GPS question

[macminn]

I was using my fishing boat Lowrance locater/gps unit as my gps on the ice. It finally kicked the bucket. Trying to figure out what to replace it with as far as a gps unit. I was at a store in Rogers and looked at the garmin units. Liked what I saw, but they don't take the lakemaster chips if I heard right. They did have a hunting/topo/lake chip for $100 that looked good, but it looked like the contours on mille lacs for instance was only 5 foot increments.

I'm trying to educate myself on these units. Is there any units that I can use in my fishing boat and on the ice with a lakemaster chip? Or is the garmin units with the hunting/topo/lake chip good enough?

I have my flashers so I'm set on that front.

Thanks in advance, I love this site.

[MN Mike]

If you had a Lakemaster chip for your old Lowrance, there isn't much that chip will work in anymore, so you are probably looking at an new data card no matter which way you turn.

Garmins will accept Lakemaster chips, IF you can find them, they have to say Garmin on them. Better yet, Garmin makes the Upper Midwest Fishing Guide MicroSD card, it's been out for about a year, has the same data Lakemaster had on their cards and it covers MORE areas on one card.

I've got it and so do many others and it makes a great combo and Garmin includes more than just lake data on this card too.

In your fishing boat, are you looking for just a handheld or a depthfinder / GPS combo? Garmin has those too but I'm just curious if thats what you are looking for.

Mike

[schweady]

And the UMFG chip shows 1 ft increments on Mille Lacs. Makes a great Christmas gift. Just sayin'.

[Might_B_A_Pike]

you could look into getting the Humminbird ICE 385 ci combo or the 597. Humminbird has a rebate program going through the rest of the year for a free lakemaster chip. if you are looking for a summer and winter unit.

[CaptainMusky]

The lakemaster chips will still work in the lowrance units its just that new ones are no longer made for lowrance after the buyout by Johnson outdoors.

If you were to buy a new HDS unit the chip you have should work just fine. If the chip you have is the microSD inside of the SD adapter (small chip inside a larger one) you can pop out the microSD and use it in Lowrance's Elite series units as well.

[macminn]

Thanks for the input so far. Too many choices. I didn't know garmin made chips. I also saw a chip at a store in rogers, Hunting GPS Maps, that has public hunting land, lakes, and topo on it.

Anyone familiar with it?

[schweady]

Yeah, one of the limitations of the lake chips is the lack of WMA and walk-in access site detail (especially good boundary lines). There are, however, some web sites that are starting to offer some of those sorts of maps in .gpx or .kmz format for free. Do a search for 'gps' on the dnr site and you'll see some.

[MN Mike]

I've been using MNTrax for hunting around public land, it's been a very helpful. It does have some lake depths on it too but no Topo.

I think they have a banner ad on one of the forms, check it out.

Free topo maps can be downloaded to your Garmin.

Mike