Garmin or Lowrance
 

Ok guys and gals...... getting ready to buy a new GPS which should it be? Garmin 296 (don't need the weather)
or the Lowrance 2000C . How about some input, which one should I buy and of course WHY. Thanks for the help
Shine'r

Just had the same decision a few months ago. I tried the Lowrance first. I like to use Vnav. The lowrance does not have Vnav. I know, they say it does, but you have to input all information every time. It's just a calculator. Lowrance is too big physically for my taste. Also you cannot change the scale when you are in "auto zoom" like you can with Garmin. These are minor things that may or may not be your preference. But these are the things that made my decision.
Mel...DAR

Mel,

Can you explain "... you cannot change the scale when you are in "auto zoom" like you can with Garmin."

Maybe I don't understand autozoom..., I know you can easily change the screen scale by a touch with either unit. Personally, my aging eyes prefer the larger Lawrence 2000 screen.

Lowrance is my pick.
 

Shiner,

I'm a Garmin guy from way back. I own two Garmins in addition to the Lowrance. However, the Lowrance is our choice for the RV-8.

Here are my reasons for liking the Lowrance;

1. The screen is oriented in the correct way.
By that I mean it is in Portrait orientation rather than Landscape. Why Garmin think that you might be more interested in what is beside you rather than what is in front of you is beyond my comprehension.

2. Although the resolution is less than the Garmin, the font size is just right for my ancient eyes.

3. I like that I can download into the SD cards whatever mapping level I choose. I currently have the Canadian Topo mapset downloaded for the entire B.C. and NWT with every tiny creek and duckpond shown. Not to mention roads with addresses.

4. I have just installed the Lowrance Terrain Awareness SD card which is pretty good. The elevations are shown in relief rather than contour lines as in the Topo map sets but the presentation is good.

5. This unit is very good for reading in the sunshine.

6. The unit is capable of running an autopilot and Trio Avionics have set up our A/P to run off the Lowrance. The update interval is every second.

Having flown to Wisconsin using this unit last summer from the Canadian West Coast, I was very happy with the performance of the unit.( I was in an RV-4) After crossing the border, I never used charts again. It was all there. Even zipping under Milwaukee's control zone on the way into Racine was a breeze with the Lowrance giving me the warnings and the layers of the wedding cake.

If someone stole this unit, I would buy another one.

Cheers, Pete

Kitplanes magazine did a side by side comparison between these two units last year. In the end, the 296 was the "hands down" winner due to it's resolution and user interface.

They mentioned that the resolution and color of the 296 made it much easier to define overlapping airspace boundary's, where the Lowrance appeared to blend some together, and was harder to define.

I myself, think highly of improved resolution, as I don't like the blocky look. I also found that I like the landscape mode, even though my older Garmin used the portrait view.

My Trio A/P is also connected to the 296's output.

Price
 

One thing everyone left out is price.If you shop around you can almost buy 2 Lowrances for the price of one Garmin. I have used Lowrance since they first came on the scene many years ago and they have never let me down.

Ollie 6a

Evil Empire
 

And don't forget Garmin is the Evil Empire building their monopoly slowly but surely.

Check out the new Lowrance 600C. Looks pretty cool. Smaller, but has neat Terrain features . ..

TDT

Mike,
Unless they have changed since I tried it, with the Lowrance, you must be in manual zoom to change scales. In the auto zoom mode you cannot change the scale without first changing to manual zoom.
I will certainly admit that there are several things I like about the Lowrance; mainly the vertical orientation of the screen. But just the physical size made it difficult to use in the -6.
Mel...DAR

I've been a longtime Garmin user but this time around I went with a Lowrance unit. I went with the new 600C model because in my RV-4 I don't have much room. I have to confess I really like the unit. It's not as configurable as the Garmin unit and I'm still getting used to the interface but overall I really like it. It locks on quick, has great resolution, terrain awareness, SD cards for hi-rez mapping, ground navigation mode, marine navigation mode, all for $500. Not bad.

The large Lowrance Airmap 1000 fits nicely in my RV-6, my eyes appreciate it, and my wallet really liked it! :D



Does a fine job of driving the very capable EZ-Pilot, too. The only quirk of the Lowrance units when used with the Trio units is that Lowrance doesn't send the standard airport identifier via the NMEA data stream. The EZ-Pilot works precisely as advertised, but the waypoint in the EZ-Pilot display will be a number instead of a K-indentifier. The same issue was present in my old Airmap 100. If I forget where I've pointed the plane, I just glance over at the GPS. ;)

Sam Buchanan