Sonar Decisions, What to look out for

Looking to upgrade my sonar for this winter while not breaking the bank.

Anyone have any good reviews of what they own?

Mainly looking for info on what you find most useful and what to look for when trying to get all the features you want.

I use a humminbird helix 5 on the boat as well as ice fishing. Has the flasher option but I mainly is the graph. No problem marking jigs in 100' of water.

kevb81[B], does that helix 5 have the temperature graph where it reads the temp of the whole water column? I think that's what it's called, guy at cabelas was showing it to me on one of the humminbird units but im not sure if it only comes on specific units or specific transducers...

As far as I know just surface temp.

i always hear people talking about the helix 5, but which one should I buy? when i go to the humminbird website, they have different models, anyone know which one is the most popular? thanks

Humminbird Helix5, has the combo specifically for ice fishing. comes with bag, ice ducer and battery. you can use the same head unit for the boat by purchasing the transom mount transducer for a boat if you have one.

https://www.humminbird.com/Products/ICE-HELIX-5-SONAR-GPS/

What is "The Bank"?
Recommendations here will vary, not only by manufacturers but by features such as screen size, GPS, ice-units packages, etc. Once you have one of those more expensive features, it's like going back to "black and white" models without it = never again!

I use a Vexilar FL-20. Works great. Bottom zoom is a must have for me as I'm generally going for whities and lakers. Battery lasts, never anY issues in 4 or 5 seasons. It has probably tripled or quadrupled what I catch.

The bad: Price of a new one has nearly doubled since I bought it - not much good other than on the ice

They are all the same head thing jkust different features ice unit comes with a bag and ice ducer. FYI you can send in a new transom mount to humminbird and they will send you an ice ducer for free.

They are all the same head thing jkust different features ice unit comes with a bag and ice ducer. FYI you can send in a new transom mount to humminbird and they will send you an ice ducer for free.

they are not all equal. some have just sonar, some have DI, some have SI and some don't have GPS/map capability.

in addition, their ICE series have the proper short cables and base mount that everything plugs and attaches into.

I was very happy with the helix 5 last season, and I was happy with the humminbird 385 that it replaced. They did all I needed without a lot of frills.

None read the temp for the whole water column just the surface temp . There is a probe some use while downrigging that goes down with the cable that reads temps as its lowered . Only other thing is one of those vexilar thingys that look like a test tube or some underwater cams . But trandsucer at surface only reads surface temp .

TD

this the list of options i needed on my sonar since i mainly fish lakers:

higher screen, don't care about wide ones as i don't need to see what happened 10 seconds ago.
200/83 freq
300-500 RMS
at least 640 vertical pixels,
split screen,
fast scroll,

got 587 5 years ago, and still bank lots of fish.
see if you can get your hands on the older 6 series models.

good luck

For ice fishing all you need is the most basic version of Helix. Humminbird released this year the generation 2 of Helix and some stores still have few generation 1 sonars at clearance price.

If you want the cheapest option, for ice fishing, you will be OK with "Helix 5 Sonar", you don't need DI, SI, GPS...for $200 or less (I saw the clearance price at Sail about 2 months ago). The new Generation 2 version is in store now for $260. Gen 1 should be a lot cheaper if you find a store that still has one on clearance.

The regular sonar comes with a transom mount that you can rig easily for ice fishing, or purchase a ice transducer and a $10 lunch bag. I rigged a transom transducer myself for ice fishing 4-5 years ago and it worked quite well. The disadvantage with using the transom one, is a longer cable.

I have a Vexilar FL-8. Very responsive, bright in colour (in and outside a hut), zero lag, multiple colours, great battery life, and bottom lock or zoom feature is great to really dial in finicky biters.

But yes, it was $450, aka a truck payment!