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Bill Kiene semi-retired
11-07-2006, 02:06 AM
I just ran accross this on Dan Blanton's message board:

"Posted by Brian on 2006-11-06 20:21:14 in reply to GPS for Delta & Car? posted by BobL on 2006-11-06 19:20:19

I am a GPS geek. Spent too much money on GPS's, but they make my life simple, and I don't get lost anymore. I also no longer need to carry 20 Thomas Guides in the back seat. I can also find my way home on the delta in the fog, at night.

I have a Garmin Streetpilot 2720 in the truck, 2 Lowrance units in the bassboat, and one in the Whaler, a handheld Garmin Etrex (too small). I have had 2 other Garmin handheld units, and one Magelan. $400 is about the most you should spend.

If I was getting one unit to have in the boat, car and to carry around it would be a Lowrance iFinder h2oC. It has everything.

http://www.lowrance.com/Outdoor/Products/iFINDERH2OC.asp



Here is the deal. If you are going to fish with this unit, GO CHECK OUT THE MAP CARDS FIRST for the areas you like to fish, then buy a unit that works with that map.
This is the best chip for the delta and the west coast.
http://www.navionics.com/Charts2.asp?ContinentID=5&RegionID=44&ChartSizeID=6&Classic=0&Gold=1

If you fish in lakes, get this

http://www.lowrance.com/Mapping/FHSelite/west.asp

The both show the bathemetry very well, wrecks, shoals, bouys, marinas...

If you go with other brands these are things to put on check list:

1. get a color screen
2. get one with as large of a screen you can afford. It is hard to look at the tiny ones while driving.
3. get one that will plug into a cigarette lighter so you don't have to run on batteries all the time.
4. Get one that you can get map modules like the Navionics Gold III so you can get detailed underwater topographic data-
5. make sure it will run on 2 AA batteries, either alkaline or rechargable --- no weird batteries allowed.
6. make sure you can use SD cards or something very similar for future programs. USB cables are nice too.
7. make sure they sell a mount so you can attach it to the baot. Nothing worse than flying over a wake and having your GPS bouncing overboard. "

Bill Kiene semi-retired
11-10-2006, 01:38 AM
While flying back from New Zealand on a 747 we got to go up into the cockpit with the pilots in the middle of the night. They showed us all there navigation equipment. Very impressive.

On our way to the Tsiu River we overnight in Cordova, Alaska both ways. The US Coast Guard has a pretty large vessel docked there that they use to tend the buoys in the area. We got invited for a tour of the ship which was fascinating. We got to go up to the bridge and they showed us their navigation equipment that they were testing for the Navy. They showed us a satellite map on a screen where they came down right on top of the ship. You felt like you could go outside and wave at yourselves. They said the new system was beyond GPS.

At 61 I have trouble using the new technologies unless it is almost daily.