Showcasing four ways to heat up your dash with some of the season’s top electronic picks.

Lowrance X47
The Lowrance X47 is a compact, economical and easy-to-use fish finder offering several features for weekend anglers and tournament pros alike.

Its four-inch diagonal 168x132-pixel high contrast LCD screen incorporates a Film SuperTwist display offering a four-level grey scale for excellent target detail and separation, even in direct sunlight. The LCD is backlit for excellent viewing at night or in low light conditions and it’s easily readable with polarized sunglasses on.

Physical features include an easy-to-use keypad, allowing users to select many functions including Advanced Fish Symbol I.D., which is designed to automatically interpret sonar echoes and display them as fish symbols. The symbols are displayed up to four different sizes, matching the relative size of the target echo. Turn the Fish I.D. off and the targets are displayed as fish arches. Using Fish I.D. with the FishTrack setting and the depth is displayed above each fish symbol, which is helpful in determining lure presentations at the correct depth. With the X47’s Advanced Signal Processing (ASP), sonar settings are enhanced to provide a clear and bright display of what lies below the water’s surface. According to the company, the ASP helps filter out obstructions such as boat wake disturbance or suspended particles like algae and plankton.

When it comes to fishing deeper water, the X47 can read as deep as 600 feet and features a true 800 watts of peak-to-peak power. Another highlight is its low-profile high-performance 200 kHz Skimmer transducer, which comes complete with a built-in water surface temperature sensor and provides up to 60-degrees of coverage with high sensitivity settings. The transducer also allows the unit to operate while running up to speeds of 70 mph. The X47 is housed in a space-saving case with adjustable tilt, a quick-mount/release and a fast connecting/disconnecting uniplug cable.

For more information contact www.lowrance.com

Raymarine S100 Wirless Remote
Raymarine’s S100 is a new remote control compatible for the company’s S1000, ST1000, ST2000, ST3000, ST4000, ST5000 and SmartPilot autopilot systems.

According to Raymarine, the unit boasts a user-friendly menu, making all functions easily accessible, while a high contrast 24 x 127-dot matrix screen can display up to two lines of text.

The wireless operation range is 30 feet from the base station and when the remote is out of range, it will set off a signal and drop the autopilot into standby mode. Extra base stations and handsets can be added to accommodate larger boats or crews.

The S100 uses two AAA alkaline batteries and comes with a base station, SeaTalk lead, two mounting cradles, lanyard, belt clip and even batteries.

For more information visit www.raymarine.com (Page Top)

Ready At Will
Furunos’ new GP7000F/NT is a versatile unit designed for smaller boats. This newcomer boasts GPS/WAAS, a chart plotter plus a fish finder in one compact, waterproof unit. The GP7000 displays vital data on seven-inch colour (TFT) LCD display, which features an ultra bright display with an Anti-Reflective coating to enhance viewing in direct sunlight. It also has extremely wide viewing angles, allowing users to see the display from nearly anywhere on a boat.

According to Furuno, the GP7000F/NT utilizes the latest C-MapNT+ and C-MapNT MAX electronic charts, which provide highly detailed information on more than 1,000 of the most popular cruising, fishing and sailing destinations across North America. This added feature operates by using C-Map’s Local, Wide or SuperWide charts that are now available on the new Secure Digital (SD) memory card, which is similar to the memory cards commonly found in digital cameras or MP3 players. In fact, two SD card slots allow one slot to be used for a chart, while the second slot can be used for storage of waypoints, routes or other essential data.

Another highlight while using C-Map charts is Guardian Technology. This function continuously scans chart data in front of the boat to detect rocks, shoals or other obstructions. If an obstruction is detected, the Guardian Technology triggers an alarm to inform boaters to change course. The area is identified by a triangle on the screen.
Users can choose from a variety of presentation modes, including the Course Plot Mode, which allows boaters to choose True Motion North-up, True Motion Course-up, Relative Motion North-up, Relative Motion Course-up and Auto Course-up options.

If you’re serious about fishing, the GP7000 has a built-in, dual-frequency (50/200 kHz) 600-watt or 1,000-watt (RMS) fish finder that delivers superior fish detection and detailed bottom structure. Sounder pictures can be displayed jointly with course plot and other nav information in split-screen format, or on the full width of the screen. Some modes found in this function include Bottom Lock, Bottom Zoom, A-Scope and Marker Zoom. Depth, water temp and boat speed are also featured.

For more information contact (360) 834-9300 or visit www.Furuno.com

Better, Stronger, Faster
Simrad’s popular CX34NavStation has been redesigned with an abundance of new technology to make it a viable unit for any helm. Some new features include radar overlay with Head-Up mode, a radar display with depth info and even enhanced course vectors.

In addition to introducing a new radar antenna to provide enhanced performance that includes speed adaptive antenna rotation and dual range presentation, the CX34 features SunView display that reduces glare and extends the viewing angle.

The CX34 incorporates the very latest C-Map MAX cartography and is capable of interconnecting with SimNet, which allows instruments to share vital information with other on board equipment.

For owners who wish to install a CX34 with the full range of functions, the unit can be upgraded by the dealer and supplied in the configuration required.

For more information visit www.simrad.com

(Page Top)