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I have a good friend that has asked for my advice. We is purchasing a 33 Hydra Sport CC and was wondering if he should go with the new Raymarine C-Series 120 or the Furuno NavNet. Pro / Cons and maybe some pricing and where to order these units would be helpful.
Thanks in advance!
It's kind of like comparing apples to oranges and it really depends on your needs.
The C series does not support the sharing of full display information between screens. In other words you can't have two C series displays and share the full display information between them. The C series does support sharing a limited amount of information with other devices via SeaTalk or NMEA. If you go with the C series and are considering radar your options are limited as far as the power. Ray offers 2kW and 4 kW domes and a 4kW open array if I'm not mistaken. There is no 6kW offering. If you want more than 4kW the next step up is 10kW. In my opinion the C series does have a much clearer display than the Furuno Navnet.
Furuno Navnet (when properly configured) allows you to network displays and you can show full display information on whatever screen you like. Furuno also has a more granual offering for radar power by offering a 6kW. This is significant if you are on a budget and yet want to be able to find birds because a 6kW will do it.
It really depends on your needs. If you plan to have a tower or second station and you want full functionality and display sharing you will have to go with the Furuno. If a single display will satisfy your needs or multiple displays without sharing screen information the C series will do fine.
Price wise, I think the C series is a little more economical but that is a trade off in comparing it with a networked system.
East Coast pretty much summed it up, I have the 120 and love it. I have had no issues with it and find it very easy to use. I don't have radar on that yet, but am planning on adding it. Both units are excellent, tops in the class in my opinion, you can't go wrong either way. The C series will be less $ but on the boat your getting, you won't notice that small difference. I do believe that the fish finder is much better on the Ray, but Furuno is no slouch either.
I've got the C-120 as well and have the 4kW dome...works very well and the DSM-250 finder is better than anything I've seen in the recreational market.
In a single station installation, the C-series is an excellent choice. FF performance is great but as always hinges almost entirely on transducer selection/installation.
Chartplotter performance is exceptional, Radar (I have 2kw radome) is very good. Overlay is very helpful.
All this praise for the C-series is after the last update, which has fixed all issues I and others uncovered. It has been rock solid. Not one glitch or issue in over 50hrs of use over 12 separate trips since the update. Prior to the update many C-series users had valid complaints especially when viewing/zooming around chart boundaries causing resets, and the lack of waypoint transfer/management. Since the update and free waypoint transfer management utility, the silence has been deafening. The lack of posts on the C-series recently indicates that I am not alone in my pleasant experience.
Furuno makes great stuff, and prior to the DSM 250, I would say they clearly HAD the best FF technology out there (i.e. 582L). I don't know that they have a leg up on FFs anymore over the DSM now though. Cost/feature in a single station installation will make the C series a better choice. Long Term reliability? The jury is still out, and will be for years. Ease of Use/ User Interface: Ray has it nailed, but Furuno is very good as well, and has a very strong and loyal user base. Useability of all features on one screen: Excellent even w/ the C80 (I have redundant handheld gps and VHF so having one unit does not bother me). Display: Excellent. SW/waypoint management: OK - The capability now exists w/ free sw to transfer waypoint to/from PC via excel spreadsheet and compact flash card. Not as good as Garmin's blue chart CD solution, but useable and fairly convenient.
I am very happy with my C80, 2kw radome, GPS -WAAS antenna, DSM250, heading sensor, Navionics Gold cartography ($6.5K including install, SH Intrepid VHF, Digital Antenna, house battery w/ switch, by certified Ray marine electrician). You probably can't go wrong with either, but pay close attention to install details for transducer, heading sensor placement/callibration, and house power. Power glitches will make the best electronics unstable. My install is excellent.
thanks guys. How about some places in where I can purchase them for the best price. Everyone keeps telling me Boaters World. I pulled this up this morning and thought this was a good deal. http://www.boatersworld.com/webapp/w...=&cat1=5771843
Best retail deal I found was from Consumers'. I've heard you can negotiate for their "boat show" prices, which is just slightly more than wholesale cost. Tough to beat Consumers'.
Defenders boat sghow pricing right now is excellent. No sales tax if you live outside CT. That having been said, I bout my C-120 for $1795 during last February's Miami show for $1795, so ask them to sharpen their pencils. $500 for the DSm and $500 for the M260 with the in-hull tank.
It is alot tougher choice now. The Furuno with reabate is REAL close in price and the only choice for more than 1 screen is Furuno. The C-120 has a bigger screen and higher pixel count. No matter which one you get the Transducer will make the package. If you hamper either unit with a dinky POS ducer it will suffer. Save money somewhere else and pony up for a 1KW ducer and either unit will serve you well.
I have a shot of my C120 installed in my Regulator, check the photos section for my thread. Fantastic unit so far - appears to do everything I need and more.
MI Ben,
Looks good!!! If you don't mind me asking, How much was that set up? Sure looks good. I have always been a furuno man and have just really started seeing raymarine around my area. I would say 95 percent of the center console in the area have furuno electronics!!
Keep in mind Furuno still uses the old cartography, so there's more to just comparing screens. If Furuno is offering rebates it may be an indication that they are about to unveil their models with Nav Gold+, which would drive the price of their existing units down even further.
Seems the old hands are mostly Furuno, with newbies(from scratch) mainly going Raymarine.
With C120, transducer, GPS antenna, radio antenna, east coast chip and Icom 5- series radio + all mounting kits and hardware the setup cost me around $4400. I had a local marine electronics shop install it all, which came to about $1600. So about $6k, signed sealed and delivered...and I'm very happy with the setup.
Oh yeah and if you can spring for the extra I highly recommend splurging on the C120. I feared it was overkill but once it was in I saw what everyone meant when they said "put the biggest screen you can fit in there".
I can be messing around at the transom, glance back to the 120 and see, through bright sunlight, DETAILS of both the chart and FF, even in split screen mode!
We have used two C80's on the same boat. One is gps/radar ,the other is gps/depthfinder. Both units use the same gps sensor thur a seatalk junction block. We wanted a single display for the depthfinder. Wanted to use the c120 but was to large for our installation. The screen is much better than the furuno, and the dsm 250 is a great depthfinder. We figured if one of the units goes out a simple process of connecting one connector would give you a stand only unit with gps/radar/depthfinder. The C80 does have radar overlay with the spilt screen mode. The screen quality and the depthfinder quality out way the Furunos sharing screen function. In this configration you almost the same functions of screen control as the NavNet setup. The only thing I would change is getting the 4kw instead of tthe 2kw radar.
My boat is sitting in my driveway in GA and it didn't even get rained on according to my wife. I'm up in RI visiting my folks (helping decommission my dad's boat for the winter). I'm going to the Newport Boat Show this weekend to see what's new as I might now be around in Feb for the Miami show.
Raymarine C-Series 120 or the Furuno NavNet 
I do believe that the fish finder is much better on the Ray, but Furuno is no slouch either. 
