I just got an HDS 7 and am on vacation on the IOP. The HDS is impressive in general, but it seems screwed up as far as gps accuracy goes. I wired it up and hooked up the NMEA 2000 to my yamaha and that’s it. I don’t have any chips installed or anything, just the insight that is pre-installed (I assume it is preinstalled, it was a hurried install).
I’m disappointed in the accuracy of the grass lines and some of the topo lines. Some of the topo circles aren’t even matched with the blue/light blue color changes that indicate depth differences as well. For example, where a deep hole is, there will be a circle/oval filled with light blue, but the topo line will be offset on top of it, like the map under the topo is wrong/inacurrate.
In some places, I know the water and just scoot through, then as I was coming back, I noticed my trail showed I had cut through the grass. I had come through at low tide, so that wasn’t true. Again, it is like the grass/base map is shifted.
The biggest problem is that I do a lot of night boating during shrimping season and accuracy of stuff is pretty important and my EAGLE was accurate enough that I could move along quickly even at night. The HDS/Insight makes me scared it isn’t accurate enough to keep me safe.
Any experiences with this? What’s going on? I’m not positive that my Insight is even working. I’ve checked my chart data selection and verified that Lowrance is selected and even selected Navionics, which wasn’t any more accurate and I’m not sure which is which. I assume Insight is Lowrance, but is it on unit when it comes or did I miss a card in the box or something?
Long winded, sorry. Tried lots, got no better, just frustrated.
no way I’d put all my trust any electronic gadget to navigate around with at night other than a big spotlight. I wouldn’t recommend moving around “rather quickly” either. Too many things change daily to expect an electronic chart to navigate you thru shallow waters, never mind what comes floating along. Remember that acknowledgement to agree to when you power up your gps, stating that it is not to be used as a primary navigation aid, they put that there for a reason
I ran a Lowrance with the Nautipath (I think) built in charts for several years. I was generally happy with them. Kept me out of a lot trouble I am sure. Worked great running the channels and most creeks. Yes a few noticeable discrepancies but I assume things change, like around the inlets, or perfect data is just not available. Not like they are shooting this topo themselves and keeping it up to date. Assume they are working off old maps and aerials I suppose?
And no I don’t think the data is on another card. I expect the Insight units to come with it built in. Possible you have to select it but if you can see the bouys, ICW markers, tide info etc. then the info is there. Can’t speak to where it shows grass without being there looking at it. I know their latest software upgrade was to make some improvements to GPS/charts/plotting so you may want to check to see what version software you have and update it if necesssary?
The base map that comes standard with the unit is pretty much a joke. It does a fair representation of what the channels are shaped like and even where the channel markers are at but the shore-line is hit and miss.
Buy one of the upgraded cards and you’ll be more happy if detail is what you need. As for the bread-crumb it should be spot-on.
Just wait till you see where the HDS7 says the shoreline is at on Lake Greenwood.
I don’t haul arse in the middle of the night while boozing, but you are all correct about being extra careful and not assuming Lowrance is the guiding light.
Just fyi, Inisght is much more than the base map. It is a coastal map detail package and about a $200 upgrade as I recall so it is comparable to the Navionics chips. I recently swtiched from Lowrance to another brand and now have Navionics maps. I was plenty happy with my Lowrance maps. I never ran at the coast in the dark, except for one night of dock light fishing on the ICW south of IOP and ran it fine that time. But after I ran something once, the unit was set to store all my trails so I would just run the trails. I only needed the map topo when I went exploring new water which was very helpful. I am sure it was off from time to time but I can only think of a few places up and down the coast where it was off a lot and like I said mostly it was inlets. Not defending the product but just relaying my own experience.
