Side imaging

[1weezer]

After they made the 987, they found some things that really needed to be changed and made a lot of improvments to it. After several changes and improvments, and a lot of field testing, they came out with the 997. The 987 is a very good unit, but I think the 997 is a much better unit.

[Darryl Morris]

Daryl,

Let me first say, I am not qualified as an expert on the SI, but I have played with mine enough to be dangerous.

Having fished with you, I think I know what you are hoping to accomplish, but I have some reservations about your expectations.

I also mounted my transducer on the TM (actually Slipcork did it). That's where I wanted it, I'm still glad I did it. But, hovering can mean more non-straight movement of the TM, which will skew your view on the 997. Another thing, as you hover, you will need to be far enough away from your boo to allow the SI to pick it up, otherwise, it should show on your regular DF view.

I think I heard you got the opportunity to experiment with the SI at Crappie Camp, so you probably already know if it will do what you want. I am COMPLETELY sold on it, but I do think everyone needs to think carefully about where to put the transducer. Also remember, you need to run straight lines for the best reading.

I don't know about the direct hook up to a lap top, but a $10 card reader will give you some great images of the bottom.

Also, I didn't follow everything that was said earlier about the mounts, but the knobs and the gimbal are not very quick (and sometimes just contrary). I really got spoiled on my previous quick release.

I'm still trying to figure out how to see the fish, but I'm seeing EVERY stick, stump and brush pile in the lake. It's GREAT.

Once you get "expert" on yours, we'll swap talk on the settings. After a week, you will have logged more time on yours than I have all spring!

Titleman

Thanks Titleman, the shop talk sounds great to me and I'm sure there will be many things I'm thinking about in theory that will have to be adjusted when put into practice.

[Humminbird_Greg]

Cane Pole,

I can’t recall my electrical theory right now but I know that there is a relationship of 8 when converting RMS to P-t-P in an AC circuit. If you were to look back in time you would see that we used to only use the RMS measurement – not sure why we never used an average measurement. When our competitors started using p-t-p measurements in their advertising and started brain washing the public into “more power is better” we had to end up following suit.

It would be nice to have an industry standard for the power rating and also for the sonar beam widths – another area where the public has been mislead. As an ex-Quality Tech I can tell you that there are a great number of things in this business that there is no industry standard for and that the customer could profit from if there was.

[Humminbird_Greg]

Darryl,

If what you are trying to do with the PC is to save all of the Waypoints you make when you find or make new brushpiles, than you will have to either use an SD card or you could use a connection cable from your 997 to the laptop – but you could not do this real time and would have to stop using the sonar to put the unit into a communications mode with your PC. It would be easier to just download the waypoints to an SD card while the 997 is running than plug the SD card into your laptop. Only problem with this is that when you download the waypoints; it downloads all of the waypoints in the 997 – even those you may already have in your laptop. I think it would be best to wait until after a day of fishing to download all the waypoints in your 997 to the SD card, load them into your laptop via HumminbirdPC and save them as a file (this can be named per the body of water and you can keep separate files for each body of water). Than delete all the Nav Data on your 997 – only after you have it saved on your laptop! Make whatever name or icon changes to the Waypoints you have in the file on your laptop, than export the file to the SD card again. Than when you install the SD card into your 997 and power it up, all of your waypoints – new and old – along with whatever changes you made, will be in your 997 and you will have a duplicate copy on your laptop in case something bad should happen. Also, if you keep GPS data for each body of water in separate files, you can load only the data you need for the body of water into your 997 for that day. This will keep you from having to scroll through or search through hundreds of waypoints just to find the one you want. Another nice feature is that you could have more than one file for a body of water as one fisherman told me that he loads a different set of waypoint data when certain friends of his are on his boat – as he doesn’t want them to know all his honey holes!

For those of you who don’t use a PC to keep a copy of your GPS data consider this: what happens if something goes wrong in your GPS unit? You could lose all of those hard earned waypoints and possible safe passages marked with trackplots or routes. When you send your unit in to be serviced, do they keep your GPS data intact or do they erase it all? What if your unit ends up having the internal circuitry or memory device replaced? Also, having your Waypoint data on a PC can help you keep track of and quickly search through all your waypoints. Example: the water level on a body of water you are on fluctuates enough so that some waypoints you have marked may be too shallow or too deep the day you are fishing. You could use your PC to search through and eliminate those waypoint locations that are not of any use to you due to water depth (or lack of water). The same thing could be done for types of structure (man-made PVC structures, stumps, logs, Christmas Trees,…). You could than save this waypoint data in a separately named file and eliminate those waypoints that aren’t of use to you and load only those into your unit that will be useful.

Looks like all you will still need in addition to the cable connector holder and unit switch is a trolling motor mounted HDSi transducer: XTM-9-HDSi-180-T This is the same as the transom transducer except that it comes with a trolling motor adapter. You could use the smaller Compact Side Imaging transducer with your 997 as it is smaller but you will give up some sonar resolution in doing so.

[Humminbird_Greg]

The main differences between the 987 and the 997 are the display and the Si sonar.

The display is an inch larger diagonally but it is also brighter than what is in the 997. As affordable display technology advances, so will the displays in all consumer related products.

The wide beam on the 987 is a 262kHz beam, on the 997 it is a 455kHz beam. This allows for better sonar resolution capabilities. The narrower Si beam on the 987 is a 455kHz beam but this was changed to an 800kHz beam on the 997 – again, this allows for better sonar resolution capabilities. This isn’t to say that the 987 was not or s not now a good Si unit, it is just that the 997 is an even better Si unit.

Most other differences between the 987 and 997 are no longer there, thanks to the latest software update to the 987.

[gonefishing]

I fish a lake that is only 4-6' deep would it be worth the mony for this typy of fishing? I also fish some back water off of the Mississippi for bream will it show the bream beds in the flooded woods?

[Humminbird_Greg]

Sure, I don’t see why not. Look on the Yahoo Unofficial Side Imaging web site (you must register as a member to see the pictures) at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sideimaging/

Look in the “Photos” section for the folder named “Images: Shallow Water (<10)” as there are a couple of screen snapshots of bream beds while the boat was in 3.1 and 5.4 feet of water. Several other screen snapshots of other structures totally demonstrate this units shallow water Si abilities and the area that you can cover.

[titleman]

I fish a lake that is only 4-6' deep would it be worth the mony for this typy of fishing? I also fish some back water off of the Mississippi for bream will it show the bream beds in the flooded woods?

Gone Fishing,

Skinny water is my home. Yes you will like the Si in shallow water. I use a 22 foot side scan setting. That way I can actually fish whatever I see. After awhile you get pretty good at knowing the location of what you are seeing on the screen.
Bream beds show up really well with high resolution and slow chart.
I'm still not getting as much clariity as I would like on actual fish targets, but I'm still learning.

Titleman

[ShilohRed]

Most other differences between the 987 and 997 are no longer there, thanks to the latest software update to the 987.

Greg do you know if we (The ones with the 987's) will still get the update to allow our older units to zoom in on the side imaging?
Also will the instructions be added to the web site for the upgrades?
Like how the record works on it and stuff? As ours did not come with that .
Pete

[gahunter]

With a cost of $2K I was wondering about the length of warranty and how good it is. I'd hate to spend that klnd of money and the unit go belly up in 3 years. Do they offer an extended warranty? For a cost of $2K, I'm not a tournament fisherman so I'd want to be certain I could get at least 10 years
($200/yr) useage if not more. I'd be curious how many years most fishermen get out of their units now.

It seems manufacturers are trying to see just how far consumers will go to catch fish. I recently saw a bait casting reel for $650. I know we as sportsmen can't ever justify the cost of the trip in $/weight etc. but it makes you wonder just how far we will go to feed our adiction.

"Heh have you heard about the newest fish catching item to hit the stores? It's called FPIL (Fish Phermone Identifier and Locator). It has a sensor mounted to the bottom of the boat which detects exact fish species by exact type of fish emitted phermones. It will even tell you if they are in a feeding mood or not."