B&W / greyscale screens on Plotters ....

[Guest]

OK - so many of you lot have bought colour screens and I agree that it has to be better .... but if like me - you hate opening the wallet to pay for things .....

Do greyscale / B&W screens on plotters work ok and actually useable ?? I know there are a lot of 'em out there ... hopefully someone upgrading will hook onto me and wrench a bit of cash out of me for one - WITH chart cartridges of course !!!
/forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif

 

[jimi]

Re: B&W / greyscale screens on Plotters ....

I've got the "old" Garmin 230 and its OK with a G Chart,, Invested in a 176C and got the Blue chart Chip, needless to say the muttz nuttz. However I also tried the bluechart chip in a friends "new" greyscale 180 and it was almost as good as the colour. In conclusion G Chart is useable but nowt special, Bluechart is much superior whether in colour or greyscale.

 

[LeytonC]

Re: B&W / greyscale screens on Plotters ....

Yes, totaly usable, i have a furuno 1640 and its great IMHO, the screen is crystal clear a works ok in bright light to, and I have it connected to both my DSC radio and furuno radar and it just works!. BTW i use C-Map.

 

[Aardee]

Re: B&W / greyscale screens on Plotters ....

I have a B&W Navman using C-MAP cartridges, mounted in the cockpit. A bit slow to update/ redraw but apart from that the display is perfectly clear enough. Only really use it as a backup for "old fashioned" paper nav anyway...

Must be loads of allegedly obsolete B&W plotters out there.

Graham.

 

[Nat]

I have a Garmin 182 with bluechart i'ts really good but sometimes difficult to see in bright sunlight., so I made a matt black cowling to fit round it, result easy to see. When I upgrade it will be to colour..........Nat

 

[BarryH]

Depends on the size of the screen and the amount of pixels. Senn some B&W with good resolution and clarity where others are not so good and a bit "blocky"

 

[Talbot]

biggest drawback of the B&W is that it is harder to assimilate the data at a glance. Colour provides a much more user friendly display, and much better appreciation of navigational dangers.

 

[peterb]

It\'s not all that time ago .........

that all Admiralty charts were black and white (without even the benefits of a grey scale).

 

[Guest]

Re: It\'s not all that time ago .........

I can remember B&W charts ... and I think it a pity that the style and character was lost ..... The Chart covering the Southern Atlantic was a classic ..... Whale sighted here 1897..... Water-spout etc. etc. and all the little signs and drawings ...
Colour Metric charts went sensible and lost all the character ... easier to use of course ....

/forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif

 

[Guest]

So where are they all ???

Where are all those B&W obselete plotters and cartridges .... I know a market for them ......... ME !!!

/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[peterb]

Re: It\'s not all that time ago .........

I've got a lovely one of the west coast of Australia. The deep sea soundings are from the original survey, pre-1800. The most intriguing note is about 40 miles inland: "Water by digging". I always wonder what made them try.

 

[tcm]

BW is perfectly fine. All this "instant assimilation" crap is a er grey herring.

 

[Talbot]

[ QUOTE ]
TCM says BW is perfectly fine. All this "instant assimilation" crap is a er grey herring.

[/ QUOTE ]
And what are your plotters then - I seem to remember that they are colour! when you are not using them to watch a DVD /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif

 

[ShipsWoofy]

I have a geonav 6 using navioncs in B&W. Tis a stand alone with own aerial and is supposed to be waterproof and float (never tested).

Benefit over the the colour ones is a much bigger screen in the similar range. Though I am looking to sell soon with a chart from Portpatrick to Falmouth including Ireland.

Any one know what it might be worth.

 

[Guest]

Re: It\'s not all that time ago .........

Remember that a lot of old B&W charts were based on the original naval surveys back in 1700, 1800's etc. Water and landings were very important and were marked on charts for other ships to have benefit etc.
The East India Company, Tea Clippers, other Merchant Companys and afraid to say Slavers gave the world a mass of navigational stuff that still today is basis of charts etc.

Wonderful stuff though ..... in the old days Masters / Pilots used to draw their own charts where there wasn't one on board .... take them back home ... get a chart agent to draw up professionally for them .... amazing stuff !

 

[Guest]

Probably not a lot but ...

I would be interested .... but need South coast to Kiel coverage !!

OK OK OK ... shoot the piper !! If the price is right .... its worth getting the other cartridges .....

So Woofy .... with or without cartridge ??

 

[Oldhand]

It depends on the screen resolution more than colour. For example, a B&W 7" Raymarine Pathfinder display is 320 x 200 pixels but the colour one is 640 x 400 for the same size screen. As a result the colour display is not only more interesting due to the colour, but much crisper as well. This also means the font sizes are smaller but just as readable, if not more so and the data boxes take up less space on the screen, leaving more chart or radar plot visible.

So in the above example, the colour version is a considerable improvement over the B&W display and currently the former as a radar/plotter unit can be bought for less than a B&W one!

 

[peterb]

Re: It\'s not all that time ago .........

[ QUOTE ]
Water and landings were very important and were marked on charts for other ships to have benefit etc.

[/ QUOTE ]

I appreciated the necessity for charting the water supply. My interest was how far inland they had explored to find it. And I doubt whether water found that far inland would be very useful to ships, because of the transport problem.

 

[Guest]

Re: It\'s not all that time ago .........

Especially ..... 40 mile inland .... DIGGING for it !! Suppose they must have had Diviners with them !