PDA

View Full Version : Garmin 550's



Terry Barnes
17-01-2008, 08:26 AM
just acquired a Garmin 550'S from a fellow fisho who won it in a tournament unfortuneatly for him it was to small for the big boat & to big for the small boat, but will suit my Barracuda. Any one know anything about the this model.

Snapp
17-01-2008, 12:57 PM
I don't think there any good.
Wouldn't be interested in selling it ????

scruhland
17-01-2008, 08:15 PM
Hi,

My Dad just bought a 525s which is very nice however the resolution on the 550 model is fairly poor compared to the 5x5 series and Lowrance / Hummingbird equiv's. It does however have built in Australia maps so you do not need to purchase the G2 vision charts. Not sure on the details of the built in maps though. The 500 series (520, 530, 540 and 550) all have a screen res of 240 x 320 pixels whereas the 5x5 series (525, 535, 545, 555) all have a screen res of 480 x 640 pixels, noticeable difference. That model is selling for something like $1900 in the shops (without g2 vision maps) fyi. We picked up the 525s for $1600 AUD from the states including the G2 Vision East Coast Australia charts, saving us around $1000. ;D

-Scott

greyfox
18-01-2008, 09:11 AM
Hi Terry. I have heard the unit you have is fine but the screen is quite chunky to view compared to the 525 series Scruhland referred to. That doesn't matter if you haven't looked at the better resolution. Scruhland seems to think his dad got a good deal but there is always better. I just paid $1190 for the same combo delivered to the door and I guess it was probably cheaper somewhere else. If you got the unit for a good price and the preloaded map isn't quite what you want, have a look at a unit with the g2vision chart. It might be worth buying a chart. You can get them for @$240 US dollars and delivery is cheap. Better than the prices we have to pay through Aussie dealers (not all their fault, I am told). It might be worth checking the garmin website in case a later version of the preloaded map is available. It was in the case of the unit I bought and it was free from the garmin site.

FNQCairns
18-01-2008, 09:24 AM
Terry do a search a little way back there have been some posts over the 550 and it's immediate family the other ones listed above.

You might consider a firmware/software upgrade as the first step, they seem to be a good unit, I have a couple of minor complaints although I think this is because the software tries to cover all uses from sonar/sailboats/leisure so the designers try to dumb complexity down by excluding a full range of setup choices for user friendliness...which is a pain.

It's all good though, the uprated screen is a cracker though, as good as a crt computer monitor (it's probably not really, but it's as close as i have seen)

cheers fnq

Terry Barnes
21-01-2008, 10:36 AM
:) Thanks guys for your feed back on Garmin 550s, I went back through previous posts to August and picked up some useful info, I havent as yet had the 550s installed but this should be around late Feb, in time for my annual trip to Nelson Bay, Port Stephens. :D I will keep you posted.

Tight Lines
Terry