The Marine Electronics Hub
Raymarine had a busy Monday announcing new and updated hardware, software, and cartography. They unveiled an updated Axiom MFD called the Axiom+, all new LightHouse charts, LightHouse Premium subscription plan, and a new companion app called RayConnect to their Axiom line of MFDs. Raymarine recently presented the new functionality to members of the media allowing me share some more details about the announcements.
LIR Systems announced today Raymarine Axiom+, a powerful new series of multifunction displays (MFDs) for anglers, cruisers and sailors, plus updated Raymarine LightHouse Charts cartography, bringing new levels of clarity and control to marine navigation.
The new SI-TEX SP-120C Color Autopilot features a compact, rugged housing and bright full-color LCD display that can be easily viewed from a variety of different angles on open or enclosed helm stations. This makes the SP-120C and ideal autopilot option for a wide variety of vessels up to 38 feet in length, including center console fishing boats, sailboats and cruisers.
Simrad Yachting – a leader in the design and manufacture of world-class marine navigation, autopilot, radar, communications and fishfinding systems – announced today a software update for its NSO, NSS and GO series systems. The 20.0 update includes a wealth of powerful new features, including C-MAP Embark passage planner sync, NMEA 2000 update capability for Mercury VesselView Link, Naviop performance improvements, accessory control of Lowrance Ghost freshwater trolling motor and Rhodan trolling motors and more…
Aqua Map version 10 is now available for Android while Aqua Map Master 2.0 is available for both Android and iOS with several new features. The new Android version brings the same speedy map performance released to iOS the end of last year. The new features in Master 2.0 add even more features to the already feature-packed $10 per year add-on package.
“Furuno Connections” is back, and Furuno is bringing something very special for Season 2. They’ve outfitted four boats with complete electronics packages, one from each of their major competitors and one with NavNet TZtouch3, and they are taking you out on the water to put all of these systems through their paces in a head-to-head product shootout! …
Raymarine owners can get underway with the confidence in knowing their electronics will perform in extreme conditions. Why? Because Raymarine electronics are literally tortured in the company’s very own Environmental Test Center in the UK, where they are subjected to hard drops, prolonged vibration, extreme temperatures, wireless emissions, relentless rain and spray, full submersion, and the simulation of months at sea inside a salt mist chamber.
While walking the floor of the Miami International Boat Show something caught my eye in Si-Tex / Koden’s booth. I saw what looked like a PC screen running Coastal Explorer but with a radar display shown. It turns out this is a new version of Koden’s RADARpc that interfaces nearly any Koden or Si-Tex radar with a PC running Coastal Explorer.
It’s always exciting when a new series of MFDs is announced and Furuno’s Time Zero Touch 3 is no exception. As you can see Furuno is promising quite a few improvements with TZT3. Furuno has also announced higher powered open-array, solid-state radar units and the availability of their SCX20 and SCX21 satellite compass.
While Furuno has just introduced powerful new TZT3 multi-function displays and NXT solid-state radars, that’s all the more reason to highlight their remarkable new SCX satellite compass design. After seeing prototypes demonstrated on the water, I believe that the technology delivers much more than similar sensors at a reasonable cost with lots of install flexibility. In fact, I expect to eventually see the SCX20 mounted on boats that don’t even have other Furuno gear and hope to see other brands develop similar multi-sensors…
