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Hello sailors..
I am looking for opinions and recomendations regarding the use of gps software to be used with my laptop. My intention is to use the laptop and reciever at my navstation in conjuction with my older handheld gps rather than a chartplotter at the helm. Will be using it most often in the Great Lakes. Anyone willing to share what software has worked well for them?
Jim in Ohio...
Lots of software out there. I assume you're on a Windows platform.
I've used Ocean Navigator successfully for several years, and like it very much. Maptech has several levels of compatible programs.
ON is great for planning and underway navigation. It has a nice feature which allows you to plot a course, with waypoints, and to print out a copy of all the courses, distances, times, waypoints, etc. I always do that before a long trip, and have the hard copy along as well as the program itself running on my laptop.
I also keep an older Dell laptop runniing Win98SE and ON, with the identical routes and waypoints and charts. It's cheap insurance in case the IBM Win2K machine fails.
Hello sailors..
I am looking for opinions and recomendations regarding the use of gps software to be used with my laptop. My intention is to use the laptop and reciever at my navstation in conjuction with my older handheld gps rather than a chartplotter at the helm. Will be using it most often in the Great Lakes. Anyone willing to share what software has worked well for them?
Jim in Ohio...
I'll chime in, I'm using a magellan meridian marine with Mapsend BlueNAV and google earth. works great for me but I'm sure others have different methods.
hope this helps!
I have a garmin GPS/ the Capt'n charting program. Works great. I have taken it to the Islands when sailing the US Spanish Islands and use it in the Great Lakes. I have a combination 12 volt/gps/Computer cord. the only thing that would make it better is a portable GPS antenna. The cord is long enough for me to put the gps up on the coach roof but the antenna would be an improvement. Great portability.
Can anyone see or read the laptop/notebook display screen out on the water under the bright sun? I find that it needs to be kept below out of the light to see it.
Most laptops will need to be kept below or heavily shaded in order to read the display. The only laptops that are daylight readable are usually "ruggedized" models that have a transreflective LCD display, and are designed for use outdoors.
The Cap'n program is pretty good if you want a Windows-based solution, and it can work with the free NOAA ENC charts. MacENC works pretty well if you're using a Mac-based laptop, and also works with the free NOAA charts.
Doesn't really inconvenience me...but it is considered rather rude by net etiquette standards...also means that many people will end up replying to both threads, not realizing that they're from the same person, which uses extra resources on the server that really isn't necessary.
Cam- Can you merge this thread with his other one???
I use Maptech on my computer tied into a 12 volt gps. The computer is at the nav station because you cannot see the screen in sunlight. I do all my course work on the computer. At the helm I have an old Magellan chart plotter but I rarely use it as a chart plotter prefering to use it in something like the "highway mode" which gives me course corrections SOG waypoints etc. I manually install the route on the Magellen This works fine in open water. I am going to up grade my helm chart plotter because my current system doesn't work so well in close quarters like going down the ICW.
Talking to the Maptech guy at the Miami boat show you can now get weather via satellite through your GPS but you need the pro series. Weather is coming and may soon be on some GPS/chartplotters soon if not already.
My system provides redundency
Not really... the software field for the Mac is a bit more limited. Two of the major programs, GPSNavX and MacENC are by the same company, and the last one that is of any note hasn't been updated in quite some time.
Thanks cam.
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