Lakemaster vs Navionics

[arola]

I have been having a debate with fellow coworkers about the lake master chips or the navionics chips. I say lakemaster is the way to go but they say that you get more lake with navionics. we Also talk to a navionic dealing in grand rapids and he said Navionics will upgrade their card when new lakes are added for a few bucks while you have to buy a whole new lakemaster chip to get the new lakes. if anyone knows what the deal is please let me know.

[PerchJerker]

Lots of threads and posts about this recently in the Equip Forum, you should look through there too.

Nav has more lakes but not more high definition maps. In my opinion the only maps that are worth using are the high definition (ie. super-accurate depth contour maps). The other maps are basically DNR maps with GPS coords overlayed, so the depth information is suspect at best. But even if they're not high definition maps, they are as good as any map you could get for those lakes.

Nav has an upgrade program - I believe it is your old map chip plus $75 for the new map chip. At this time LM does not have an upgrade program but they claim to be working on one.

There will be a new LM map chip coming out sometime soon, that will have something like 12-15 new high-definition maps on it.

LM lets you zoom in closer than Nav, very nice for getting very precise.

LM has much better road and point of interest data than Nav, which could be a concern if you're using the chip for traveling in addition to fishing.

I think the best thing to do is go to each HSOforum, look at the list of lakes on each chip that are high definition, and decide which one is better for the lakes you fish.

[PierBridge]

Oh great I get to trade in my $200 Navionics premiuim north chip and pay more money to upgrade....

Oh wait minute that's right I bought a LakeMaster Minnesota Chip for $69 and IMO it's much better chip.

Good Luck!

[sightfisher]

The MN Lakemaster chip has the MN portion of the Lowrance Map Create software on it, roads, towns, all sorts of stuff. It not only is a more accurate lake chip, it's an 'everything' chip.