What is a good value sounder?

[Sean]

I know you can spend as much as you want on sounders, But where do I get the best value for money unit? How can I tell a good one? how much will i need to spend? for river/sea use, fishing not much deeper than 300ft and this deep rarely, more around the 180ft mark, Thanks Sean :) does anyone suggest I try E-bay?

[Dr_Dan]

When i did all my hunting (a few years ago now) the Garmin units appeared to be good value. GO for as large a pixel count as you can. Would probably get a better response if you post the kind of price range you are looking at.

Dan

[Burley_Boy]

Yeah the Garmin are still good bang for buck.
I suggest looking at some of the sounder posts and especially the post on sounder readings in the tackle section to get a good idea of what you can expect from different gear.
180ft is still deep enough to require about 500W RMS transducer to get any sensible readings at least from the lower cost units so double check before you get a lower wattage unit than that.

[banshee]

I did allright at the 32's off Ballina with a Lowrance X-85 (discontinued) it had 375 watts and 240 x 240 pixels,if this unit did not have the ability to set upper and lower limits I think it would have been useless at this depth.depends entirely on your budget,but the most power and pixels with the ability to show a certain part of the water collumn is what I'd be looking for.

[caveman]

yep check ebay you can get the matrix 20 including GPS on there at the moment for about $400 landed here

[Jewmaster]

I use Ebay regularly and have no issues with the gear I receive. Bought a GPS unit and alot of fihsing gear. No issue yet. Check out TACKMASTERS shop as I picked up a few spoons and bait school rigs for 1 dollar each plus postage. There a few people selling cheap lures currently.

[Thud]

I purchased a Lowrance X87 in Mackay last year. When I got home and unpacked the box, I found it was an X97 :o
Bloody good value eh?? IMO
I reckon it's a damn fine sounder as well. ;D

Cheers,
Tim..

[aido]

in two words,
furuno colour

[Burley_Boy]

Great to hear Banshee. I reckon that the quality of the sounders and features like you mentioned can make up for a lack of power. Then after that I'd say 60% is operator skill and I'm still working on that.

You should find a Matrix 20 for around $180USD or the Matrix 27 for around $250USD from plenty of the online retailers. Note they won't work with Celcius or Metres you'll be a fahrenheit and foot man but they will be a cheap way of getting into reasonable quality.

[aquarius]

I'm with Aido......once you use a colour sounder there's no going back to the grey screens.
You can get either a lowrance or navman colour unit with 320 by 240 pixels for less than $700.
Cheers Brent

[Sean]

Thanks for all the help. prob. looking to spend $400 or so :)

[Jewmaster]

Lowrance X51 is good sounder with good resolution, on special in darwin for 350

[aquarius]

Yep Jewmaster is right......The x51 has a pixel count of 240 by 160........GREAT VALUE FOR MONEY.......and in your price range.
I owned an x51 prior to buying my colour sounder and was amazed at how much detail came up on screen and very user friendly.
Cheers Brent

[NeilD]

I would look at the Lowrance X125. I picked one up for $475.00. It has a 5" screen, 480 X 480 pixels, temp, 16 level grayscale and heaps of grunt(2400W peak to peak). The definition is great for a moderate priced unit

Neil

[DaneCross]

I'm very happy with my x51, only given it one run since installing it but it was a thousand times better than the piece of s##t humminbird that I had in there before hand, I didn't realise what I was missing out on! At $320, couldn't ask for more.

[Jewmaster]

I still want a color sounder. My X51 just recently stopped comunicating with the transducer, out of warranty by 3 months, will have to buy a color sounder to make myslef feel better.

:o :o :o

[gif]

I looked at this thoroughly recently

I ended up with a Furuno 4100.

Furuno are top level professional gear - and have moved down to small boats. So you get the top level engineering at a lower price. The Furuno is repairable - unlike others that are all disposable sealed units.

And it works fine.

About $470 from BIAS - pity you missed the 10% off on the weekend.

Gary

[Jewmaster]

sweet, thanks for the advice. Checking out bias now.

[goodoo]

THIS WEEK I MANAGED A HUMMINBIRD LEGEND 3005 DEEP NEW IN BOX WITH WARANTY OFF EBAY 320 V PIXELS DUEL FREQ TRANSDUCER FOR $385 AU PLUS 20 POSTAGE NORMAL PRICE AT CALOUNDRA MARINE 1545 :GOODOO

[macca]

Sean

I'm going for the lowrance X125 as soon as a can afford it.

For freshwater work like I do, 480 x 480 pixels will be very good to spot the fish.

I have x51 and X75, both are good but I want something with more pixels.

I think their round the $530 mark

Can't wait

Macca

[NeilD]

I picked up an X125 for $475.00 at a Southside Marine dealer. This was about $50.00 cheaper than anyone else. I also looked at the Furuno but the screen resolution on the Lowrance made the difference.

[Jewmaster]

Yeehaa In and Outboard marine came through with the goods and got my sounder under warranty. Brand new X51, They found my receipt it was bought 22/08/02 and gave nearly 2 good years of service before this.

Fishing this weekend...... have to buy a new VHF now. Any comments on the Navman range of VHF