Browsing: Garmin

Cruising Life
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Garmin Big Winner at NMEA Conference with Eight Awards for Product Excellence

Garmin was the big winner at the annual NMEA conference recently, as the electronics giant was named Manufacturer of the Year (for the third straight year) and won eight awards for product excellence. Garmin dominated the annual Product of Excellence competition at the National Marine Electronics Association convention in Bellevue, Washington. In voting by NMEA members, Garmin won in eight categories – radar, autopilot, multi-function display, mobile application, utility, fishfinder, AIS, and multimedia entertainment. For the second straight year, Garmin won the MFD category with its GPSMAP 8624 (pictured above), a 24-inch, all-in-one chartplotter with the highest screen resolution in…

Cruising Life
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Best New Radars: New Technology, Sharper Images, Shorter Ranges, Easier Tracking

Choosing the right radar for your boat certainly isn’t easy, and a lot of people already have their own ideas about which brand is best, or the most user-friendly, or technologically advanced, or is most compatible with their other electronics. Meanwhile, almost all the major manufacturers keep coming up with their own technologies to produce sharper images, better tracking of nearby vessels and overall improvements in situational awareness and safety. Here’s a look at eight new radars from Furuno, Garmin, Koden, Lowrance, Onwa, Raymarine, SI-TEX and Simrad, from the editors of Marine Electronics Journal. They asked each manufacturer to supply…

Cruising Life
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Garmin’s New 360-Degree Spherical Camera, With GPS (Of Course)

Garmin has just introduced the VIRB 360, a versatile, compact, waterproof, spherical 360-degree camera. It offers high-quality video up to 5.7K/30fps, it has four built-in microphones to capture sounds in all directions, and it comes with a 4K Spherical Stabilization to make your video look smooth and steady. And, taking advantage of its built-in GPS (this is Garmin, after all), the VIRB 360 provides custom data overlays for all its settings. “The VIRB 360 lets you relive personal experiences and share them with your friends – from a different point of view, every time,” says Garmin VP Dan Bartel. “VIRB…

Cruising Life
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Ten Great Boating Watches, from $230,400 to $220

How would one of these look on your wrist? This Bloomberg roundup of ten watches is timed for the America’s Cup, but it applies to cruising boat owners anywhere in the world. After all, even if you have redundant nav electronics on the lower and upper stations of your boat, plus a few handhelds scattered around, you still need to know what time it is. And what better way to find out that to glance at the Breguet Marine Equation Marchante 5887 (above left), from a company with a history going back to the French navy 200 years ago.…

Cruising Life
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Garmin Buys ActiveCaptain: Should Be Good News for Cruisers

It would be hard to find a serious cruising person who, at one time or another, has not turned to ActiveCaptain for help. I know I have, and so has almost everyone I’ve cruised with. Its major strength is its ability to update real-time information about navigation hazards, marinas, anchorages and points of interest supplied by its 250,000 users, and offer all that data digitally on web browsers and most smart phones and tablets. Now ActiveCaptain is moving into an entirely new realm, with its purchase by Garmin, one of the leading electronic companies in the world. The synergies here…

Cruising Life
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New Garmin Smartwatch: Drive and Navigate Your Boat from Your Wrist

This is just very cool: A new Garmin smartwatch with a dedicated marine GPS that connects to Garmin chartplotters and other electronics on board and even lets you connect to the autopilot so that you can turn, change your heading and steer the boat, all from your wrist. The new device is the Garmin quatix 5 marine GPS smartwatch, designed from Garmin’s Fenix 5 platform. When paired with other Garmin electronics, it can stream NMEA 2000 data to access boat speed, depth, temperature and wind information all to your wrist, no matter where you are on the boat. When paired…

Electronics
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Stay in Touch, Anywhere in the World, With Garmin’s New inReach SE+

Now you can stay in touch with your family and friends, no matter where you’re cruising, for a reasonable price with Garmin’s new inReach SE+, a handheld two-way text messaging device that sells for $399.99, with satellite plans starting at $11.95 a month. The Garmin inReach SE+ uses the Iridium satellite network for pole-to-pole coverage anywhere in the world, giving you, and your family at home, some peace of mind when you’re cruising. And you don’t have to worry about running up large air time bills. The two-way text messaging connects with cell phones, computers and other inReach devices around…

Electronics
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New Smaller Garmin Touchscreen and Keyed Chartplotters

Designed for people who don’t have a lot of space at their helms, Garmin just introduced at the Fort Lauderdale show a series of smaller, less expensive touchscreen and keyed chartplotters and combo units. The new models are additions to Garmin’s popular GPSMAP series and are  7- to 12-inch plotters available with or without built-in sonar. The new units are GPSMAP 7×2 and 9×2 touchscreen chartplotters and GPSMAP 10×2 and 12×2 keyed chartplotters. Dan Bartel, Garmin’s VP of worldwide sales, says the new units “are designed for the budget-conscious customer who desires premium features typically found only in a higher-end…

Electronics
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Furuno and Garmin Win Big at NMEA Awards

The National Marine Electronics Association named 16 winners at its annual expo, giving its annual Technology Award to Furuno’s DRS4D-NXT Doppler solid-state radar (pictured above), plus 15  “Product of Excellence” awards to other companies. Garmin was the big winner overall, being named the NMEA’s Manufacturer of the Year for the second straight year. Here’s the NMEA’s official statement. NMEA NAMES 2016 PRODUCT AWARD WINNERS AT CONFERENCE & EXPO NMEA Product of Excellence Award presented in 16 categories Garmin repeats as Manufacturer of the Year-Support Furuno Doppler radar wins NMEA Technology Award SEVERNA PARK, MD—The marine electronics industry honored several manufacturers…

Electronics
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Prize-Winning Garmin GPSMAP Shows Engine Data

The new Garmin GPSMAP 7600 chartplotter with J1939 connection now provides engine information and is so easy to use and install that it just won the Best New Electronics award at the Newport International Boat Show. The judges, all industry experts, said the new unit “has a very intuitive user interface. Sensor data is served up very nicely and the custom setups are easy to understand and can be built in as little or as much space as needed. It has all of the features and capabilities needed and is extremely easy to use.” The new unit is a redesign…