The Garmin GHP 10 autopilot system, announced back in November, looks like it will make its “third quarter” shipping date. It’s hard to tell in the photo—since the GHC 10 control head is so similar to the GMI 10 instrument—but this new Krogen 44 has been a GHP beta site since March. I happen to know the owner, an experienced and technically astute fellow, and thus know he witnessed the install and then used the pilot all the way from Florida to his Chesapeake home port. He says it works well, and particularly likes “shadow drive”, the system’s ability to go in and out of standby just by “feeling” your desire to steer, or not steer, in the hydraulic line (sensor seen below).
Doh! There’s a pall of embarrassment hanging over Panbo HQ today. When I first reviewed the new Raymarine software and Platinum+ charts, I complained that I couldn’t see the live tide and current icons that were an announced feature. None appeared after the “real” reset either, and so I complained to Raymarine. Well, gosh, they were right under my nose: select any regular tide or current icon on a chart, hit OK, and—ta! ta!—there’s a new “Animate” soft key choice. Which gets you to the very able screen above, full size here. Every station in view animates either automatically or step-by-step at an interval you choose, and you can zoom and pan at will. Nice! (By the way, I used the Fish’N Chip chart here because it seemed cleaner-looking at this zoom level, interesting data too.)
I have a gripe about High Definition radar, or Ultra HD or Super HD or whatever; as best I can tell there is no identifiable technology, specs, or benchmarks to compare one with another, or even to grasp what it is. But it definitely is something. I’ve seen screen shots of Northstar/Simrad HD that looked good, I’ve heard excellent reports on Garmin’s HD and Raymarine’s, which I also saw myself, though only in tight quarters and flat water. But last week I spent nearly six hours inshore and off with a Furuno UHD 4kW 3.5’ array, and…wowsuh, I was definitely, and highly, impressed.
After I’d written my first impressions of the new E-Series 4.29 software and the Platinum+ charts it supports, I learned that I hadn’t done the “real” version of the recommended factory/master reset. You see, though Raymarine’s own FAQ is unclear about it, a reset done by powering up while holding down the leftmost soft key is apparently different, and deeper, than the one I’d done from the System Setup menu. I know for sure that this is true, as after a “real” reset yesterday, some of the problems I’d seen went away. For instance, I can pull up the System Diagnostics SeaTalkNG sub-menus now without causing a reset, though the device list there remains strangely empty (the new manual says it’s “for diagnostic use by authorized dealers” anyway). Much more important is how the test E seems be performing even quicker and looking better than what I’d noticed the first time around.
A guy’s got to ham it up once in a while! But, truly, trying NavNet 3D on the water today had me grinning. I spent hours with that MFD8 because it and its MFD12 mate have become one of the mysteries of this system. Are they as sensationally fast and smooth as the big expensive Black Box version many have been blown away by at boat shows? I threw everything I could at it—UHD radar (very impressive) overlay, hi res photo overlay, dual radar ranges, Sirius weather overlay, ARPA and AIS targets, and mucho zooming, panning, and 2D/3D flipping—and we were often doing over 20 knots and sometimes going in circles. Verdict: no, it’s not as knock-your-socks-off fast as the BB, but it is quite fast, very powerful, and elegant to use. Furuno and MaxSea have created not just a remarkable navigation system, but one that scales easily from center console to megayacht. Sailboats too. More to come, of course.
Yeeeeha…today I’m driving down to Cape Cod so that on Thursday I can ride on Furuno’s test boat equipped with the geekalicious NN3D network of gear shown above, and bigger here. Hosting the demo will be Brice Pryszo, founder of MaxSea, and his son Iker, who now works at Furuno USA headquarters. I’ll be Spot sharing, taking pictures, pushing buttons, and asking questions. And I’m open to suggestions about just what to ask and look for.
I’ve been bench testing Raymarine’s E-Series V4 software update (aka 4.29) for a while now, mostly with a variety of new Navionics Platinum+ cards I borrowed. If you’ve read the comments to that V4 post, you’ll know that some upgraders have had to revert to 3.31, and I’m not surprised. There’s lots of changes in 4.29, and even my relatively unstressed test E-120—just a bit of N2K input; nothing attached via standard SeaTalk, SThs, or NMEA 0183 right now—goes a little twitchy sometimes. Like suddenly the 3D rotary controls don’t work unless I do a reset. And it invariably resets when I try to query the new STng (N2K) diagnostic screen, no matter what’s on the backbone. Plus I’ve yet to see P+’s live tide/current icons or the now built-in Fish’N Chip bathy data, despite another 4.29 flash and master reset (apparently Raymarine and Navionics are working on that latter one). However, I’d certainly recommend updating; just be prepared to go back to 3.31 if needed, and be on the lookout for the update to the update surely in the works.
I was pleased to find this fine set of gauge configuration options on the Maretron DSM250. Note how you can set the RPM dial’s range, tick marks, and warning colors. Nice! Note too the live demo of the gauge you’re building (there are RPMs and other engine PGNs on the Panbo network now, thanks to a Lowrance simulator). Display customization is one reason why virtual gauges can be superior to real ones, but so far few of the N2K instruments I’m testing take much advantage of the possibilities. You can’t even set the range on either the GMI 10 or ST70 speed dials, which means you’ll constantly be reminded of how fast you can’t go. And, good as the DSM250 is, it doesn’t even have a speed gauge yet, or a depth graph.
It’s been a while since Jeppesen bought C-Map, and even longer since the 9.0 version of NNS (Nobeltec Navigation Software) came out. But the new versions of VNS and Admiral are now shipping, and looking good too (big Admiral screen here). Of course, the major change is that the programs now support C-Map MAX Pro cartography, which is why they’re called MAX Pro and not version 10. Besides a world portfolio of some 30,000 charts—versus Passport’s 10,000–another bit of nice news is that everyone who currently owns NSS 9 gets a free upgrade to Max Pro, and a free MAX Pro chart region for every Passport region owned, and a free copy of the new Raster Plus Pack. (Owners of earlier NSS versions get various deals, depending, as explained in the press releases.)
Check the bigger image; is that not a pretty sweet install, even if I do say so myself? There’s also some interesting screen detail here, like the handsome water temperature graph the GMI 10 can put up. Just behind its Menu button are choices of range and time. But the Garmin does not yet do a depth graph like the ones seen on the IS20 Graphic and ST70. On the latter you can change time ranges from 1 minute to 24 hours with just the left/right buttons, which is cool, but wouldn’t it be nice if Raymarine put the current depth in bold font in that white space upper right? The Simrad graph covers a few minutes and has no controls, but I do like that icon reminding you that the depth is being measured from the keel. All screens, by the way, are at max brightness, except the Garmin, which is at 60%. Next week we’ll see how they look in direct and filtered sunlight. Now here’s a question: if you were photographing these for a powerboat and fishing magazine, what screens would you use?
