Garmin v Raymarine: Which One Do I Buy ?

[bstreep]

Originally Posted by CarlF

+1 on the ease of use for Garmin. This is a huge safety factor. My wife can easily operate the touch Garmin. That was not true of our old Raymarine C.

+2

We have a boat full of Raymarine. A buddy of mine just did his in Garmin. Garmin is much easier to use, for typical use. If you are REALLY into nav stuff, the Raymarine may be worth considering. However, for common, everyday use, Garmin's intuitive interface is hard to beat.

[Burls]

Originally Posted by CarlF

+1 on the ease of use for Garmin. This is a huge safety factor. My wife can easily operate the touch Garmin. That was not true of our old Raymarine C.

+3 on ease of use for Garmin.
My wife once said to me, “I’ll only use the GPS when it works like my iPhone”. I installed a Garmin 750 (touch screen), and now she’s happily plotting the route for the day. Can't argue with that!

[kjinoz]

+4 on ease of use for 750

My old Seiwa Millennium 7 was a good unit but it's like comparing chalk and cheese.

I've had time to plot a few local routes and its very user friendly.

I have a Garmin Oregon 400C which is also touch screen but the 750 is even easier.

My best guess would be that touch screen will become the standard eventually.

Cheers,

Keith

[James Baines]

We have Raymarine at the nav station with a repeater topside but the one we use for navigation and autopilot, because of its better definition and ease of operation, is a topside mounted Navman Trackfish 6600 and we use the topside Raymarine for radar, weather, and monitoring the engine. The Trackfish happily connects with my laptop and transferring routes between the two is duck soup. All that said, I strongly suspect that because the technical differences are so small, it really comes down to personal preference. Go with what works for you, or better yet, go with what makes you smile...Better still, go with what makes your bank manager smile...

[Juniper]

I've got a Ryamarine A50D, so far happy with it, wish it could handle radar but otherwise good, the transom transducer that came with it I just waxed ( toilet ring wax ) it to the inside of the hull and it works well.

[tartansail]

Originally Posted by roger.waite

FWIW if you re going with the Garmin, I have successfully glassed a transom mounted transducer onto the inside of my hull. (My hull is not particularly thick.) Just avoid any cored areas, and be careful not to trap bubbles in epoxy between hull and tranducer.

Sensitive enough to show fish, and depths to >300 metres.

P.S. You could test by making an oil bath before final install.

Garmin now has a transducer designed to shoot through the hull: http://www.blueheronmarine.com/Airma...79-235-N2-5338 Easy to install and use, but confirm compatibility to your plotter.

[kjinoz]

Juniper...the wax is an idea is one I haven't heard before. How did you do it?


It looks like our current boat might be sold in August but the new Garmin isn't going with it.

I had decided to do a temporary install, just wire the chart plotter and not worry about the sounder (which the boat has already)

I glued the old transducer to the hull using Selleys Clear (something like silicon) and it works fine.

I couldn't think of a easily removed method of fixing the new transducer...the wax might be just the ticket.

David...I knew Garmin made in hull transducers but had never seen one.

Looks impressive...I'll keep it in mind for the new boat.

Thanks,
Keith

[gello]

been cruising outside the US for 10 years.
left with the most expensive set of Raymarine instruments money could buy.
they never all worked at once in 10 years.
i kept sending them back during hurricane season from all manner of
foreign ports and they would fix one and another would break (mostly software issues).
Finally they told me the units were out of warranty and refused to look at them again without a large fee. They never did work till i used them for target practice. They worked fine at accepting lead.

I am an engineer and carry a full test bench as well as hundreds of generic spare linear and digital parts when i travel.

Off central america (like 100 miles off) i came across a single hander whose raymarine autopilot was broken. I traced the problem to a power regulator in the head. The chip number was unreadable. I contacted raymarine by winlink email and asked them for the chip number off the schematic so i could jury rig a repair to get this guy and his 50 footer home (a dangerous undertaking without an autopilot single handed on that size boat).

They told me not only no, but hell no. Regardless that it was a matter of safety and i was willing to sign any non disclosures they demanded (just to get a standard commercial part number, geeeezz).

when my own raymarine autopilot went south,
they refused to fix it (too old).
they also refused to send me the schematic so i could fix it if they wouldn't.
they then refused to send me the obsolete bus protocols
so i could jury rig it.
however they did offer to give me a paltry discount on a new $3000 setup.
(i ended up hacking the protocols myself to get it working)

BY CONTRAST:
I called garmin with a request for their bus protocols so i could interface some unique equipment. They asked me to check their website in a week.
What I found was a complete and high quality design document with all details including descriptions of the proprietary ones which i didn't expect.

Raymarine makes a great marketing pitch, but i find their service and support to be sub par to say the least. They don't seem to realize that people actually install their equipment on boats and that those boats move to places that are not 2 miles from a West Marine for replacement.

Garmin has always been forthcoming when working on both my equipment and others.

I will always trade that extra bell and whistle for something that actually works and that the manufacturer stands behind. Hopefully raymarine will improve but as a guy fixing this stuff at sea my money is all in garmin and maretron (a truly impressive newcomer) now.

[senormechanico]

Gello's experience with Raymarine brings back similar memories, although nowhere near as dire regarding safety. Their help was worth about 2% of what I expected.

That's the main reason I went with Garmin when it came to updating my radar/chartplotter with a 5208/18HD.

[daddle]

I'm pretty sure nobody at Raymarine has ever sailed a boat of any kind. Certainly they've never ventured more than an hour offshore with their products. I have not much experience with Garmin, but I'm sure it's better equipment. Their traditional GPS units are fabulous.

Can't wait to dump my Raymarine junk.

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by daddle

I'm pretty sure nobody at Raymarine has ever sailed a boat of any kind. Certainly they've never ventured more than an hour offshore with their products. I have not much experience with Garmin, but I'm sure it's better equipment. Their traditional GPS units are fabulous.

Can't wait to dump my Raymarine junk.

I'm no fan boy for raymarine but your comments are junk ray extensively test their equipment in Portsmouth and have Access to several vessels and a body of beta testers

How are you " sure" garmin is better equipment

Often peoples experiences boil down to the relationship that the local dealer or manufacturer builds. Good and you like it bad and you don't. Buy that's not a comment on the gear per say

Dave

[swagman]

Guess we all call it as we find it, and my past experience with Raymarine made me buy it again when we ordered a new boat - around £15,000 worth.

The past experience was in 2003 when a Raymarine teccie checked over the six year old (we bought that boat pre-owned) ST60 intruments which had moisture inside. 'Shouldn't be like that' he said and replaced the control head and two other instruments at no charge. Remember, that was 6 year old kit, bought by someone else.

And once the moisture went we never had any other issues with that kit.

So when we had the choice to specify kit on a new build Hanse in 2005, we ignored Hanses pitch for Simrad and went for Raymarine in a big way. Two E system plotters, radar, radio, autopilot, and ST instruments.

Found it all really intuative to use and after we'd covered 25,000 miles we did have a problem with the cockpit mounted plotter. Fault traced back to moisture getting past a seal and corroding the motherboard. Not quite as good a deal as first experience, but Raymarine offered to repair for material cost only. We did give that boat quite a bashing in a short period of time, so even that response was acceptable to me and enough for me to say without doubt - if I had the chance to build / buy once more, I'd go again with Raymarine.

But hey - I dunno if Garmin and or Simrad would do even more.............maybe they would!

JOHN

[goboatingnow]

It would seem to be the case that Ray is better supported east of the pond. Then of course they are a UK producer and it helps to talk to the locals direct.

Dave

[brak]

Originally Posted by gello

I called garmin with a request for their bus protocols so i could interface some unique equipment. They asked me to check their website in a week.
What I found was a complete and high quality design document with all details including descriptions of the proprietary ones which i didn't expect.

I would be extremely interested in finding out more about this - what protocol did they provide specs for? Do you still have access to their documents?

[sck5]

I would suggest doing what I did - Go to the boat show and play with the models the different companies have on display. You will be able to see what they do and how easy they are to use. Also makes it easy to see which exact model is right for you.

I went with Garmin plotter and radar and am very happy - Excellent plotter (4210) and very good radar - The radar in fact is so easy to use that even newbies on my boat pick it up in a very short time. Also, the new digital radar spins up in about 20 seconds (or less) so it is easy to use for short periods of time without draining the battery.

The autopilot and other electronics are Raymarine. No problem with them talking to each other. The only electronics I have had trouble with is the ST 7000 control head for the autopilot which has died twice in the past 6 months.

Though it is a matter of personal choice, I would NEVER get a touch screen. I really dont want something that I have to avoid touching in my cockpit. I am much happier with the non touchscreen version.