Garmin 5212

steve mac

steve mac

New Member
Aug 23, 2007
130
Cape Cod, MA
Boat Info
2000 400 Sundancer
Engines
CAT 3116TA
Does anyone on CSR have experience with the Garmin 5212 (touchscreen)? I think I have settled on that unit, but wanted to get any feedback from real-life users. I will be replacing the Raytheon radar, GPS, Chartplotter that came with the boat in 2000. The ray chartplotter stopped working, so I need to replace the radar and plotter anyway. I will keep the Raytheon GPS as an installed back-up.

Also, I will keep the Raytheon auto-pilot (which I don't use often), but I was told it will interconnect with the Garmin stuff.

Any experience, good or bad with Garmin 5212 I'd love to hear about it.

One month 'til launch time!!!!!
 
I have it on one of my boats and love it. I am a huge fan of that unit in fact. If you can wait a bit you might even check out the 5215. These units are very easy to use, you will probably never need to open the manual. They have the brightest screen on the market, and are simply a joy to use. They get 2 thumbs up from me.
 
I have the 5208, after having Raymarine's E80 on my last boat.. I love the Garmin and especially the XM Sat weather.. If I would have had room to install the 5212 I would have in a heart beat. and I saw the 5215 at the Miami Boat Show...wow...just no where to put it or the 5212 on my 320.

Barry
 
I have a 320 DA and am looking as well and am leaning towards Garmin. I have the automotive unit and it is so simple to use. Is the 5208 the 8" unit? is that the largest that will fit in the port side of the dash?
 
Yes, the 5208 is the largest and that is where mine is. It works great and the G2vision card is very cool, you can put the satellite imagery in the background and also I suggest you get the XM weather module as you can run realtime satellite weather on top of the chartplotter and zoom in or out and keep track of any storms coming your way.

They just upgraded the software and it is very easy to do as well.

Any other questions, feel free to pm me.

Barry
 
steve mac said:
Does anyone on CSR have experience with the Garmin 5212 (touchscreen)? ....Any experience, good or bad with Garmin 5212 I'd love to hear about it.
Click to expand...

Love the 5212! I bought one about a year ago, its great. I do not know how I used to operate a non-touch screen GPS - totally spoiled now. My main complaint is that on the main chart screen it doesn't list the time of day. My second complaint is that with the XM radio option you have to exit out of the current GPS chart to switch the XM radio station. At the annapolis boat show end of last year I brougth this up with the Garmin reps. and they said they've had similar feedback on both those subjects and hope to remedy them in a software update.

My last complaint is that the GPS has a nifty feature where you "touch" your destination point and the Garmin automatically figures out, according to your minimum water depth input, the best route to navigate to that desitination. However, it WILL NOT send this info. to the autopilot. So you have to manually input all the points you want the boat to steer to your destination. Sort of makes this awesome feature useless IMO.

Make sure you spend the extra few dollars for the G2 Vision chip. The info. and pics are great when coming into a new port or marina.

Hope this helps,
 
Mike, I was at the Miami Boat Show and they were talking about their new Auto Pilot that will be out over the summer and will connect with the auto route on the plotter. Also check and see what version of software you have, they have upgraded it as of last month. It's pretty easy to do, all you need is an SD card and card reader if you don't have one on your PC.

Barry
 
Barry,

Thanks for the info., will be awesome if they make the auto-route feature compatable with autopilot.

I'll try the new software update next weekend, hopefully it corrects the time and XM radio issues :smt001
 
The update will correct the XM issue, you can put an XM navbar at the bottom of the screen. I don't think any autopilot will be able to follow the auto route because it doesn't actually use waypoints. If they figure that one out that would be too cool.
 
Thanks for all of the great feedback!! It seems that everyone who has one (either the 5212 or 5208) love 'em.

I will be getting the 5212 installed with the 18 in HD Radome and the XM sat weather.

Thanks again!!!
 
Steve, I have the 5208 with the regular 18 dome and love it. Everyone on your dock will be anxious to take a peak at the unit and the touchscreen. There are a few downsides including cost of the MFD but it is a very nice unit and functions reliably. I don't have the vision card in mine as we only go to non-familiar marinas 1-2 time a season. The built-in charts are adequate and garmin does a nice job updating firmware when they see there is a problem (Raymine seems a little slower in this..?)
 
don't forget the digital sonar...All in all a great package. I'll be curious if there is a big difference in the HD dome and the one I bought less than a year ago...Will have to find someone and compare.

You will really enjoy the system. I also bought and connected a color reverse camera which is mounted under the arch and let's me see either the people sitting behind me in the boat, or the boat traffic behind me which on weekends in the Intracoastal can be pretty heavy. I also have the garmin connected to my 26" HD LCD down in the cabin, and if someone down there wants to see what I'm looking at, (which is usually a combo screen of weather and chart), they can just press the remote to see it.

Good luck!
Barry
 
I was told by a local electronics shop that the HD radome provides a much "sharper" radar image. Of course, he could just be trying to sell me the slightly more expensive radome. He said that he was at the Garmin training a month ago and they demo'd both the HD version and the digital radome. The HD radomes are not available until April, so I am waiting until April before I get the new unit / radome installed. Here in the Northeast, I can use it much before mid-April anyway.
 
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