what are some good portable lake gps that show the contour map?

[Dbumb]

any one know some kind of portable ice fishing gps with contour maps, and what does lake master mean? or the chip lake master or something like that.

[nofishfisherman]

Do you have a smart phone? If so look for the Navionics App, that should be all you need. Its $10 for the US maps and it will give you 1 foot contours on all the popular lakes and 5 foot contours on all the rest.

If you want a handheld GPS you'll be looking at maybe $200 for the GPS plus another $100 for the map chip. You can get either a Navionics map chip or a Lakemaster map chip, but they are pretty much the same for the most part and they are basically the same thing as the $10 Navionics App.

So if you have a smartphone save yourself $290 and just get the App. Thats all I use and it works great.

[bogeyman1]

Lowrance makes a nice hand-held gps. There are brands out there as well or better but make sure they accept the Lake-Master chip. The gps units will run aroud $200-@300 depending on model and the chip runs around $100. Most of your bigger or more popular lakes are on the chip and show your depths and contours. This has become part of my arsenal of equipment when both Summer and Winter fishing.

[HaRdWaTeR jUnKy]

For those of you that have the lake map app, can you put markers on a particular lake and then come back to the same spot later on? What else can you do with the app...? Thanks

[IamZombie]

For those of you that have the lake map app, can you put markers on a particular lake and then come back to the same spot later on? What else can you do with the app...? Thanks

Yes you can.

You either mark a spot as favorite, or use the camera from within the app, and it'll geotag that spot.

[MN Mike]

any one know some kind of portable ice fishing gps with contour maps, and what does lake master mean? or the chip lake master or something like that.

Recently Lakemaster became part of Humminbird exclusively, you can probably still find some Lakemaster data cards or CD's out there for products other than Humminbird but they will be disappearing fast and when they are gone, thats it.

Humminbird does not make a portable handheld device, so that leaves you with Garmin or Lowrance.

Garmin builds many GPS devices ranging from around $120 all the way up to $600. Garmin recently release a product called the Upper Midwest Fishing Guide, it covers 7 States and over 9500 lakes and many with 1 foot contours. It's the best bang for the buck out there in lake maps, it would cost a small fortune to cover that many lakes / states with the Lakemaster product.

You can look at a Garmin Etrex Legend HCx, Etrex 20 or 30, GPSMap 62 or 78 and then the Oregon and Montanas. When looking at Garmins, just make sure they have the MicroSD Card slot, most will.

Mike

[Bulldoggr]

Lowrance makes a nice hand-held gps. There are brands out there as well or better but make sure they accept the Lake-Master chip. The gps units will run aroud $200-@300 depending on model and the chip runs around $100. Most of your bigger or more popular lakes are on the chip and show your depths and contours. This has become part of my arsenal of equipment when both Summer and Winter fishing.

Lowrance makes a [PoorWordUsage] handheld GPS. Don't buy one. Lowrance really screwed themselves when they tried to replace their own Ifinder series. Even the sales reps at the Sporting goods stores will tell you to stay away from the new Lowrance handhelds

[govikes211]

All smartphones except blackberry does not have an app for lakes. Does anyone know why?

[broman]

As someone who has used the Navionics app, iFinder with LakeMaster and a Garmin with LakeMaster I can tell you that the Garmin is the way to go. Assuming you can find a LakeMaster chip or CD for your unit anymore.

The Navionics app is slick and does work well. However, I tried using it again this weekend it on Mille Lacs and it would get confused and loose it's GPS signal since it relies on your having 3G connectivity in order to figure out your location (iPhone). Also, while driving around the cold will zap your battery on a phone in 10 seconds.

On a Lowrance H20 you have to click up and down to change through all the letters and numbers to edit waypoint descriptions. While on my Garmin Oregon with the touch screen it's much easier with the fully letter layout. Granted, the H2O is old technology.

IMO a real GPS is the way to go if you can swing it. My phone is just too important for me to drop in the snow or a hole.

[MN Mike]

IMO a real GPS is the way to go if you can swing it. My phone is just too important for me to drop in the snow or a hole.

We were having a conversation along those same lines yesterday and that exact point came up, so they are looking at a handheld GPS too.

Mike