Monthly Archive: March 2014
Lowrance Elite 5/7 cheap CHIRP, the sonar wars rage on
Sonos WiFi HiFi tested: excellent at home, maybe for boat
Si-Tex T-760 Series radar, other ways of integration
More Ray LightHouse II goodies: Sounder Select, GPX, DSC, PDF & Fusion-Link
One of many features in Raymarine’s latest software update (besides the just-discussed LightHouse charts) is support for multiple sonar sources. While I didn’t have the hardware or even the working vessel to test this, it’s neat that the demo video I screenshot above is built right into the LightHouse II update (and actually more detailed than the one currently on YouTube). But who needs multiple sonar sources? I know that some readers may perceive it as feature glut, but not I, and I’m not even much of a fisherman…
Raymarine LightHouse II, the chart goodness
A demo look at the new LightHouse Charts got me excited last fall and I feel more so now that I’ve cruised around with them. U.S. boaters who own Raymarine a-, c-, e-, or gS-Series multifunction displays will find that both types of reprocessed free NOAA charts install fairly easily, look good, and zoom/pan quickly. And though no LightHouse charts for waters beyond the U.S. have been announced, Raymarine clearly has the ability to produce them or permit third party cartographers like NV-Chart to do it themselves. Finally, Raymarine’s U.S. plotter models should hopefully cost a little less with free charts and Navionics has perhaps been motivated to up its game. (Whatever the motivation, significant new Navionics features are right around the corner.)
The new MarineTraffic Internet AIS service, cautiously optimistic
These days I feel obliged to include a warning every time I write about AIS over the Internet. What you see in a nice app like ShipFinder HD (above) probably does not include every vessel that’s transmitting AIS info even in fairly well covered areas like the Miami/Lauderdale area, and many areas aren’t covered at all…unless perhaps you’re using the Seapilot app in Sweden or somehow have access to another well-organized AIS receiver system. That’s because what most of us see on computers, phones or tablets connected to the Web is target data collected by patchy networks of volunteers whose shore antennas may well miss even fairly nearby 2 Watt Class B AIS transmissions or even 12 Watt Class A signals obscured by buildings or terrain (or may suddenly go offline just because the volunteer’s kid trips on a power cord or similar).
Fusion-Link N2K & Garmin, happy together
The ability of Fusion marine stereo systems to integrate with multifunction displays over NMEA 2000 (or Ethernet) is a wonderful example of what MFDs and standard network protocols can do for us. One day last summer a Garmin software update suddenly made the GPSMap 7212 already installed on Gizmo’s fly bridge the best interface I had for the Fusion IP700 stereo installed below. And, mind you, I already a Fusion NRX remote control up there and also had the Fusion Remote apps running on iPad and smartphone via Gizmo’s WiFi router. There was a notable glitch, which I’ll describe, but that’s long past and now Fusion-Link has arrived beautifully in the Garmin 740 and 8000 Series MFDs seen above.