C-Map NT+

[Martin J]

Before I spend hours on the phone calling round I thought I would check you guys. I need to have 3 C-Map NT + charts Chip updated.
Anyone had this done recently or know of a company that does this economically ? I called Bluewater and got a terse $150 each of them. Seemed a little heavy for a few minutes work. Could by a new preloaded GPS for that.

 

[ranger58sb]

Can you not do the download yourself? Our system supports that; download, stick it on an SD card, insert into plotter, update, done.

-Chris

 

[Martin J]

Sadly my plotter / radar has been around a few years. It does not have update capacity. It seems that the chips have to be updated by a service.

 

[STB]

What unit do you have?

 

[ranger58sb]

Hmmm.... ours is 10 years old now...

-Chris

 

[Martin J]

RDP 139 The manuals on board when I bought the boat are dated 2004. The chips are not SD's They are proprietary square chips.

 

[STB]

Shoot. Yeah. So those are C-MapNT chips. I have never priced them. My go-to place would probably be Bluewater (bluewaterweb.com). I think they can send you new chips or you can send your old chips to them for updating.

I really don't know what it would cost for either option. But, $150 per unit doesn't sound out of range. I think I paid about that for me Maptech charts for my i3 Navigator and the CMap-Max charts for my Xinuo unit.

At any rate, I'd give them a call.

Good luck!

-Greg

 

[Cajun]

I use the same chips in my vintage 2005 Raytheon (not Raymarine) chartplotter. I've been subscribing to the Club C-Map where the $80/yr membership includes one free C-Map update. HOWEVER, I recently had an issue and was totally unable to get a response from their customer service via phone when I had no internet service. So I'm still using my older chips, but I now also use Open CPN on my laptop and have a Navionics subscription for my iPad. The Navionics is very user friendly and all your map areas are updated periodically during the annual subscription at no additional charge.

 

[STB]

Cajun,

I'm also a big fan of OpenCPN. Hard to beat free for those areas of the globe where charts are available.

 

[Martin J]

With free charts available, it requires $450 for the east and west coasts + Bahamas. For that you can buy a new GPS preloaded with all the charts for the US.
Plus the other thing they don't tell you is if the new charts don't fit on the chip, you need a new chip at a further $100.
I am installing 2 more mini computers and monitors with open CPN and noaa charts etc. The reason for maintaining the Furuno is the radar and depth sounder built into the system overlaid on the charts. The chart quality is poor compared to what is available today.

 

[CaptTom]

Still, it's not a bad idea to just call C-Map, explain the situation, and see what they can do for you. True, it may be cheaper to start over, but at least you'll know you made the right decision.

 

[sdowney717]

I do it all for free, except for the hardware.
OpenCpn
NOAA ECN charts which are very good
Linux Mint OS

The hardware to me is an old modified to fit ATX case located behind a wall that no one can see, into which I can easily swap in MB or drives. Meaning cheap easy upgrades. I buy parts off ebay.
The LED Monitor is 17" and is secured to chart table next to helm with a single screw.
Keyboard and mouse and GPS puck run to a USB Hub, 20 foot of cable back to PC.
HDMI 25 feet takes video from PC to monitor.
I crafte a remote on switch with indicator lights for the PC, push on button next to helm on side of chart table. I wired that using a section of ethernet cable. There is 8 wires available in those cables.

 

[ranger58sb]

Still, it's not a bad idea to just call C-Map, explain the situation, and see what they can do for you. True, it may be cheaper to start over, but at least you'll know you made the right decision.

Used to be C-Map had a "Club" and an annual membership fee got "free" updates every year. I don't remember the fee being all that huge... Anyway, maybe they still have options like that and can cut a deal...

-Chris

 

[Recb]

I had to get upgraded charts recently and CMap gave me a couple of options and overall I was very pleased with their service and felt the costs were very reasonable.