Hi guys ... after my trip with Dave I knew I needed a Fish Finder so bought the Huminbird 525. I figured I didn't need anything fancy and that seemed to be very reasonably priced. I now learn that may have been a gross mistake. I am willing to buy a new/better graph if that is what is required but now I don't want to make my same mistake twice. I'll take advice on which graph to get. I guess I can afford up to about $300. I also need to hire someone to install it for me. I had a dealer install my Huminbird 525 but for a number of reasons, I don't want to go back to that dealer so if we know someone who can install a fish finder I buy and is willing to charge, that would be great. The dealer I used last charged $80/hour and installed in about one hour (well that's what he charged me).

I would reccomend a lowarnce 125 about 299 or a eagle 480 about 199. Both are 480X480 pixels. You can't go wrong with these.
Johnny

johnny is right, you must have a decent graph. sometime there huging right on the bottom, unless you have a decent graph you wont see them.

I have a question that goes along with the graph theme. I have an Eagle 320 0n the bow and an Eagle 480 in the cockpit. Besides the emulator and tutorial are there good descriptions of how to set them up. For some reason those tools I mentioned do not help me at all. Basically my set up now is to leave everthing on default settings with the exception of changing the sensitivity from time to time. I think I have a hard time seeing the fish on the bottom myself.

Karl

Karl I think you can change both of those units to the zoom 2X. This will focus on the lower half of the water column and show the fish hugging the bottom much better.

I can zoom in, although I have never really thought that made much of a differance so I have only seldom done that. I will have to try that.

Thanks,
Karl

So thats what I need the zoom for. Thanks

bama how's work? must be slow if you are surfing......

Karl,

Next time you get on the water put your fish finder on 4x and don't touch it again!! My finder NEVER comes off 4x. When your looking for sandies to slab up you are only interested in the bottom few feet. And when your screen goes black with 4x, don't worry about taking out the zoom to see how tall they are stacked up......just reel in the fish!! LOL

See ya soon,
Weston

Kolban you sound like me ... i really sux at fishing unless i see a school, I been really seriously fishing bout 2 years.And I bought a lowrance fish finder w/gps and still dont know how use it.. I need to learn to how to fish w/out a school of birds, wonder if there any good fishing guy out there who can teach me?....Alrite Kolban if you see me out chasing bird, that would be me in a Alumaweld strkyer 18ft ..later

PM'd Kevin.

sshhhhh, Everyones sleeping. I don't want to wake them . I've got a job where if im not doing anything, that means I've done my job and the companys making money . When im busy, they're losing money . I repair mfg. equip. At least thats what we keep telling our boss.

Kevin, I feel your pain, I've been looking for humps on my depthfinder and not really seeing anything for quite some time now. I believe John Varner posted a pic of his graph a couple of weeks ago of some fish on the bottom, the proverbial lightbulb went off above my head . What I interpeted as structure around the humps was in fact fish holding on the bottom. I've been fairly lucky since seeing that post. Then earlier in this post somebody posted to use the 2x&4x function on your graph, lightbulb again . I've never used the zoom on my graph before but I guarantee I will from now on.

You can put it on split between two different zooms such as normal mode and 2X. That will definately help you understand and see what you're looking at.

It's amazing what you can learn after having something for over 2yrs. Where were you then? One of these days I be able to use half the things my unit can do . I hope.
It's funny, I've know about these things but didn't really know what good they would do me. Lightbulb.