I really dislike Active Captain ....

[Refueler]

Went to check on my 38ft'r today ... feeling not bad this morning - most mornings the Ulcer gives me gyp ...

Checked that my new Solar panel will fit where the old one is ... yep ! Good ... will just need sorting the cable as the old has a single two core cable - but new has separate + / - cables.

Had to repair washboard and while waiting for glue to set - I decided to connect AC to update the Garmin 92sv .... its software - not charts. My charts SE Sweden and Baltic are out of date

PITA !! Get and insert the AC sd card ... then connect phone to unit ... it checks unit ... then starts transfer ... then validates .... then connection breaks - reconnects ... checks unit again ... transfer ... valdate ... sometimes stays connected .. checks for another update ... transfers ... validates ...
Cycle repeats and repeats and repeats ....
After 1 hour after it disconnected again .. I decided to call it a halt and continue next visit ...

I think the problem I am having - is that there are many sequential updates and AC is transferring each one - then next etc etc.

 

[fredrussell]

I share your pain re Active Captain. I’ve long since given up on it. I have a morbid fear of updating any bit of happily functional equipment so not using the app is no great loss to me.

I’ve always thought ‘Active Captain’ sounds like a dating app for gay men.

 

[PaulRainbow]

I use Active Captain all of the time, it mirrors the 2 MFDs on the flybridge with 2 Android tablets at the lower helm. It can also be used as a stand alone plotter, using charts downloaded from Garmin FOC, as i have a paid version on my account for the plotters. But, as OP says, the updates can be a real pain, sometimes they work first time, others not. It's possible to download the updates to an SD card and just stick that in the plotter, update everything on the N2K network in one go. FWIW Raymarine is no better. I think they both fail at the slightest data transfer glitch.

 

[davidaprice]

Downloading the updates to an SD card is convenient, you can use your home network rather than using potentially slower and more expensive phone data at the boat.

What really gets me is that the plotter (I have a GPSMap 723) can't join a WiFi network, it insists on creating its own for Active Captain. My boat has its own WiFi network with a 4G connection, the plotter could use that and it could do updates over the air without needing Active Captain or an SD card. With the boat's own network, the plotter's network and the AIS device's WiFi network, my boat has three active WiFi networks wherever it goes, and I have to switch my phone between them depending on which app i'm using. (To be fair, the AIS device, Digital Yacht AIT3000, has a newer model, AIT5000, that can join a WiFi network rather than creating its own).