Garmin Striker 7sv

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I am in the market for a new fish finder, and I thought I had decided which one to get. Then I saw a video of a guy in a bass boat with a newly installed Garmin Striker 7sv. I was amazed at the clarity and user friendly menu. So, I decided to do some research.
First I went to Fishfinderadvisor.com. There I read an article which stated that if you can do without maps, or even the possibility to add them, this is a great unit. Comments after the article weren't so glowing, as it was stated that the Garmin does NOT retain personal preference setting from one startup to another.
Next I saw a video made by a Lowrance guy in which he stated that Garmin transducers lack a dedicated down view crystal, and as such are deficient in that aspect. His proof was a boat rigged with two transducers connected to a Garmin and a Lowrance, passing over brush piles. The Garmin clearly failed to detect some and lacked the Lowrance clarity on the others.
So, my question is: what's the truth

The "video made by a Lowrance guy" has been debunked some time back. Alas, false info doesn't go away in internet land. Blended down view was/is used by some HB for several years now. No feedback about that. LWinchester2 (bassboatcentral) has put up some tests with blended versus dedicated dv on the Garmins. Essentially, unless you are deeper than 30 fow minimum there is no negative impact. I have the Garmin 93sv chirp with dedicated piezo for dv. I am happy with this unit. I have basically no experience with other brands and results. I had two trips with my late buddy and his HB--he bought a Garmin later. And one trip with a friend who had higher end Lowrance. His was very good, but cost almost three times as much. Bottom line is I find a lot of cover and catch my share of fish. I won't tell a guy to buy one over another. I do know that the Garmin works well for me, and is really easy to use. Important point when you're not the sharpest knife in the drawer. I do have experience in that regard.

I have been running Garmin for a lot of years. I use the 93sv echomap series on the console and decided when the striker unit came out, I would save some money and put one of them up front. After trying the striker, it wasn't hard to see the striker series was not even close to the echomap when it came to clarity and images. I talked to a Garmin rep just a couple days ago about their transducers. I found out the CV series transducers do not have a dedicated crystal in them but gets the image feed from the unit itself. Even the new touchscreen series echomap plus units came out with the CV series transducers. They are Livescope compatible but the CV series transducer is 2nd generation. The latest transducer they produced is the GT 22 and the GT 52 series. They do have a dedicated crystal built into the transducer and it's a lot clearer on down imaging and side imaging. If you have a current Garmin 93sv with a 12 pin connector or a 73 with an 8 pin connector, you can upgrade the transducer to a GT series. The GT 22 is for a 7 inch and the GT 52 is for the 9 inch. I did not ask if they would work with the striker series. The GT 22 series transducer sells for 189.00 and the GT 52 is 300.00. Don't think most people would ever notice the difference in the CV and GT transducers except the die hards like myself.

I work at a certain big box outdoors retailer selling fish finders, so here's my two cents worth. For 90% of fishermen, Garmin is the best unit on the market. Easiest to use. Good image. Pretty much trouble free. With comparable screen size and features, the least expensive out there. The Striker series is good. The Echomap is much better...comparable to Helix or Elite. Big sale starting next Fri the 15th. The 93SV will be $599 and 73SV will be $499. That's touch screen, side view, maps. I've had a 73SV on my boat for 2 years. Going to buy a 93 for the console and move my 73 up front.

Decisions decisions I'm still trying to make up my mind also, Garmin Striker 7si or Hummingbird Helix 7sv. There is a bit of a difference in price also.

For what it is worth, here is a couple screen shots from a 73sv. One with si and one with di. I'm not sure which transducer I have but it was just box item.
I'll check if your interested. Attachment 330127Attachment 330129

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G920A using Crappie.com Fishing mobile app

Those are with the CV52HW ducer

BobL, I just left your store with the Echo 73sv. There were no 93's left. Folks at BPS said they had a huge line when they open and 100 of the 93's disappeared. I'm sure I will like it, even though it is more unit than I am capable of understanding. One thing I discovered in my research about what to buy was that almost everything is a comprimize in one way or another. Thanks to all who posted to this thread.

I have a Striker 7 plus and all my settings are stored,they don't go back to defaults after each restart.In my opinion the Strikers are really good units for the money if you don't need precharted maps and the quickdraw mapping feature works really well and is simple to use.

You made a good choice with the 73SV. If you were there after 5:00 today you probably bought it from me.

I was there at 3:30. I felt sorry for the Lowrance rep. He came up to me and asked me if I needed help. Thinking he was an employee, I asked for the Garmin, if there were any left. He was very nice, and if Lowrance had a shorter SI transducer I would have walked out with a Lowrance. I got way more unit than I needed, but who knows? The challenge may help to ward out " Old Timers Disease" ! ;-) Thank for your input.