To be clear, my cheeky post was my own announcement, not Raymarine's who probably feel they are still in the autopilot/instrument business. Randy, I'm more or less where you are on this, and I am realizing that the casual, recreational boating space is no different than many others, where apps, and fast-moving technology on portable technologies are clearly the future. (not talking about a vendee globe racer or coastguard ship)
I suppose to many its obvious, but what had not fully dawned on me when I bought this Raystuff was that today, unlike in the past, we are buying software as much as hardware when we buy an autopilot, display, or anything else. Your example nails it - the software does the job, the transducer just provides the bits and bites, and has to be good enough not to break. This frames the firmware (which should really be called an app most of the time) update discussion very differently, and makes you think a bit differently about the trajectory of the technology, and about Raymarine's customer-bruising approach. I agree with you on the future of this stuff. Its interesting and it's happening quickly. More on my electronics here - stumbles, learnings, mistakes included. http://cncwindstar.blogspot.ca/ <end rant> Dave 33-2 Message: 6 Date: Tue, 20 Sep 2016 05:44:58 +0000 (UTC) From: RANDY <randy.staff...@comcast.net> To: cnc-list <cnc-list@cnc-list.com> Subject: Re: Stus-List Raymarine exits the instrument, vhf and autopilot business! Message-ID: <1263700711.917947.1474350298433.javamail.zim...@comcast.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" So, I'm a neophyte compared to you guys when it comes to electronics and instruments etc. But I wanted an inexpensive electronic wind instrument for my boat this year, and chose the SailTimer Wind Instrument ( http://www.sailtimerwind.com ) over the basic Raymarine i40. Given Raymarine's announcement, maybe I made a lucky choice. :) I chose the SailTimer Wind Instrument because I liked the idea of a solar-powered bluetooth-enabled (no wires) masthead vane sending data to an inexpensive iOS app. I was already familiar with the SailTimer app ( http://www.sailtimerapp.com ) from last year, and sold on its features - optimal tacking routes, boat-specific (even sail-specific) learned polar diagrams, etc. But to be most effective, the app needs real-time wind speed and direction information, so I bought the instrument. For the kind of sailing I do with my boat - club racing on a lake in Colorado - it made the most economic sense to have a commodity device and OS (iPad or iPhone) in the cockpit running an app from a potential marketplace thereof, consuming an industry standard data stream over bluetooth, instead of custom display hardware in the cockpit cabled to sensors and running custom firmware / OS / application software. Who knows, maybe the SailTimer approach is the way of the future. I'm just now installing and really learning the whole setup - I ordered the instrument in April and received it in August. So I'll write a more thorough review later, once I've had some experience with the app and instrument together. I'll be using the combined system for the first time in the coming week (on Friday it's forecast to be blowing 20 gusting 30 at my lake - woo-hoo!). But the instrument is compact and solid, and the initial setup has been straightforward. Best Regards, Randy Stafford S/V Grenadine C&C 30-1 #7 Ken Caryl, CO ----- Original Message ----- From: "John McKay via CnC-List" <cnc-list@cnc-list.com> To: "cnc-list" <cnc-list@cnc-list.com> Cc: "John McKay" <jmckay...@yahoo.ca> Sent: Monday, September 19, 2016 10:36:48 PM Subject: Re: Stus-List Raymarine exits the instrument, vhf and autopilot business! I bought an EV100 autohelm this spring. A few weeks ago, I got an email from Raymarine talking about a software update. I call their tech line asking how I could get the update since the autohelm is stand alone. The rest of my electronics are Garmin. He said I was out of luck. I pointed out I could update my Garmin with an SD card. He did not give a shit! John on Enterprise
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