Lowrance 4 HDI with Navionics+ question

[Millzee]

I recently purchased Navionics+ to go in my sounder to cater for the gps needs. The card arrived and I uploaded the updates onto it after registering on the Navionics website and then put the card into the sounder. While I was on the site I read about the Iphone app and decided that I'd get it on my phone as well. I've been playing around with it on my phone and have found it to be very good, it shows a lot of bush tracks that I drive on around my area and also has Lake Wendouree and Cairn Curren Res with a bit of detail.
I took my yak out yesterday and went down to Wendouree, the Navionics on my phone had the lake showing the rowing track, car parks and all the surrounding areas in great detail. Once I got out on the water I flicked my sounder over to GPS and it didn't show anything, said I was on land only, what's the go with that???
The fishing was crap due to the deepest part of the lake being only 2m with weeds coming up so high they were visible and the fins kept grabbing them so I packed up and headed back up to Cairn Curren Res. When I got to the res I checked Navionics on my phone and again the water with a few depth marks and the surrounding areas were in good detail. I got out on the water and again my sounder only showed that I was on land with no detail. Is there a setting that I'm missing or something? Surly a $20 Iphone app can't be better than a $400 SD card to put into a lowrance sounder.

[Seasherpa]

In the chart menu your sounder will have defaulted back to lowrance maps wen you removed your card. Set it back over to read navionics charts and you should be right.

[Tim399]

Eoin is on the money there i had the same issue when i first installed my elite 4 i thaught it was just taking forever to load my location but i had to select to use the card in the menu

[Millzee]

I picked up on that and selected "navionics", it still didn't get to be like my phone app.

[Millzee]

I've just done the latest update to make sure I'm doing the right thing and have since been playing around with it. From what I can see, the Murray river doesn't even show up on the Lowrance yet alone the Hume dam and all the other popular fresh water fishing areas. Am I correct in thinking that the navionics+ gps system in a Lowrance elite 4 HDI will only show you the coastline?? from what I'm seeing here as soon as your on land it's useless.

[vikodin]

I've just done the latest update to make sure I'm doing the right thing and have since been playing around with it. From what I can see, the Murray river doesn't even show up on the Lowrance yet alone the Hume dam and all the other popular fresh water fishing areas. Am I correct in thinking that the navionics+ gps system in a Lowrance elite 4 HDI will only show you the coastline?? from what I'm seeing here as soon as your on land it's useless.

Yes navionics gold xl only shows you the coastline, and at best a couple k's up an estuary.
I agree that for the money it costs its just plain wrong that a $14 app gives much better maps but thats how navionic treats its customer

[Widsa]

Ok, I just went through the same thing and found that I needed to update my sounder software for it to work.
I was interested in using the fish n chips to show finer contour lines like you get with the phone app.
make sure when you upgrade your card online you select all the check box's and the area you want loaded.
You need another blank micro sd card with Your sounder update on it and then start the sounder with this card in it.
After your sounder is updated put your map card back in and select it.
I have the elite 7 hdi and that's what worked for me.

Having size that I don't think the hdi units display Google overlay and this is limited to hds units.
I did find it took some time zoomed in on the location I wanted to use for the maps to actually appear on the sounder.
This sucked when I was trying to cruise to my location at 70ks, I had to use my phone navionics untill it loaded.
Hope that helps.

[Millzee]

Cheers for that. I made a phone call and found out that the bloody $400 card only shows the coast and offshore, that really sux but I guess I'll have to deal with it and use my phone. The only trouble with using the phone is that it'll run the battery flat quickly so I guess when I upgrade the sounder battery to run lights, I'll have to install a phone charger point too.

[shane]

I've found exactly the same thing Milzee. I have an Elite 4 CHIRP with a gold card that I upgraded online for free to get the sonarcharts detail (select fish and chips in the sounder). It's great for offshore and the bays with the extra detail but Wendouree doesn't appear as water, although you can still record tracks. By the way you don't need an extra card, you can download the update onto the original navionics card and then 8nsert it to upgrade the sounder.

I'd persevere with Wendouree as it will be the most productive water in the area. You just need to understand that the only area you can reliably troll is in the rowing lanes in the section next to the reed beds. Just use HB's and tassie devils that only dive to around 1.5m and you will find it can be very successful. In other are as of the lake you will need to fish mudeys or cast weedless plastics etc.

[Millzee]

Thanks Shane, I tried trolling the lane beside the reeds with a few different lures, I think I went up and back about half a dozen times but got really sick of the weeds. I think I'll stick with Cairn Curren for a while, I've started to map out a path of the deeper areas that sound up structure with fish, some of them are very big. Recently a fella caught a big Murray cod out there so I'm guessing that's what they'll be. Cairn Curren is also only 15-20 minutes from my place as apposed to Ballarat being around an hour. If I strike a few good fish I'll post up a report so you can decide if you want to come up for a trip.