Talked to a fisherman friend today that had recently bought a new Hunningbird GPS/Fish Finder that called his "Redneck" GPS since HE could even use it. He took back a handheld that he just couldn't understand how to use it and likes the user friendly Hummingbird that he has used on one trip so far.
Just thought it might be something someone might want to consider.

I will never consider a HB again.

It's user friendly because it doesn't work. He should have just invested in a rock...I think the rock would do a better job.

I don't even rely on it for depth readings. I have one that came with my boat on my trolling motor....just waiting till I can get the money together for an investment in a real, actually working unit.

The Eagle or Lowrance fish finders are very nice. Althought they can be very complicated, it only takes time before you get famiilar with the features.

It's like putting on a pair of glasses when you're eyesight has failed you. Night and day compared to the HB.

I said it before and I'll say it again...
My old humminbird seemed like my son's old scroll like toy that just repeated the same screen over and over. I could swear that it was in a perpetual demo mode.

R

Yea, I'll settle for my Lowrance 332 and handheld H2O. They have got so many features it is stagering. I just wish I could go out and use them. It has been toooo long since I have been fishing, except in a friends nice 2 acre pond.

i have a humminbird on my boat. IT SUCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!
It will pick up a fish in your driveway.
we were running in about 2 feet deep we could see the bottom. it picked up about 4 fish and there was not any there.
another time we were on the water and it starts showing the bottom with humps going as deep as 69 feet to 13 feet. The thing is we were only in 9 feet of water.
I am going to buy a Eagle 480 before next spring.

Joe,

I had a TX-400 HB and I have to agree with the other guys, IT SUCKED. I just bought two new depth finder's and hope to try them out soon. I bought a Lowrance x-135 for the console and a Eagle 480 for up front. I'v never used either one but every one on here swears by both of these units. I hope to get my new boat Wed or Thur this next week and try them out.

From a earlier post I saw that a few people had problems with their Humminbird finders. I have a HB 737 with the wide side transducer and I have not seen anything but the bottom on it so far. It has been bench tested but it does not seem to work for me. I pulled into trees and over brushpiles and shows nothing. Even with the fish ID on, nothing but bottom.
Any opinions on HB would be appreciated. I'm thinking maybe I should of ask this question before I bought one..
But I am wanting to buy the gps add on accessory for it, or maybe not..Any helpfull addvise? Thanks...

Don are you still having trouble with your finder? I think if I was you I would try to take it back.
Cliff

I agree HB sucks, I have a Matrix 20 with GPS, sent it to factory because the GPS would stop ( lots of fun in the fog), also the sonor seemed to replay over and over the same thing when sitting still. Used it in salt water and fresh. One other problem, could have been me, but it happened several times, I would make a WP and try to go back to it later, no luck. Hope others have had beter luck, but does not sound like it. I now have a LMS-332c WOW,WOW amazing it does everthing but bait your hook.
JIM

Hey donlaundry, here is a picture of the bottom of a lake with my eagle 480fishelite. The picture is of a crappie condo I sank just minutes before. The graph accurately depicts the hight and breath of the condo on the screen. Here is a pic of that shot and the condo before we sank it....I never, and I mean never saw any bottom structure like that with the HB.





Now that's bottom definition....
R

Sweet

Of course I do have the HB 432c that is working great.

I think when it comes to graphs you get what you pay for. I have two Lowrance graphs on my boat. One was rather expensive and the other is some what cheap. The expensive one (X135) shows me tons more fish and structure than the cheap one. They are not even in the same league. I bet it is the same way for HB as well.

Wow,

I just had a salesman at Cabela's tell me that the humminbird was great because of the 60 degree cone. I opted not to purchase because I already had an extra lowrance transducer and seemed like a waste not to use it, so I bought an x-125 for the bow (LMS-332c on dash). From the sounds of your posts, I'm glad I did.

FT

Fishful_Thinking ,

As I said above, I had a HB TX-400 Tri-beam and it was worthless for finding anything (brush or fish). It was one of there so called better units when I bought it at Bass Pro. I think it was around $350.00 or so when I bought it. It did do fairly well on depth. I just bought a Lowrance X-135 for the console and a Eagle 480 for up front. I'v never used either one but every one on here swears by both of these units.

I'm thinking about trying mine out tomorrow on Lake Ray Roberts.
Hope to catch some fish, too

Yea, after reading the marketing hype, it seems like it would work great...3d, under the boat, 60 degrees of visibility, what more could you ask for....then you find out it's just hype. It looks great on paper! That salesman had probably never used one first hand. If it actually did that, don't you think me and others here would be singing their praises? Don't think I didn't give them the benifit of the doubt.

Just like my daddy used to say....if it seems too good to be true.......

wigginsjd, just spend a little time reading the manual and you won't be dissapointed or frustrated. If you don't, you will just have a bit of difficulty starting out. It took me a awhile to become comfy with mine.

Try downloading the sumulator from eagle's web site and playing with the mapping and sonar funcitons. This will definitely make your trip much more enjoyable.

One final note....the nav aids and memory cards make the eagles/lawrance units much more effective. Giving you detailed shore line and bottom navigational aids. The memory chip lets you download your path, and more. Very nice if you fish the same lake a lot. You can plot paths, save your trips...I haven't even scratched the surface on the capabilitites of my unit and I've had it for almost three years now.

R