Thread: More Hummingbird thoughts

I've been working on testing out a theory -
My issue with the GPS use seems to be centered around the slowness of the re-draw rate, screen refresh, whatever you want to call it...

I'm thinking this could have something to do with the speed at which
the unit can process info -

So my theory is, REDUCE the workload on it by turning off, disabling
features one by one, and see if it will adapt and speed up.

So far, this has been limited to running in simulation, so I really don't
want to state my findings until I can verify it with actual on-the-water
results.

But, let me say this - it APPEARS that this is the case.
The things I'm turning off are shaded depth, reducing the amount
of map detail shown, and ultimately, taking out the map card itself...
My 797 (NVB) and 787 ('08 premium South card) are showing some
differences that are interesting too, that I'll hopefully detail for you
next week. Seems like everytime you turn something off, it gets faster,
which I guess should have been a no-brainer but I have to see stuff
for myself sometimes. Now the thing is, some of these features I'm
turning off, are some of my favorite things to use - but, there seems
to be several steps in between all off or all on, so I may find for example that I can live with the shaded depth turned off in exchange for faster
screen redraws. This weekend will tell more.

In doing this, I uncovered (found a fix) for one peculiar little quirk in
the NVB map on my 797 - for some reason, when zoomed in to 1000'
range or closer (showing the 1' contour lines) in INDIAN CREEK on PICKWICK -
the back half or so of the creek did not show at all. It looked like they
just decided not to survey that portion, and I was cussing Navionics...
Where the chart stopped, it was sort of a diagonal line across the bay,
like a map boundary.
But by chance, I went to menu choice "chart" went down to the
"map preference" (I believe it's labled) choice, and took it off "auto",
put it on Hotmaps - and BOOM, up came the missing part of the map

your theory is right.. The less the processor has to do, the faster it can do other tasks. Although some items can be hidden, the processor has to keep up with the stuff. Probably saves some time not having to display the info.

This is the real time programming I have been referring to in previous posts. The less the processor has to do, the faster it can run. In laymen terms, you can run around one city block faster than you can run two city blocks (given the same size).

What this looks like is Humminbird cheaped out on both the GPS chipset and the main video/internal computer processor. Since I don't have access to one, I do not know for sure... but that is what all these complains are pointing toward.

Given cane Pole's analogy above, it seems like not only are you having to run around the block, you are having to do it with a 50 pound pack on your back.

Tom

Well, without getting TOO deep into this before my real-world test -

The 787 running off MMC maps slows down noticeably when you turn
on the shaded depth feature, AND it gets worse the DEEPER you set
the shaded depth... I did a "what if" on the Bay Springs lake map,
it is a deep lake with mucho contour lines - I set it to shade down to
65', it gets agonizingly slow. Changed back to 25' where I've been
running it lately (giving up fishing info here ) it's not as bad, turn it
off and it's even faster.

The NVB on the 797 does not have Bay Springs on it, so I moved my
cursor up to Pickwick, which is - shaded depth seems to have little or
no effect on the NVB unit. Here I go thinking again, but I'm speculating
that it aquires the info quicker/easier from it's internal memory as
compared to my 787 having to read all that info off the MMC every time
it shifts and redraws. I've not been a big fan of NVB, but this seems to
be one advantage it has - IF it's got your lakes on it.

Can't do a true apples-to-apples on the map on/off question, but found out
I can set the non-NVB unit to "unimap" (or just remove my card)
and it gets (comparatively) blazing fast. A happy medium I'm playing with, is card IN, but map detail set to "basic". This loses the contour lines I love, but still at least gives you a decent outline of the shore, and spot soundings -
try it on yours if you don't know what I mean.

Only way I found to "un-use" the NVB maps is to manually set preference
to "gold +" which does not have my lakes on it, so you end up with just
a white plotter screen with grid lines.

Also, going to re-visit turning sonar completely off and using it as chartplotter
only - I started out with the two units mounted side-by-side using them this
way, 1 for sonar, 1 for GPS. It seems like this would free up some brain-
power, but it's not looking that way. Like I said, I need to re-check that.

In the end, what is gonna tell the tale is when I get back on some of my
tight groups of waypoints fishing, and see if any of this makes the icon movement less herky-jerky, better reacting at low speeds. I ought to know something Sat. if good Lord's willing and creek don't rise :D

Good observations Jeff. Keep us informed. Be nice if I had a boat to look at this stuff.........

Guess we all need to take a HB behavioral modification class.....

Mr Cane Pole wrote-Guess we all need to take a HB behavioral modification class.....

Yep we best modify our sights to a better SI Company