What GPS?

[Hawgeye]

I am looking into buying a new GPS. I have the handheld Garmin 45xl that works great but would like a mapping style in the boat. I don't need a new sonar so I am looking at both the Eagle Journey and the Lowrance 1600. They are around $200 different. What is the difference between these two products manufactured by the same company? How about the LMS350? Does that have mapping? Any advice on what I need for fishing is greatly appreciated. I would like the ability to use Hotmaps eventually and that is also a factor...

[jerryr]

I have the Lowrance Global Map 1600 and have been pretty happy with it. It has a nice big screen that is much easier to view while the boat is underway than my previous Garmin GPSIII. I like the features and it's pretty easy to use. They provide a disc with some maps of different areas in North America that provide reasonably good detail of lakes. I just downloaded two of them into my until prior to a Lake Erie trip a couple of weeks ago and all the islands, reefs, and navigational buoys were shown. I also have bought a couple of Navionics maps for Lake of the Woods which I download in prior to my annual trip there. I'm very impressed with the Navionics maps. They do cost $100 each, but if you fish a lake year in year out, to me they're worth it. The only complaint I have about the 1600 is the memory is limited. Navionics has a map for the entire Lake of the Woods that I was going to buy but it required more memory than my 1600 has. That really surprised me. I've called Lowrance a couple of times to inquire about memory upgrades, but haven't found anyone there yet that understands my problem. Maybe I'm not explaining it very good. Outside of the limited memory, my 1600 has served me well. Good luck.

[Hawgeye]

Bringing it back up. I was wondering if anyone has done comparisons between the Eagle and the Lowrance in the Journey or the Status GPS compared to the LMS1600? The price difference is significant and I would buy the Eagle if they are close in features. I don't know enough about GPS's yet but will be doing some studying, any more information would be appreciated...

[joe]

Hawgeye,

I'm going through the same process as you, if I have everything correct I think the units match up as follows:

lms160 - eagle status (gps and sonar)
lms1600 - eagle journey (gps only)

Like all eagle/lowrance products the difference is just the backlight whereas the lowrance units have the better light. The software is identical and one would be wise to save the bucks and opt for the eagle.

If you considering the eagle journey(like me), Cabelas has them for 299 but that doesn't include the mapping software - I'm not sure if this is necessary.

Any help would be appreciated.

[Hawgeye]

Joe,

Just got off the phone with Reeds sport shop in walker. They have an Eagle UltraMap which is a discontinued model of the Status. They changed the name to my understanding since the SA was turned off. I compared the owners manuals of the Status, The Ultramap and the Lowrance 160 and find them to be exactly the same. You can get the Ultramap at Reeds for $439 which has the sonar and the IMS CD Mapcreate software. I guess for the $139 additional, it would be worth purchasing gaining both sonar and the CD. If I can convince the wife that I REALLY need this unit, I will go with the Ultramap. Otherwise the $299 on the Journey would be my next choice. Let me know what you end up doing!

[David Anderson]

I purchased a Garmin 162 this spring. Got the Hotspots software, which was nice as a freebee, and the mapsource software downloads as well as my old waypoints from my GPS3+. The biggest factor however is that the 162 can be upgraded through Garmin's website to receive WAAS signals. I have operated it in the car for the last month and am impressed by the accuracy. Accuracy is somewhat relative, however I consistantly get displays under 10 feet with the lowest being 7.1 feet. When I put a waypoint in, and come back to it later, I am right on top of it at the 120 foot scale. I am sure I will be redoing most of my waypoints to take advantage of this. I am a Garmin bias.

[David Anderson]

I purchased a Garmin 162 this spring. Got the Hotspots software, which was nice as a freebee, and the mapsource software downloads as well as my old waypoints from my GPS3+. The biggest factor however is that the 162 can be upgraded through Garmin's website to receive WAAS signals. I have operated it in the car for the last month and am impressed by the accuracy. Accuracy is somewhat relative, however I consistantly get displays under 10 feet with the lowest being 7.1 feet. When I put a waypoint in, and come back to it later, I am right on top of it at the 120 foot scale. I am sure I will be redoing most of my waypoints to take advantage of this. I am a Garmin bias.