Garmin plotters. Are the charts free?

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fredrussell

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I shall shortly be buying a plotter for the boat. I’m drawn to Garmin as I have it in my head that the charts are free. On a ‘which MFD?’ thread running on the forum currently someone complains that the Garmin large area charts for plotters are expensive.
Can someone clarify please. If I buy a Garmin plotter (prob a GPSMAP 722, if that’s important) will I need to budget for additional charts? And if they are free - are you limited to a certain area?

Edit: by the way, I have an iPad with Navionics already, so if we can avoid going off on that tangent I’d appreciate it.
 
GPSMap series plotters do not include charts, there are various packages, see the Garmin website fpr details of coverage and prices. Echomap series plotters include full UK charts, no extra costs. In both cases, the charts could also be used on mobile devices, using the Garmin Active Captain app', at no extra cost.

The two key differences between the two series of plotters are, a) you cannot mirror the Echomap to a tablet, the tablet will be stand alone and b) you cannot connect radar to the Echomap.

IMO, if you don't need those two features, the Echomap is great value.

If you want to see a 9" Echomap in use, i have one fitted to my boat, in Shotley, subject to the usual social distancing rules.
 
Thanks Paul, very helpful. That’s rather thrown a spanner in the works as I think the Echomap plotters are discontinued. At least that’s what the Garmin (USA) website says. Certainly a google search for suppliers of the echomap 73sv comes up with very few results.

Edit: Hmm, I think was searching for the wrong model. The current one is the Echomap 75sv which is available on eBay but a little hard to find at the usual suppliers. Force 4 are listing it as “discontinued”.
 
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fredrussell said:
Thanks Paul, very helpful. That’s rather thrown a spanner in the works as I think the Echomap plotters are discontinued. At least that’s what the Garmin (USA) website says. Certainly a google search for suppliers of the echomap 73sv comes up with very few results.

Edit: Hmm, I think was searching for the wrong model. The current one is the Echomap 75sv which is available on eBay but a little hard to find at the usual suppliers. Force 4 are listing it as “discontinued”.
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You need to search for Garmin Echomap UHD 75cv (or sv if you want sideview sonar). Check to see the best deal you can get, if that happens to be an sv and you don't want side view sonar, don't worry, it all works fine with no sonar trancduser at all.
 
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Never Grumble said:
thanks. but what do they show i.e. how detailed and how do they update or dont they?
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The pre-installed charts have the same, full, detail as the paid for G3 charts. Don't confuse them with the Silver crap that Raymarine pre-installed on the old widescreen MFDs. They only "better" (i use the word reservedly) Garmin charts are the G3 Vision, which include some pictures and a few bells and whistles, but nothing extra in termas of chart detail.
 
Garmin is an American company, nothing comes free.

Least year I popped into my favorite chart agent, The Sea Chest in Plymouth to discuss charts for a round UK trip this year. The charts in my Garmin are 10 years old. As I have an very old plotter, I now need four G3 upgrades to cover the same area as my current G2 chart.

My chartplotter is a secondary device, that is there to display and collect data, I decided not to upgrade as most things have not moved, and I navigate without the need to know where I am within +/- 2mm.
 
When I bought my Garmin GPS Map 750 in 2014 it came with Blue Chart UK and Ireland large area map pre-installed - that was a compelling argument for the Garmin on VFM criteria as the charts for the equivalent Raymarine device would have been around £200. Updates for the G2 (now G3) charts were also cheaper although now gone from £50 to £80. (why does nothing marine just go up by RPI!?)

However I now dislike the appearance of the blue charts so much I only use the plotter to display AIS data which I can't on my much better tablet with Navionics.
 
KompetentKrew said:
The B&G Vulcan is about the same price though - currently £596 from Rowlands Marine Electronics - and they always have an offer of free charts in the Spring.

Is the sonar worth having?
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The Raymarine Axiom 7 is also about the same price, as is the Garmin GPSMap 722, all of which don't have charts included. All of these models support radar and sonar. the Axiom and the Garmin both support sonar, the B&G does not. So if someone wants radar, all three are worth a look, if they want sonar the B&G is not suitable.

But the OP specifically asked about Garmin and doesn't need radar, so the Echomap seems a good choice to me. As for a price comparison, currently, the 28XG charts for the B&G are £229, so the current price comparison is £665 for the Garmin and £825 for the B&G. I don't think a fair price comparison is what might be available in the Spring.

As for sonar, i guess that's an individual thing, i personally don't have the sonar transducer installed, i'm happy to just have depth from a triducer (DST810), which can be viewed from the plotter via NMEA2000. I do know people who have the sonar transducer installed, it's popular on motorboats especially.
 
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When Garmin advertise their GPSMap plotters as ‘with Worldwide Basemap’ - what does that actually mean?

What can a ‘basemap’ give you without a chart? Just some basic coastline and geoid to see where you need to purchase charts for?!
 
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