Ripcharts vs. Hilton's......

Team Seadation · 07-02-2009, 05:34 PM

Fellas....

I currently have a subscription to Ripcharts that will be expiring in a few weeks. Im thinking of switching to Hilton's because 80 percent of the time when I log on to Ripcharts the imagery is either blacked out or is not viewable due to cloud cover. Can any of you guys give me some feedback on Hiltons, Good? Bad? Ok? Bout the same as Ripcharts? Im not bashing Ripcharts and I do like the 89.00 a year for Ripcharts vs. 200.00 for Hiltons, and I do like the map tools that Ripcharts offers.(does Hiltons offer the same ones? ie. distance measuring tools, radius tools) I can and will say that when I first subscribed to Ripcharts and was encountering the blacked out or partially blacked out images and tried emailing them about the issue on several occaissions I never got a reply until I made a post on Rodnreel and called out one of their guys who was posting (for advertisement purposes) on Rodnreel.com. And even then I was fed a line of BS that they had returned my emails, blah, blah blah. I know that satelite imagery is satelite imagery and neither one of these providers can control certain aspects about it such as clouds and blackouts but when Im paying you for your service I want the bare minimum courtesy from you to AT LEAST reply to my questions about your product that Ive subscribed to. Help me out with the comparison and decision making process fellas.......

lumpfisher · 07-02-2009, 05:48 PM

I have had both and prefer hiltons simply because they have more rigs and floaters displayed.

GotchaRB · 07-02-2009, 06:32 PM

Rip Charts

anhospog · 07-02-2009, 08:31 PM

I subscribe to Hilton's and they have not had a good chlorophyll image for our area for the past couple weeks. I'd say about half the time I see a good 24 hour old image and the other half I have to use their 3 day or 7 day combined image. It's hard to trust an image that is a week old since the rip can move so much in one day much less 7 days. I've noticed that when Hilton's has a poor image, the free Supermaps also has a poor image. I suspect all the services use the same satellite info to create their images. Anyone know otherwise?

REDWEISER · 07-02-2009, 09:14 PM

I have no problem with RipCharts for my needs ... use what you're comfortable with.

jtburf · 07-03-2009, 05:52 AM

Go here!

Check out Louisiana-Offshore.com

John

South Bound · 07-03-2009, 03:05 PM

If there are clouds in the sky, it doesnt matter if you are serviceA with satelliteA or serviceB with satelliteB -- neither service + satellite can see through clouds.

Contender One · 07-03-2009, 03:19 PM

Hilton's.

Team Seadation · 07-03-2009, 04:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by South Bound

If there are clouds in the sky, it doesnt matter if you are serviceA with satelliteA or serviceB with satelliteB -- neither service + satellite can see through clouds.

Thanx Capt. Obvious.... My biggest concern was the blacked out images. I was just wondering if people encounter that with Hiltons......

reelfinatical · 07-03-2009, 06:21 PM

SeaView from any of the SST-Offshore.com sites gets you some useful shots which help GREATLY when clouds are in the way.

07-03-2009, 07:19 PM

I don't think it has been overly cloudy for the last two weeks, but the sites have had no real picture for about that long.

Team Seadation · 07-03-2009, 08:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mikie1

I don't think it has been overly cloudy for the last two weeks, but the sites have had no real picture for about that long.

Yep, I was thinking the same thing and that kinda psses me off! But on the other hand I know that sometimes you get scattered clouds WAY high that we cant see on ground zero and possibly that is what causes the cloudy pics.... Like I said before, its not the cloudy pics that piss me off, its the blacked out pics!!!

justhookit2 · 07-04-2009, 12:39 PM

You have to know the super secret password in order to get the non-blacked out pics

Seriously I'm not real sure what your complaint is. A "blacked out" portion does not mean someone at Ripcharts is trying to hide the info, it means that they do not have that image, period.

anhospog - yes you are correct. All the services are using the same pictures that are available for free. The services differ in the way they interpret/re-package the data.

Southern Hunter · 07-05-2009, 08:43 PM

Hilton's

Team Seadation · 07-06-2009, 07:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by justhookit2

You have to know the super secret password in order to get the non-blacked out pics

Seriously I'm not real sure what your complaint is. A "blacked out" portion does not mean someone at Ripcharts is trying to hide the info, it means that they do not have that image, period.

anhospog - yes you are correct. All the services are using the same pictures that are available for free. The services differ in the way they interpret/re-package the data.

Well, what Id really like to know is..... does the peeps that use Hiltons experience this "blacked out image" problem, and if so how often is it occuring?????

Southern Hunter · 07-06-2009, 07:55 PM

I have never expeirenced the blacked out image.....I simply login and go to chlorophyll then I click on archives and go to the most recent clear picture, which is usually no more than a day or 2 old. I have found Hilton's to be VERY accurate! RipCharts does not have nearly enough rigs on its maps, and I get blacked out pictures probably 70-80% of the time!

bigtuna · 07-06-2009, 09:07 PM

I use hiltons...I love it. My only complaint is lack of chlorophyll updates. Sure wish they would update more, especially after we are given a cloudy image. That water can move fast!

deeplus · 07-07-2009, 01:13 AM

hilton is definitely the way to go, they offer much more than just chlorophyl imagery