398 SI worth a try?

Right now there are a few deals out there on the Humminbird 398 SI combo unit. They are hitting around $250 to $300. This may be my only chance to own a side-imaging unit until the Helix drops this low, but I was curious if the 398 is too small of a screen for the side-imaging to be useful? Is there a way to increase the view by zooming in to show only one side at a time, maybe? It's almost too tempting to pass up, but I was curious if anyone else here had dealt with one and if its small screen size was a factor in it's being discontinued.

You are correct the 398ci SI can be viewed one side at a time to increase the size of objects in the SI image ...

You can also open a zoom box on interesting objects ...

You can also save recordings to a SD Card and play them back in Humviewer on your PC ...

I would guess that the smaller core units are being "Replaced" by the wide screen format Helix ...

Rickie

I have one and although the screen is small it doesn't seem that small when it is lit up. I also find myself watching the real time sonar more than the rest of the screen and that sliver is only 1/2 inch wide. Haven't use the side imaging all that much but I have only had it since Christmas. For verticle jigging it works great and has helped me to understand where the fish are in relation to the bottom and what motion attracts and what motion triggers a bite. Surprisingly the two jigging motions are not the same. I figured for $250 it was well worth it and will one day go on the bow of the boat when it gets replaced with a larger console unit down the road.

Thanks for the input guys. For $250, I don't think I'm going to be able to pass it up. Worst case, I'll have a color GPS/fishfinder/DI combo for less than most basic fishfinders alone.

Sometimes structure is difficult to discern even on my larger screen 1197 ...

That's when it so handy to drop a waypoint on items that are just "out of place" on my SI image ...

Then I can reposition the boat to get a closer scan ...

You will train your eyes to notice these "out of place" items on the SI image ...

Rickie