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I haven't put my Helix 9 in Simulator mode yet so I don't know how effective that is or even what it does.
If I bought an extra power cable for my Helix, and hooked it to an AC/DC converter, could I learn how to use my depth finder from the comfort of my recliner? I'm not lazy, I just don't want to sit in my boat, in my driveway looking like I'm fishing for yard trout.
Can you navigate through the depth finder and use Lakemaster info in simulator mode?
I don't know about the Lakemaster info but you can do pretty much anything to the settings in simulator mode.
Have you made any recordings so you can play those back on water that you've actually experienced? You can twiddle dials all you want to see how it affects things. You can even take a snapshot off your recording of something you're not sure about and post it and ask questions about it. When people can see what you're seeing it really helps with explanations.
As long as it's fused properly, you could hook it to a small lawn mower type battery with alligator clips and forget about the converter. Someone more clever than me can tell you all about those types of options.
As long as its getting around 12-13 volt the battery will be fine,
My Lakemaster card will work in simulator mode,
Nice for storing waypoint info right from the recliner[emoji3]
Sent from my iPhone using Crappie.com
Thank you both for the info! No I haven't recorded anything yet. Does it record automatically onto an SD card or do I have to do something? I really know nothing about this thing
in the waypoint menu there's an option to export use that to put points on the card
You go in to the snapshot and recording view (while you are on the water of course!) and hit menu and tell it to begin recording and hit menu and stop recording when you want to stop. Just be sure to have a blank SD card in there and lock your Lakemaster card so you don't accidentally write to it. You can switch views while you record and fish with no problem. It really is a wonderful option to have. The more you play with it off the water the easier it will become to understand it.
The PDF manual that came with my Helix 10 is very informative, more so than the little booklet that came in the box. Or maybe I downloaded it from the humminbird site, don't remember.
I know from my own experience that it seems overwhelming to you right now but with it running in front of you, either on the water or on the couch, it WILL become less daunting.
Some of my 1st experiments was with the Recording feature ...
I would fish until about an hour before dark and then put up my poles ...
Then I would motor to a point down the bank about a mile from the loading ramp ...
Start Recording and record the entire bank all the way to the loading ramp ...
(the unit records all views regardless of which view is on the display and also it records the raw data so changing settings during the Recording does not affect the recorded raw data) ...
Then take that recording home and study it in the house, Mark waypoints in the Recording for checking next time I was at that same fishing area ...
And like 6poundtest mentioned - even take screenshots during the Recording to post in the forums for interpretation ...
I still have dozens of those old recordings saved on my PC for referring back to ...
Rickie
Quote:
Originally Posted by 6poundtest
Thank you for the whole reply, but most definitely that last sentence. Yes, I feel overwhelmed and seriously have wondered why I spent that much money. I WILL learn how to use it to find fish, instead of just for the "wow, that's cool" feature, but right now, that's all I've got.
Thanks for the explanation Rickie, I will give it a shot.
For those in the know, what size SD card do I need to use? Do I have to do any special formatting before using it in the 'bird? I've got several that I use in trail cams but don't know if they're large enough, storage wise.
I just deleted some recordings and seem to remember a 10 minute recording being something like 50-60 megabytes. No special formatting was needed for my "new in package" cards.
According to your owners manual (I downloaded it from HB website last night!) you need a standard size SD card. Helix 5 & 7 use the micro cards.
One other thing I did was to go in to the advanced options and turned off all the views I didn't want or need. I only use about 6 views of all that were available. If, in the future I think I need them, I can always turn them back on. And it's quicker on the water getting to the one I need at a given time.
Less confusing, too!
HB units can use SD cards up to 32gb ...
Faster write speed SD cards can be a little more efficient during recording and capturing screenshots because the unit is writing the data to the card in real time ...
Rickie
Thank you both, so very much, for the help. I'm going to take the owners manual out with me this afternoon, and "play" with the depth finder a good bit. I'm also going to try and get some recordings and hopefully post up some screen shots for help with questions. Thanks again!
Welp.....
I took the boat out this afternoon to an area of the lake that I'd never fished. My intentions were to run the creek channels looking for structure and "what's that?" things to post on here. I stopped on the way and bought a new 16GB SD card. I took several snapshots while on the water. I just got finished eating dinner, stuck the card in my computer, and THERE ISN'T ANYTHING ON THE SD CARD!!??
What the heck did I do wrong?
I had a couple of serious questions to ask about the pictures. When I have the screen split, with DI on the left and SI on the right, I'm losing the right side side image. Left side shows up fine, but right side is just a dark area, like the water column but all the way across. When I switch to only the standard full screen SI, both sides show up fine. I figured I'd call HB Monday and ask them and I figured the first thing they'd ask me to do was to restore factory default settings, so I went ahead and did that. I think that fixed it, but to be honest I don't remember if it did or not.
I did not take any snapshots after resetting to default, so did that erase my card? That's all I can come up with.
Snapshots are created by holding the Mark button for 3 seconds until you see a popup on the screen that says "PNGxxx created" ... Are you holding the Mark button long enough ...??
Also make sure the slide lock on the left edge of the SD card is in the unlock position (up) ...
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The gremlin you describe with the right SI sounds like the "SI Enhance Sharpness On" gremlin (which is a known software glitch) ...
*Press Menu 1 time when the SI view is displayed ...
*Cursor down to SI Enhance ...
*Cursor right to open the SI Enhance overlay menu ...
*Sharpness (in the overlay menu) set to any value except Off creates the gremlin you describe ...
Restoring Defaults sets the Sharpness setting back to Off (if you had changed it to Low, Med, or High) ...
Rickie
That's exactly what I did Rickie. I'd hold it down until that message popped up. I know I had some images at one time, but I don't know that they were on the card. I could see the thumbnails of the images on one screen as I'd "flip" through all the screen views. Tab on SD card is in correct position.
I do think I had the SI Enhance sharpness on.... Maybe they'll fix that glitch with a software update.
FF, I sent you a PM but forgot to ask, are you doing the majority of your searching in the full screen SI, or the combined views? If it was me, simply searching, I'd not be using the split screen until I located something I wanted a better picture of and had driven back to. Shrinking that SI screen down to 1/2 size negates (in my mind anyway) the whole purpose of it in the first place. You want it as big as possible to view as much terrain as possible, within reason.
I have to remind myself when offering advice that my situation is so totally different than 99.9% of the folks here simply because I fish such small waters from a rowboat.
I used some of both. I think what I need to do is to put my boat in the largest of our two stock ponds and play around with the setttings until I get familiar with it. It's about 3 acres. Then I won't have to watch for boat traffic, while messing with the screen. We put some stumps into the ponds and also built a raised "road bed" in one of them that I can map so they'll be something there to see on the SI or DI besides fish and mud
If you saw the thumbnail images on the Snapshots and Recording view - they were on the card because that display view is looking directly from the card ...(removing the SD card will make the thumbnail images disappear from the Snapshots and Recording view) ...Quote:
Originally Posted by FurFlyin
The Snapshots are stored in a folder called SNAPSHOTS on the SD card ...
Did you open this folder on your PC ...??
Rickie
No I didn't open a folder. I wasn't given that option, although it may not automatically give you that option. I inserted the card into the slot and a window popped up and said there were no images or videos on the card.
EDIT: Yes I opened it on my PC
Success! Thanks for posting that. I finally figured out how to get into the card and the snapshots are on the card. I'll try to post some up before church this morning but if not, I'll post some this afternoon.Quote:
Originally Posted by rnvinc
Now would be a good time to start a folder organization system (on your PC) for your Snapshots ... This is beneficial as your Snapshots library starts growing ... and for re-viewing Snapshots on the HB unit at a future date ...
It's important to understand that the SNAPSHOTS folder must be kept intact to view the included Snapshots on the HB unit ... This means that the folder title SNAPSHOTS must not be edited in order for the unit to recognize it is Snapshots ...and the files inside the SNAPSHOTS folder must not be edited for the unit to display them ...
My system is ...:
*Create a folder on my PC desktop labeled "Humminbird"
*Inside the "Humminbird" folder - create a new folder labeled "Humminbird Snapshots" ...
*Inside the "Humminbird Snapshots" folder - create a new folder labeled with "today's date Snapshots" ...
*Inside the "today's date Snapshots" folder - copy and paste the SNAPSHOTS folder from the SD card ...
1. This system allows easy reference to Snapshots taken on a certain day ...
2. This system allows keeping the SNAPSHOTS folder in tact - such that the SNAPSHOTS folder can be copied back to a SD card and recognized by the unit in order to display those Snapshots on the HB unit at a future date ....
Rickie
Thanks for all the info Rickie. I'll have to move those images that I edited to another folder. Are Waypoints kept on the SD card or are they stored on the unit?
Waypoints are written directly to the unit memory of the unit that created them ...Quote:
Originally Posted by FurFlyin
The Nav data library can found under the Nav tab in "Waypoints Routes Tracks" ...
Rickie