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Random Quote: In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
gerg,
I understand all that. That's what I'm trying to tell you. FORGET the Garmin terms in HP. There is really no such thing as a "Fishing View" as greyed out in HP. There is just the selection of a chart set. Above, in the 1st pciture I selected the FISHING CHART by selecting the "G2 Viosion VUS511L" from the chart data selection box. In the 2nd picture, I selected the NAVIGATION CHART by selecting "Bluechart America's.." instead. So essentially, I changed from Fishing chart, to Navigation chart.
Yes, I know there is a greyed out option that says View, Fishing chart. But pretend that isn't there. Just select the Fishing chart, that it. There is nothing magical, it's just a different chart that happens to have more contour lines on it. If Garmin removed that greyed out option, you wouldn't be confused.
Now right now, I'm zoomed all the way in to the Hudson canyon, I have the same level of detail. ??
gerg,
I understand all that. That's what I'm trying to tell you. FORGET the Garmin terms in HP. There is really no such thing as a "Fishing View" as greyed out in HP. There is just the selection of a chart set. Above, in the 1st pciture I selected the FISHING CHART by selecting the "G2 Viosion VUS511L" from the chart data selection box. In the 2nd picture, I selected the NAVIGATION CHART by selecting "Bluechart America's.." instead. So essentially, I changed from Fishing chart, to Navigation chart.
Yes, I know there is a greyed out option that says View, Fishing chart. But pretend that isn't there. Just select the Fishing chart, that it. There is nothing magical, it's just a different chart that happens to have more contour lines on it. If Garmin removed that greyed out option, you wouldn't be confused.
Now right now, I'm zoomed all the way in to the Hudson canyon, I have the same level of detail. ??
Sorry, we aren't communicating. Forget HP. Forget the built in charts.
Focus on the chartplotter - the actual physical 4xxx/5xxx units with the G2 Vision chip installed.
Go through the menu's. You will find the fishing chart menu. Choose it and you will lose all useful information for fishing. I don't get that.
Now, on the CP, choose navigation charts. Perform that same zoom function and you will see that you lose the detailed topo lines. You still have topo lines, but they are very wide apart. Not useful for finding structure.
To some extent, HP does the same thing. I haven't used it enough to say whether it behaves identically to the CP, but the CP does behave that way.
They also intend to have HP display the same view as the CP, and that is why they have the grey's out choice for fishing chart view. It just doesn't work in HP yet, but does on the CP.
__________________
Terry Jason 35, Yanmar 370 hp, Lots of fun at a leisurely pace
What usefully info is it that "disappears"?? Nothing disappears when I switch to the Fishing chart on my 5215, actually, allot more appears. Allot more contour lines.
However, there is/was a bug in the current version v5.3, that makes the soundings not display properly on the fishing chart. Is THAT what you are referring to? If so, that is one of the items supposedly fixed in 5.4 just released (according to the list of things fixed), I haven't tried it yet.
The zooming thing is more of a scale of the chart your looking at thing. Some scales (zoom levels) do display better than others. But I've noticed that on every plotter/chart combo I've ever looked at.
I have a question that may have already been asked but I did not see it. I'm getting ready to download the 5.2 update onto my 545s. My question is do I need to reload the maps I already copied on a different SD to use with HomePort so it overwrites the old one? Do the updates change anything on the maps or can I just keep using the same SD card with the maps without updating that card?
I have a question that may have already been asked but I did not see it. I'm getting ready to download the 5.2 update onto my 545s. My question is do I need to reload the maps I already copied on a different SD to use with HomePort so it overwrites the old one? Do the updates change anything on the maps or can I just keep using the same SD card with the maps without updating that card?
Software updates do not change or update the maps. Map updates are available in some cases but they are not free, you have to pay for them. Since the maps are based on actual paper charts, there's little need to update them unless the paper charts in your area have been updated.
Birdie, the following screenscrapes show what I'm talking about. I used HP for these since I don't have the power cord to the plotter yet.
The area selected is to the east of Block Island. In the first image, you can clearly see the mudhole and gully. These are very important locales in this area - lots of fish, both bottom and palegic wander through here.
The contour lines in this image are about 1 fathom apart. Lots of detail here.
The next shot is just one click closer in zoom. You can see that the region with most of the mudhole suddenly loses it's detail. The contour lines go from 1 fathom to 5 or 10 fathoms and most of them are just not shown at all.
It appears that the chart quadrant in the upper portion is effected to a much greater degree than the one below. What appears to be happening is that the software is changing the charts that are displayed based on zoom level. Since the topo data is probably on a very large scale chart, it gets lost when the sw switched to a lower scale chart.
That's not good for fishing. I'd like to be able to see that topo data no matter what zoom level I have chosen. Other vendors somehow support that (I had it on my c-map bathy charts).
The 4212 does this as well. You may not see it because it may not happen in all charted areas, or you may not notice it because you don't fish structure.
Just saying. Make sense?
Oh, and that magenta line is a track from one of my trips this year. straight as an arrow coming home. It truncated most of the start of that trip. I guess I need to set the plotter to set the track points further apart.
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Terry Jason 35, Yanmar 370 hp, Lots of fun at a leisurely pace
Tony,
I had the SAME problem on my laptop, several times. Not sure of the cause, other than something in it's database gets corrupt, and once that occurs you ned to remove HP completly, then re-install. FOLLOW THESE DIRECTIONS AT YOUR OWN RISK. BACKUP YOUR DATA FIRST!!!
To remove completely:
1. Control Panel, Add Remove programs, find Garmin Homeport, click Remove.
2. Now DELETE the Garmin/Homeport directories under Documents and settings\your_username\AplicationData\Garmin\Homep ort AND under Programs\Garmin\Homeport. If you see it anywhere else, DELETE IT.
3. Now the delicate part: run "Regedit", and delete any Homeport Keys in the registry: there should be 2, one under Local Machine\Software\Garmin\Homeport and the 2nd under CurrentUser\Software\Garmin\Homeport. Delete both of those keys.
4. Reboot
5. Re-install the Homeport install program. No need to re-download, just click on the file you downloaded already.
6. If you had data backed up already, do the restore and yoru back in bidness.
The same issue has occured to me a few times already. Runs fine, then I close it. Go to restart HP, and nothing happens. Click icon and notta. Check task mngr and notta. Do the above dance and it runs again. Obviously Garmin has a small bug somewhere...
good luck!
Birdman, thanks for the advice, HP now loads perfectly. BTW I'm still waiting on Garmin support to ge back to me with their solution, only been over one week!!
Tom,
What happend to the CATAGORIES?? My biggest complaint with HP is the lack of abilty to filter out a list of data (WP's, routes and or tracks). The Categories are gone, and there is no separation of WP's, Routes and Tracks other than the being able to sort by "symbol". That is killing me....
In MS you could easily select the Waypoint Tab, then drop the Category selection down to a custom category selection (ex: "REEF"), and I would have all my WP's that represented a REEF, and then click on any of the header fields to sort it ascending or descending by that field (ex: date, or Name, or Location, or Depth..). I could then select the Tracks tab, and do the same with tracks.
I can almost do the same thing in HP if I separate all my WP's and tracks into different folders, but there are 2 issues with that, most of my WP's are in multiple categories, so I would have to make sure I manage them very closely. A Reef WP for example is also a "FISHING" waypoint. But not all "FISHING" WP's fall into the REEF category. Secondly, we lost all the sorting abilities (date, location, depth...), but that I'm sure they can add back in as it's easy to add sorts. Then there is the issue of making sure I would then select and transfer all those different folders to my chip when transferring data. And if I add new WP's on my plotter and bring them back into HP, now I have to copy it into many different folders in my collection using the "Sent To".
Me thinks we need the Tabs above the data box (WP's, Tracks, Routes) and the Categories back. Anyone else have this issue? Am I missing something or doing it wrong? Whoo dunn it???
Found another possible issue/bug in HP. Possibly a BIG one!! Read carefully...
I just got a new laptop, so needed to transfer all my "stuff" to the new laptop. Re-installed Mapsource (still using for city Maps for hand held gps). Re-installed my bluecharts (why not?), and finally installed Homeport. So then I go to bring in the data, I open Homeport, and choose RESTORE from the menu, and choose my last BACKUP file (copied from my old laptop). And low and behold, it says "Restore Completed". Well, NO DATA is in My collection. So I go to old laptop, and do a restore from the same file to make sure it has everything in it. Whalla, no problem. Try again on new laptop, and notta!!!
So I then Export and Import each of my Mycollection folders instead. That brings them in what looks to be ok. BUT, why didn't the Restore work??? That's a bit scary? What if I crash and don't have the old data to Export?? That's what a backup is for, no?
So the Backup/Restore can't be used as a "real" backup/restore as you would think. Not as of right now anyway!!
Birdie, the following screenscrapes show what I'm talking about. I used HP for these since I don't have the power cord to the plotter yet.
The area selected is to the east of Block Island. In the first image, you can clearly see the mudhole and gully. These are very important locales in this area - lots of fish, both bottom and palegic wander through here.
The contour lines in this image are about 1 fathom apart. Lots of detail here.
The next shot is just one click closer in zoom. You can see that the region with most of the mudhole suddenly loses it's detail. The contour lines go from 1 fathom to 5 or 10 fathoms and most of them are just not shown at all.
It appears that the chart quadrant in the upper portion is effected to a much greater degree than the one below. What appears to be happening is that the software is changing the charts that are displayed based on zoom level. Since the topo data is probably on a very large scale chart, it gets lost when the sw switched to a lower scale chart.
That's not good for fishing. I'd like to be able to see that topo data no matter what zoom level I have chosen. Other vendors somehow support that (I had it on my c-map bathy charts).
The 4212 does this as well. You may not see it because it may not happen in all charted areas, or you may not notice it because you don't fish structure.
Just saying. Make sense?
Oh, and that magenta line is a track from one of my trips this year. straight as an arrow coming home. It truncated most of the start of that trip. I guess I need to set the plotter to set the track points further apart.
Greg, I have the same problem and its irritating as hell. I believe you are right in your statement that the fishing chart feature is something that will be added later. No matter what I do it is still "greyed out" under chart selection. I'll bet we will get all of the G2 Vision features in HP in the future.
It would be nice to if they had an option to set the screen up to look like our units including having touch screen capabilities on a touch screen computer monitor.
Raytech Planner by Raymarine has their screen set up like an E or C series unit and includes the FF, Radar, 3D, bathy charts,photo overlay etc... including access to the points of interest and coastal pilot books. Best of all it was free.
Knowing how generous Garmin has been with past software upgrades I will be willing to wager that Garmin will be adding upgrades quickly as this is just the beginning of what this software will do.
Will this software work with the charts in my 3210 and my bathymetric charts? Looks nice.
I have a 3210, but I can't for the life of me remember ever seeing an option to download the charts to a chip like I can from my 4212. Even if you could, I don't think the chips are big enough to hold almost a GB of data.
My guess is the charts can't be used. The Bathy chip, or any G2 chip for the 3210, should be useable, but that is just a guess. I really only use my 3210 as a netwrok device and use the 4212 for updates and transfers.
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Terry Jason 35, Yanmar 370 hp, Lots of fun at a leisurely pace
gerg,
I see the zooming issue, but if you zoom further, it then comes back. At least the spot I tried (Hudson). I think it's a function of the resolution/scale of the chart, but I'm sure they can and would/will fix it.
But the part I don't understand, is the "Fishing Chart" feature?? And Hat Island is now also mentioning it. He's prpbably right they intend to do much more with it, we are at version 1. BUT, we are getting the Fishing chart by selecting the Fishing chart data set. What is it, you think we are missing or could possible get from the greyed out View "Fishing Chart" option?
gerg,
I see the zooming issue, but if you zoom further, it then comes back. At least the spot I tried (Hudson). I think it's a function of the resolution/scale of the chart, but I'm sure they can and would/will fix it.
But the part I don't understand, is the "Fishing Chart" feature?? And Hat Island is now also mentioning it. He's prpbably right they intend to do much more with it, we are at version 1. BUT, we are getting the Fishing chart by selecting the Fishing chart data set. What is it, you think we are missing or could possible get from the greyed out View "Fishing Chart" option?
Nobody else was using Categories in Mapsource??
Ok, I just received the power cord for my 4212 so I plugged it in and fired it up. It's possible your 52xx menus are different, but this is what I see when I run the menus.
From the home screen on my 4212, Charts > Fishing Chart. I now have a chart similar to the navigation chart, except some of the detail and features are suppressed. For example, the labels of the various structures are gone. It's generally a cleaner chart than the nav chart.
I think this is what they intend to display in HP when the feature works.
Anyway, I just noticed something in the Fishing Chart display for the area around the mudhole. When I have the scale set high so I can see where I'm going on the screen, the bathy details don't appear (just the opposite to the nav chart), but when I zoom in to about the 0.3 nm scale, they appear. I don't know if this is new in 5.4, but I can't ever remember seeing that happen before. I'd post a pic, but I can't seem to take a good shot without screen strobing.
It's something anyway. Now at least if I switch to the fishing chart when I am in an area fishing, then zoom in, I can see structure. Where it won't help as much is when I need to move a few miles to another location.
To do that, I would zoom way out, then start to pan until I find a good target, and then zoom in to find some good structure and set a waypoint.
They still have a lot of work to do to get it "right" though. But it is better than it was, or at least I now know a partial workaround.
And no, I never used categories in MS.
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Terry Jason 35, Yanmar 370 hp, Lots of fun at a leisurely pace
Yep, same exact menus on 4000 and 5000. In fact, it's the same software. I ussually download hte 4000 software because they never update the 5215 weblinks.
So yes, I also have the "Menu", "Charts", "Fishing Charts" option on the 5215.
So what your saying is, the ONLY thing missing in HP is the supression of some of the nav info, when the fishing chart is selected, correct? Because you ARE looking at the same chart when you select the 511 chart up at the top.
When you look around where we ussually fish (canyons...), there is no nav info anyway, so there's nothing to supress.
But I do see the zooming issues. It's almost every other zoom level, the detail appears or dissapears. Then definitely need to fix that.
Two items on HP.
One, HP does not run well at the same time MS is open on my computer. HP runs very slow and is very unresponsive.
Two, if HP stays open, such as overnight, it seems to run extremely slow.
Any one else have these issues, or is it just me?
Yep, same exact menus on 4000 and 5000. In fact, it's the same software. I ussually download hte 4000 software because they never update the 5215 weblinks.
So yes, I also have the "Menu", "Charts", "Fishing Charts" option on the 5215.
So what your saying is, the ONLY thing missing in HP is the supression of some of the nav info, when the fishing chart is selected, correct? Because you ARE looking at the same chart when you select the 511 chart up at the top.
When you look around where we ussually fish (canyons...), there is no nav info anyway, so there's nothing to supress.
But I do see the zooming issues. It's almost every other zoom level, the detail appears or dissapears. Then definitely need to fix that.
Birdie, the maps are layered like a cake. The bathy stuff looks like it is at the highest layer (1:100000 or so). As you zoom in, you start to be presented with different charts. Out at the hudson, there aren't that many, and maybe just the one, so you never lose the detail.
But inshore where I was looking, there are lots of overlapping charts at different aspect ratios. Once I zoom in, the bathy chart info isn't available on the lower aspect ratio charts so it disappears.
I think the fishing chart view was supposed to correct that. It needs to work better, but at least I can zoom in on the bathy chart now.
Golf, I have left HP open overnight and it worked fine. It's possible they have a memory leak that I just wasn't invoking however. That would certainly account for it.
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Terry Jason 35, Yanmar 370 hp, Lots of fun at a leisurely pace
Two items on HP.
One, HP does not run well at the same time MS is open on my computer. HP runs very slow and is very unresponsive.
Two, if HP stays open, such as overnight, it seems to run extremely slow.
Any one else have these issues, or is it just me?
Fooltain and I are having a similar issue. In my case MS is not running and HP is slow and unresponsive. I have not left it running overnight so can't answer that. Have contacted tech support and trying to figure things out. It runs good on my crappy laptop and my super Mac but not on my good windoze desktop. Anyway we're working on it. So now there are 3 of us.
, HP now loads perfectly. BTW I'm still waiting on Garmin support to ge back to me with their solution, only been over one week!!
