Fish Finder / GPS

[gettinbent]

Ok, looking to purchase a unit for my 24' Thompson any reviews or suggestions?

[Snitchols]

How much $$ do you want/have to spend?  That is a good starting point and then we can go from there with suggestions.

[troubles]

Raymarine has a few reasonable combination units. I have a 24 Thompson and use a 6" combination for my GPS with that as my backup fishfinder. My main fishfinfder is a Furuno 620. Furuno is the best IMO.

 

http://www.thegpsstore.com/Raymarine-a67-Silver-Touchscreen-GPS-Fishfinder-P3659.aspx

 

http://www.furunousa.com/Products/ProductDetail.aspx?product=FCV620&category=Products+%3a+Depth+%26+Fish+Finders+%3a+Fish+Finders

Edited September 5, 2013 by troubles

[gettinbent]

2000$ or within 100 or 2

[Adk1]

wow! I wish I had that budget. I would start with Furuno and then go Raymarine

[J.D.]

Also running Furuno 620.... best I've ever owned

[gettinbent]

Furuno it is. Thanks

[Twister]

Furuno 585 is my choice as a fishfinder. Best on the market without going to a commercial unit, IMO.

[Diversion]

Furuno, you won't be disappointed

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Lake Ontario United mobile app

[Xxx]

What ever you decide to do DO-NOT buy the ELITE 7, I have had nothing but trouble with it. Send it back Lowrance said everything was good to go, yea right, same thing as before depth jumps all around and they don't have enough memory to run cards with 1ft contours. Took it back and put my old Humming Bird 727 back on. Leaning towards the 585 with a Lowrance 5hds gps.

[Tim Bromund]

Pap, if you're going to run a separate GPS, Garmin units are the best in the biz by far.

 

Tim

[gettinbent]

What's a good transducer for the Furuno 585? I have 24' Thompson

[Sk8man]

Airmar transducers are the best by far....just need to contact them (tech guys) to match up correctly.

[Gray Fox]

also looking to change tim what garmin thanks

[Xxx]

Hey Tim what do you recommend in the Garmin line, I'm looking also to purchase a Fish Hawk, the 4xd, From reading what the guys say about the hawk, I don't think you really need the top of the line fish finder, as long as it has at least 4000 watts and a 83/200 capacity ducer that should be good enough to find structure and depth and enough memory for a 1ft, or 3ft contour map the hawk will do the rest and. the gps for location. That should be a good set up. I don't think I am going with the finder/gps in one deal it seem like it comes to the same amount of $$ either way and if one or the other pukes your not totally out of commission, just my two cents, after the Elite7 horror story I went through I'm leaning towards splitting them up, maybe others have no trouble with the hds units, but if you read Cabelas and Bass Pro comments on other units it seem like a lot of other people have troubles also, and the guys running the 585 and the 600 series must have a separate gps. as they are finders only.

[J.D.]

Complete Angeler's Guide to Transducers..

 

http://www.furunousa.com/ProductDocuments/Transducer%20Handbook%202007%20-%20web.pdf

[lineman49]

What ever you decide to do DO-NOT buy the ELITE 7, I have had nothing but trouble with it. Send it back Lowrance said everything was good to go, yea right, same thing as before depth jumps all around and they don't have enough memory to run cards with 1ft contours. Took it back and put my old Humming Bird 727 back on. Leaning towards the 585 with a Lowrance 5hds gps.

    X2-  Had trouble with 4 Elite -7 hdi's  Upgraded to a HDS 7 gen 2 so far so  good. Have used it 5-6 times so far & seems to be good.  What ever you do take an extended warranty.

[snowfool]

we added a furuno 620 that was packaged with a transom mount ducer and a garmin 526. no complaints and couldn't be happier. I wouldn't go any smaller then the 5" garmin if you'd go with them. the 4" screens start getting borderline small. It also came loaded with maps and can accept an sd card loaded with garmin's g2 vision blue charts.

[Sk8man]

Sweet! I think you'll be a "happy camper".

[Adk1]

I really had my heart set on the Lowrance Elite 7 Broadband. I dont need the HDI crap. I know two others that have the Elite 7 and have had 0 issues with them. I navigated one in Bass Pro the other day and really liked how it operated. Of course it was in Demo mode. I cant really figure out what basemap comes with the unit and what upgraded basemaps are available though. Anyone? Attached is a pic of my Current FF..An OLD Eagle Ultra II Plus...

Edited December 24, 2013 by Adk1

[Xxx]

I really had my heart set on the Lowrance Elite 7 Broadband. I dont need the HDI crap. I know two others that have the Elite 7 and have had 0 issues with them. I navigated one in Bass Pro the other day and really liked how it operated. Of course it was in Demo mode. I cant really figure out what basemap comes with the unit and what upgraded basemaps are available though. Anyone? Attached is a pic of my Current FF..An OLD Eagle Ultra II Plus...

Adk1, I think lowrance realized that the elite 7 in the beginning was a big problem, that's why they are coming out with the lower end unit with all the bells and whistles and also to compete with Garmin and Raymarine, those 2 are closing the door on the weekend fisherman who can only spend $750.00 or less and I've seen these units for as low as $550.00 on sale.

[T Luck]

I bought the elite 7 last year and love it i have had no issues

Sent from my DROIDX using Lake Ontario United mobile app

[Adk1]

THANKS. For me it seems to be ideal. Is there a big difference between the broadband unit and the HDI other than the inability to do down and side imaging

[moemoe]

 I just posted this on another site comparing hds to elite 7......dont do it!

 

I went through the same decision process, ultimely after doing a little research, I bought the elite 7....wrong choice....... the elite 7 has the same sonar capabilities as the hds 7.....same peak to peak power etc....big difference is in mapping/gps,  although the elite 7 has a "gold chip", it does not and cannot read the gold card to the full capabilities, the elite series units have less than a 1/3 of the detail of the actual gold cards....ie on the Niagara bar, the hds unit reads 33 contour lines on the drop off from 50 to 220feet....the same card on an elite unit reads 5 contour lines....same detail issues on lake erie.....the base lowrance hard drive map has more detail than the gold chip map......I have called lowrance and navionics about this.....it is not the chips...it is the ability of the unit to process the chip....this was supposed to be fixed with software version 1.8 to read the 1ft contour details......but it is not fixed....go with the hds unit 

[Adk1]

I wish that I could afford the hrs unit but that isn't in the cards. I primarily fish on my home lake the great sacandaga. I only get out to lake o twice a year. But I guess we will see