Suunto USB cable DIY

[Phil Eichler]

I just bought this computer for myself. Let's face it, this is just another money hungry company. If it was ever USA based it was outsourced to China, probably a decade ago. There's probably some poor kid working his finger to the bones to making these cables for 40 cents a day but we'll never know because it's all hidden in China's corrupt policies. Sure this is no different than from a company like Dell, whose a producer of proprietary computers, nearly all there stuff is masterminded by engineers to make it as hard on the consumer to make easy fixes without Dell interjection. What they pay for these cables is barley a fraction of what they sell them for. If the software, that is free, was high quality, then this would be understandable; however, it's entry level stuff that has a laughable GUI(Graphical User Interface). You might be able to tell that I build my own computers and although the Suunto Cobra is high tech and nice piece of equipment, it's very costly! Show a little class Suunto! First of all don't be another, money hungry monster like Dell. Don't proprietaries your equipment. And second if you do, don't nickle and dime your customers to death, you'll go further, farther, faster!

 

[bergersau]

I'm not forgetting it at all.

At the beginning, Suunto could have opened up its API to third-party developers and charged a small licensing fee (or not). Essentially, this would have driven software development costs to zero and would have allowed the company to charge less for the cable while still maintaining the same marginal profit. The company chose not to do that. It wanted to maintain proprietary control.

Subsurface dive Log software 2.1 released --> Subsurface 2.1 | Subsurface
GPL and free of charge on Linux/Mac/Windows/

 

[NCadiver]

I just bought this computer for myself. Let's face it, this is just another money hungry company. If it was ever USA based it was outsourced to China, probably a decade ago. There's probably some poor kid working his finger to the bones to making these cables for 40 cents a day but we'll never know because it's all hidden in China's corrupt policies. Sure this is no different than from a company like Dell, whose a producer of proprietary computers, nearly all there stuff is masterminded by engineers to make it as hard on the consumer to make easy fixes without Dell interjection. What they pay for these cables is barley a fraction of what they sell them for. If the software, that is free, was high quality, then this would be understandable; however, it's entry level stuff that has a laughable GUI(Graphical User Interface). You might be able to tell that I build my own computers and although the Suunto Cobra is high tech and nice piece of equipment, it's very costly! Show a little class Suunto! First of all don't be another, money hungry monster like Dell. Don't proprietaries your equipment. And second if you do, don't nickle and dime your customers to death, you'll go further, farther, faster!

If you knew what you were talking about you would know suunto was never U.S.A. based. Two you should have purchased your cobra in the pro pack. The price has drop over the years then again you did purchase a cable back in the EON computer days.
Fun how this is your first post.

 

[avengerki]

I just equated having to buy the cable like buying a new DVD player, you may or may not get an HDMI cable with it so you need to buy one separate, unless you already had one.

 

[CT Sean]

I just equated having to buy the cable like buying a new DVD player, you may or may not get an HDMI cable with it so you need to buy one separate, unless you already had one.

The difference is you can get an HDMI cable for 5.00 (as long as you don't get suckered into the Monster Cable nonsense)

 

[ChrisTull]

FWIW, i have the D4i, the Suunto cable, Macdive and DM4(Mac). All work fantastically, I don't feel ripped off and I sleep well at night.

I didn't have that feeling. On both MacBook Pro (2012) and Windows 7 machines the DM4 software SUCKED. It practically hanged my computers. What OS do you use with "fantastic" results?​

 

[muzikbiz22]

I didn't have that feeling. On both MacBook Pro (2012) and Windows 7 machines the DM4 software SUCKED. It practically hanged my computers. What OS do you use with "fantastic" results?​

10.7, 10.6, & 10.4. All work well. HOWEVER, with that said, I use MacDive almost all of the time. DM4, for the most part blows as software, but it does work. Make sure to download the necessary USB driver. MacDive also requires that you download a driver, as well, but is way more stable, and a way better program. I use DM4 strictly as a backup for archiving the same dives. I have found that if you open one up, either program, and close it, you sometimes have to reboot your machine if you want to use the other one right after. They can "hang up" that way on occasion. I think it's due to the USB drivers conflicting, but not sure. My advice, would be to cut loose of $25, and get the MacDive. It rocks, the support is OUTSTANDING, and also allows you to sync with other programs, iPhone, iPad, etc.

 

[PhatD1ver]

Not sure if anyone is still monitoring this thread, but here is a video where a guy did make his own cable for about $5 in parts, and he shows how he finally found a program using it to download his data... pretty cool, I'm no electronics geek, so I'll just spend the $70 and be sure I don't short out my $300 dive computer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQi7QKZXbWg

 

[bergersau]

That YouTube vid is exactly my solution.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk

 

[PhatD1ver]

That YouTube vid is exactly my solution.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk

I just bought a premade adapter for $6.25 here in China. I think the shipping to the US is about $10 and I'd send to anyone who is interested.