Humminbird vs. Lowrance SI units

Ok guys, after doing a LOT of research and looking through the "search option" of this site, it seems to have been a year or so since someone has brought up this subject.

I'm wanting to purchase a Side Imaging unit but don't know which way to go. From what I gather, the Lowrance Structure Scan shows FAR more detail than Humminbird SI units (and is more costly). However, I've also read that Lowrance has issues with units not working correctly and a horrible customer service department.

Having done all this research, I'm just as confused now as I was when I first started. Am looking to spend up to $2000, what should I get?

You basically said it yourself, the Lowrance is a better unit, more detail and more features but reliability is not there. You may get a good one and not have an issue, but if not it takes a while to get it back. I have looked at both and Lowrance tops it in clarity but knowing that it may have an issue I am keeping my Raymarine C120 mounted so If I do have an issue I still have a good finder. If I did not have a good back up I would think harder about the HBird. I have seen the Lowrance in action it's very nice.
Question you have to answer for yourself is, do you want the best or most reliable?

Humminbird Customer service is awesome. I had a bad transducer on one of my units and I called CS and in 5 minutes I had a new transducer on the way....no questions asked.

Humminbird. May not have hardly as good of clarity some say, but you can adjust them & get extremely nice quality images. Humminbirds are very user friendly when it comes to operating them & the customer service is absolutley top notch.

There are a couple of very Knowledgeable guys that work in the fish finder dept at Bass pro in Clarksville. One is Cody and the other is on this site but can't recall his name at the moment. Maybe he will see this and chime in.

I spoke with with Cody last week about a transducer problem. He really knows the units. He has also fished with quite a few of the units.

Not saying one manu. is better than the other but I sent my unit back to Lowrance and and it took over 3 weeks to get one back. They did upgrade me to an hds unit for free so basically I got an hds 5x for $200 (price of the original unit). I have been on the phone with customer suport at Lowrance quite a bit lately and find their support to be very good.

As somebody suggested a back up unit is a real good idea.

I was inquiring about the cone angle on the newer units which is listed the same (20 degrees) as my vintage x70a but it seems to be much wider creating a much larger dead zone near the bottom when near steep banks.

get the humminbird. the customer service from lowrance is really bad in my experience. i switched because of it. the moderator will not let me put in words what i really think of lowrance.

[QUOTE=twise7;428557]Ok guys, after doing a LOT of research and looking through the "search option" of this site, it seems to have been a year or so since someone has brought up this subject.

I'm wanting to purchase a Side Imaging unit but don't know which way to go. From what I gather, the Lowrance Structure Scan shows FAR more detail than Humminbird SI units (and is more costly). However, I've also read that Lowrance has issues with units not working correctly and a horrible customer service department.

Having done all this research, I'm just as confused now as I was when I first started. Am looking to spend up to $2000, what should I get?[/QUOTE]

Hope this helps
[url]http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sideimaging/[/url]

I am wanting to buy two new units and try to check all of these post out on several boards to help me make up my mind. One thing I have noticed is that everyone talks about HB's customer service. Is everyone having trouble with the HB and calling CS? Does not sound good to me.

[QUOTE=21ssExtreme;428761]I am wanting to buy two new units and try to check all of these post out on several boards to help me make up my mind. One thing I have noticed is that everyone talks about HB's customer service. Is everyone having trouble with the HB and calling CS? Does not sound good to me.[/QUOTE]

No it's just that Lowrance's CS is that bad, especially since Linda Colt is no longer there!!!

Humminbird just came out with a 2D sonar unit with down imaging too. Black & white units that are very affordable. bbcboards.net is a good place to view both Humminbird & Lowrance sonar forums & be able to make your own opinion on which unit would suit you more. Both forums have some out standing images uploaded that you can view. Humminbird gets my vote for ease of use. I've owned Lowrance & every unit I've owned but 1 has given me problems & have been replaced with Humminbird & not a problem so far.