Garmin 95sv or hds7 touch

[94patrol]

Going to buy a new sounder this weekend and have narrowed it down to the Garmin and the hds7 and just after some feedback from anyone who has owned one

[Dan5]

I have the 95sv and have owned a 750s and 70dv touch units........I like touch screens and was a bit hesitant at first but going back to buttons has been no big deal.
95sv as most Garmin units has a great screen quality in sunlight the side scan is as good as my mates HDS units IMO as is the chartplotter/charts.

sidevu/downvu/traditional transducer all in one is a bonus and pre-loaded Bluecharts...........unless you need NEMA2k I think it's a bit of a no brainer really..........9'' screen vs 7'' the Garmin is very good value for money and with 2 year warranty.

[94patrol]

That's what I was thinking but the guy from bcf reckons the sounder on the hfs is better but the charts on the Garmin are better i had my hart set on the Garmin so I might run with that

[chocolatemoose]

owned and used both a fair bit.
they are.. sort of.. in different catagories. the HDS is a Multifuntional unit. designed to be modular and have various options added and subtracted. ethernet, radar, autopilot. galaxy of transducers etc. the echomap is more of a stand alone unit "however recently its had a new midlife CHIRP upgrade with some funkyness. of which i shall speak soon"

i see it a bit like this. the HDS is a box ticker. it either has everything or the ability to have everything added on. and a lot of those functions work rather well. some not so much. wifi, 10htz antenna, multipoint touch, all good stuff. the CHIRP based sonar modulator built in chirping non chirp transducers "which often are the ones getting packaged up" make an OKAY meal out of the sonar.. and scores....5/10 mooses. the mapping is pretty good i will give it that. navionics or Cmap work very well with the HDS and obviously having touch makes for renaming waypoints and moving around the maps a sinch.

there are areas i have found that the navionics does show up detail better. when i was outfitting my polycraft i had a garmin 751xs and a HDS7 with the idea that the garmin would be my gps and HDS my sonar.. it worked out to be the opposite. for the area i was fishing in wasnt so fantastic on the garmin mapping.... yet the sonar on the garmin worked out to be far nicer.

but all of that aside i think the real key to all of this is .... how you engage with your unit.

doesnt really matter how good something is if you cant use it. and its here where i find garmin to be a bit ahead. they went the google approach and made things simple. .... take that back. they have gone the VW approach. high quality. subtle and easy to use. added to that the larger 9" screen is easier to see and higher quality..

its a tough one.

but for $1500 9" with that crazy good GT52HW transducer producing some of the better results up to 80mt or so. hard to not go the 95sv unless touch screen and wifi are a real sought after desire.

[Coontakinta]

go the 95sv unless touch screen and wifi are a real sought after desire.

So moose, is the software on the Garmins subject to updates like the Lowrance?
Guessing too from your post that tough is the domain of Lowrance, yes?
I too am looking at the Garmins for installation on my Yak. Had my heart set on a Ti but am now looking outside the box.

[chocolatemoose]

yeah garmin do have updates along the way. about 2 have come out this year for the echomap and GPSmap series. usually bug fixes, performance increasing or feature add ons. much like Lowrance do as well.

the Elite TI is a groovy little unit in all rights. but yep on a kayak id be playing around. sometimes going backwards to "older" non touch tech is quicker. ...depending.
though i do like the little elite 5ti. its groovy

[Coontakinta]

7" screen is tempting, way more so than a 5.
Is there a great deal of difference in power consumption between the two and is there much difference in consumption between the Lowrance n the Garmin?