Nitrox certification comparisons

[Scubaroo]

I'm looking at Nitrox courses, and am considering doing a combination of IANTD's EANx Diver/Deep Air Diver courses, which are offered together locally (the Deep Air Diver course is to 130', and seems to put more of an emphasis on deep diving skills rather than diving deep on air from what I've read, so it just seems to be unfortunately named). Does anyone know how these courses compare to similar courses offered through alternate agencies? I recently did AOW through PADI, and despite the good instructor, wasn't impressed enough by the course content to consider doing PADI's Enriched Air Diver/Deep Diver courses. IANTD seems to have a good reputation as an agency apart from the quality of their manuals, are they really poorly written, or do people just keep repeating that from hearing it elsewhere? How does TDI compare? I'd like to do GUE's Tech 1 course, but for various work/transport/location reasons it would be difficult for me to attend this course if offered.

I'm looking at doing the nitrox course in conjunction with a deep diving course, because my AOW deep dive was only to 63' because of weather conditions, but apparently that meets PADI's criteria of between 60' and 100' as a "deep dive"...

thanks in advance

Ben

 

[AdamHorsman]

I just returned home tonight from taking my IANTD nitrox course. I thought the book was very informative, and I feel it was certainly worth my investment. ($175)

Adam

 

[Jarhead]

I just finished my Nitrox course a couple of weeks ago. I did the SSI EAN diver course. The book is well written and comes with a video to reinforce the points of the book. It also comes with a set of waterproof Air/EAN tables, MOD tables, CNS "Clock" Exposure tables and Equivalent depth tables.

Hope this helps...

KD4RFA

 

[sumguy]

I finished my EAN class a couple of months ago. I went with ANDI because the PADI instructor who taught our OW and Advanced class thought we would get more out of it. He was taught by the ANDI instructor, and I found the course and book very informative. I think the instructor can make a big difference, regardless of the agency.

After our course, some of us also paid a little extra to take the PADI cert, as well (you can never have too much plastic), and their course seemed ok, as well.

 

[voidware]

There was a good article on this on divernet.com, I believe.

ahh, here it is Comparison of four courses

brandon

 

[landlocked]

I recently certified for Nitrox through SSI. While I don't have any comparison with other agencies, I feel quite confident in diving Nitrox now. I thought that the course was very informative.

 

[Lost Yooper]

It took two classes for me to get 100% O2 certified from TDI a few years ago. I don't know what all the other agencies do, but you're after a class that will teach nitrox up to 100% if possible. GUE does, of course.

Good luck.

Mike

 

[padiscubapro]

Originally posted by bengiddins
I'm looking at Nitrox courses, and am considering doing a combination of IANTD's EANx Diver/Deep Air Diver courses, which are offered together locally (the Deep Air Diver course is to 130', and seems to put more of an emphasis on deep diving skills rather than diving deep on air from what I've read, so it just seems to be unfortunately named). Does anyone know how these courses compare to similar courses offered through alternate agencies? I recently did AOW through PADI, and despite the good instructor, wasn't impressed enough by the course content to consider doing PADI's Enriched Air Diver/Deep Diver courses. IANTD seems to have a good reputation as an agency apart from the quality of their manuals, are they really poorly written, or do people just keep repeating that from hearing it elsewhere? How does TDI compare? I'd like to do GUE's Tech 1 course, but for various work/transport/location reasons it would be difficult for me to attend this course if offered.

I'm looking at doing the nitrox course in conjunction with a deep diving course, because my AOW deep dive was only to 63' because of weather conditions, but apparently that meets PADI's criteria of between 60' and 100' as a "deep dive"...

thanks in advance

Ben

I teach ANDI, PADI, TDI, and am very familair with the IANTD program

ANDIs class and manuals are the best (class is also the longest averaging about 12 hours plus 2 dives), TDI'S class content requirement is better(minimum is around 3 hours) than PADI'S(can be done in about 2 hours) but is highly dependent on the instructor, WHen I teach TDI classes they run about 5-6 hours I add in some of the material I teach in my ANDI classes and highly recommend taking the advanced nitrox to go with it . Padi's manuals are the second best but least informative class.. IANTD's Nitrox manuals are about the same as TDI's which is not saying much. The IANTD program is also a better option than PADI but you should really take it with advanced nitrox diver, to get the most out of it.