Fishing Electronics - intro

Fishing Electronics - intro

It seems like the manufacturers of electronics want to keep us all in the dark. They have so many models with so many features and no way to compare apples to apples. They may tell you how many kilohertz that they operate, but what good is that if you don't know what that means? They may give you the cone angle, but don't tell you how to measure the angle, so you have no idea how big of area is shown under that transducer. They may tell you the difference between a narrow and wide cone area, but fail to mention what degree they consider to be wide or narrow. They tell you how many watts of power the unit puts out, but they don't tell you how many watts you need. What about fish arcs? The picture on the boxes always have nice fish arcs, but most units fail to produce anything resembling what is on the box. What about resolution? How many pixels is enough? Is it worth paying double for twice the pixels? What about mapping and GPS/WAAS? Will it help to catch more fish? What about features? Go to Lowrance's website and you will see words like FlashGraf™, COLORLINE™, HyperScroll™, FasTrack™ ASP™, Advanced Fish Symbol I.D.™, and FishTrack™ just to name a few. Who has time to learn all those definitions? Who really cares who can create the most intelligent vocabulary?

If you are confused, surely you are not alone. I have read lots of manuals and articles, I have been guiding for several years, and I also have a college degree. But I still don't know all there is to know on the subject. However, I will share some of what I have learned in the following articles.