I have been having trouble with my 12 touch and 9 touch locking up for the last 3 months.These units were 5 months old when I started having trouble. They have gradually gotten worse to the point of not being usable. Called their tech line and all I ever got was some guy reading a script to me and never got any help. Finally found the number of a local Lowrance tech and talked to him. He told me that the Lowrance trailer that services the Elites was going to be at the Skeeter Owner Tournament and they could help me with everything. So 125 mile drive to Lake Fork last Friday. Was there at 8 but nobody showed up till about 9:30. No problem, they showed up. Then another Lowrance employee told me they wouldn't work on my boat because it was at a Skeeter tourny and I didn't have a Skeeter boat.

Now I would have understood having to wait for any skeeter to go ahead of me but there was no one waiting. They could have looked at it while they were sitting there, doing nothing. Am I wrong for being upset? I've got $6000 worth of Lowrance graphs on my boat that are basically useless to me and can't seem to find anyone with Lowrance that will help me. That has to be the poorest excuse for customer service I have ever seen. Lowrance didn't seem to care what kind of boat they were going on when they were bought.

I'd call Tech again and demand to speak to a supervisor. When I got him I try to get something done and I'd also direct him to this post that you made on TFF. Maybe that will get some one's attention.

Went all the way to product engineer and was told they don't know how to fix it yet. Don't know when they will know but they are working on it. LOL Won't replace mine cause he said they may do the same thing. Sounds like they have a bigger problem than just mine.

Have you tried going back on the software updates? Seems like a bunch of people are having issues with the newer updates, do you know what update your graph has in it?

It has the 4.5 for the gen 2. I asked Lowrance about that and they said that was not the issue. At this point I don't think they know what the issue is. And no I wouldn't know how to back out the update.

Try anything before the 4.0

ftp://software.lowrance.com

How do you delete the update that is already installed?

You don't delete the one already installed. You just install the new one and it will over ride the current one. Been nothing but complaints since the 4.0 came out.

Thanks grout-scout

JimmyP you are much more patient then I am...The Lake Fork situation would have put me over the edge!!! Hope it all works out.

Wow!! I am in the market to upgrade my graphs. I have 2 HDS8's Gen 1 and was to up grade to 12 inch and 9 inch but maybe I better stick with what I have. I have heard Lowrance service is pretty slow. There used to be a girl that worked there about 8-9 years ago that I dealt with twice and she was great but I heard they let her go. I am in the service business and that is what keeps our new car customers coming back, superior service.

JimmyP - is it freezing up at the accept screen when you power them on? Mine was doing that after the last update - turns out it wasn't freezing at all, the touch screen just needed to be recalibrated. Looked up a youtube vid on how to do that and all was good from then on.

HolyGrail no it is freezing up on the sonar. It might run 5 minutes then freeze for two to 15 minutes. It will start back up by itself when it gets ready. Have done soft reset, hard reset, but the sonar is useless the way it freezes up. When it freezes only the chart will work, no down or side.

Jimmy, there was a patch a while back by taking the ping rats off of MAX. Try that, any number below max.