terrific.

As I said, anecdotal - I have no direct experience with any of this. I
trust the information because these folks aren't prone to
exaggeration. One dealer that I know very well told me that the
Lowrance DOA rate on their boats was pretty significant.

It could just be a bad batch of units, but in my small boat world, the
sample is getting greater every year - you keep hearing more and more
complaints.

As to all-in-one units, Standard is a sound name. I've never heard
anything bad about Standard which is kind of unusual.

I have old style DS600 Raymarine sonar and use a Raymarine RC400
handheld GPS in a fixed mount on the console - justwaitafreakinminute
has seen the setup - it's pretty simple.

I prefer Raymarine, but they don't really have anything that would be
similarly priced to the Standard - the C series display w/sonar/GPS is
a good, but pricey. And I've heard odd things about Raymarine
recently too - nothing horrible. They've always been very good to me
and I can't complain.

That help any?

Speechless huh?

I have that effect on people sometimes. :)


Every anecdotal bit helps. We may go with Standard Horizon again; it's
what I have as a GPS Plotter on Yo Ho. So far, we are undecided on combo
vs. individual units. Hell, I'm not even sure what color adds on a
fishfinder. I remember catching too many fish using my old greytone
Lowrance: stuff in the water column looks like stuff in the water
column, no matter what color it is.