Handheld GPS for lake maps

[Bulldoggr]

Don't know how much this has been discussed on the forums herre, but I would like soome input from you. I have/ had an H2Oc boought it when they came out. have the lakemaster chips for it. I use the /had for a reason. My unit with the cigarette lighter power supply cord has disapeared and I can't seem to locate it.

So here is the problem i am having. I have invested money into these lakemaster chips. I love them, the fact that they work in my fish finder/gps unit on my boat makes it a great convience. So as I myself have just found out lakemaster was bought by Hummingbird. and Hummingbird has stated on their web site they will only continue to make and support the chips for Hummingbird units only. so if I want to use Lakemaster I need to get a hummingbird. Problem is Hummingbird does not make a handheld. second if they did, my old chips won't work cause they are not the Micro sd chips.

So that brings me to Navionics. at least with navionics you have more choices in what brands and unit they will work in. But anything I buy now will not work with my existing chips or the unit i have in my boaat.

So I ask you, what are your thoughts on this? what hand held would you or have gone with for fishing/ Ice fishing.

The Lowrance have nothing but negative reviews. Garmin is a brand that I have been hearing good things about.

as far as my H2Oc and where it is. i have a feeling it was taken from my truck. but thats just a guess.

[MN Mike]

Quite a few folks on this forum run Garmins, with a little searching, you can still find Lakemaster MicroSD Cards in stock but they won't last long since Humminbird has done away with them, so whatever is still in inventory is all that is left.

That being said, Garmin themselves released a product called Upper Midwest Fishing Guide a few weeks ago and it covers many states, for $99 it's a steal. There are over 9,000 lakes on this product and several with 1 foot contours. Garmin will let you test drive the map to a certain extent so you can see some of the coverage they provide, just go to Garmin's site and work your way thru the Map section and look for Upper Midwest Fishing Guide, when you get there, in the lower right hand corner are the states covered, click on one and start searching for a lake you are interested in.

Garmin builds several different GPS devices, I often tell people to get to the store and check them out in person if possible. Screen Size, touchscreen / Non touchscreen and button placement will be some of the physical differences you notice with Garmin GPS devices, then you get into the nitty gritty on the rest of it when you decide what you are looking for.

Garmin has price ranges covered for mapping handhelds, starting with the economical Etrex series, then onto the new Etrex 20 and 30 handhelds, Dakota series are Touchscreen GPS's with smaller screens, Oregon's are larger screened Touchscreen devices, GPSMap 62 and 78's are next ( non touchscreen ), the 78's will float and then you have the Montana's which have the largest Touchscreen's. Some devices have camera's built in.

If you get to Garmin's site, check out the mapping handheld page, on the left hand side they have a good little filter you can use to narrow down your options. Keep your eyes peeled for sales, you can often save a benny or 2 over the MSRP listed on Garmin's site.

Garmin opens their devices up to accept other maps, some states offer topo and lake maps right from their site that can run on Garmin devices and more becomes available everyday. Lots of people are building custom maps too.

IMO, Garmin's durability is second to none in the consumer GPS world.

Mike