[urgent] First dive computer for good amateur.. ? Thx!

[tathilde]

I would like to get a first dive computer, and am urgently looking for advice - birthday gift.

Any help most appreciated!

The diver: a good amateur diver; likely to try and develop his technique/level. Very much into it safety; and into the information during the dive.

The person: loves elaborated, technical stuffs - rather than simple ones; he'd probably love to connect it to his Mac; and he always sort of needs "the best" (...but haha...I know: what is it for his level and the range of computers I can afford?)

With that in mind, what would u suggest?

FYI, I was thinking of the Suunto Vyper; or the Uwatec Aladin Tec 2G [Capsule?]. Or Mares Puck?

What do you think? On what criteria/what are the main differences?


I'm also wondering about a low price range air connected computer like the Mares Puck 2... Any opinion?

Thanks a lot for your help.

 

[Straegen]

First thing to know for sure is does he want a console or wrist computer. Divers are pretty finicky about that most of the time.

Puck is a great first dive computer, but it is built for simplicity. It can do most things a rec diver wants but it isn't fancy. I would probably scratch that one from the list based on your description.

 

[devilkitty]

Be aware that very few -- if any -- dive computers have desktop software that is Mac compatible (unless you count dual-booting a version of Windows on an Intel-based Mac).

 

[DiveNav]

Hi,
we have developed online classes for dive computers.

Each class has lot of videos.

The first 5/6 videos of each class are free and good enough to give you a good idea of the specific dive computer.

Alberto (aka eDiver)

 

[JanK]

Uwatec has software for Mac (J-TRAK), PC (SmartTRAK, J-TRAK), Linux (J-TRAK) and PocketPC (TravelTRAK). All of these are absolutely free (as in $0.00, as opposed to some other manufacturers) and downlodable from their website.

TravelTRAK is relatively simple, displays the profile and some basic data. I haven't used it for the last year, as my PocketPC died.

The SmartTRAK is quite a good piece of software. I'm using it on a netbook, which then functions a complete logbook. My "paper" logbok only has date, location, depth, dive time and signature, everything else is on the PC, including starting and ending tank pressures (from which the SAC is calculated), buddies, pictures,... The logbook is archived on Dropbox, so it's accessible from all my PCs.

When displaying the profile of a dive, the emulated display of your dive computer is drawn on the screen with all the logged information displayed there, including all the warnings - exactly as it is displayed underwater. And the nice thing is that it's compatible with all their recent computers. I used an Aladin Prime until now and have switched to Gallileo Luna. No problems, just the displayed emulated dive computer face is different and more information is available. And at least with the SmartTRAK you can also set different parameters on the dive computer, e.g., max O2pp,. which alarms to sound,..

J-TRAK is a Java application, not quite as powerful as the SmartTRAK, but it runs on a PC, Mac and Linux. In any case, you can download the software and try it out. I just did (the PC version) and the basic functionality looks similar to SmartTRAK. And, as it's written in Java, it should work the same on all these platforms. It actually comes with sample dives, so you can see how it will look when he's transferred his dives. On the website it says that it's compatible with Aladin TEC2G.

Note that for this to work he will still need to get an IR adapter. From what I've heard Macs are slightly touchy about this, so the best bet would be to get a (probably expensive) original one from Apple. But I'm sure good info can be found on the internet and, if your friend's a geek, he will probably welcome the challange of getting the cheapest working IR interface for Mac

And as for the dive computer itself, I'd go with Aladin. I have used it for three years and would have gone on using it until it broke down (or my diving got much more advanced), if hadn't gotten an exceptional deal on the Luna. And now that I've gotten used to using SmartTRAK, I consider good logging software an essential part of a dive computer "package".

 

[theduckguru]

If you aren't going air integrated, want lower end with good quality, the Gekko is my vote.

 

[Jax]

Uwatec has software for Mac (J-TRAK), PC (SmartTRAK, J-TRAK), Linux (J-TRAK) and PocketPC (TravelTRAK). All of these are absolutely free (as in $0.00, as opposed to some other manufacturers) and downlodable from their website.

TravelTRAK is relatively simple, displays the profile and some basic data. I haven't used it for the last year, as my PocketPC died.

The SmartTRAK is quite a good piece of software. I'm using it on a netbook, which then functions a complete logbook. My "paper" logbok only has date, location, depth, dive time and signature, everything else is on the PC, including starting and ending tank pressures (from which the SAC is calculated), buddies, pictures,... The logbook is archived on Dropbox, so it's accessible from all my PCs.

When displaying the profile of a dive, the emulated display of your dive computer is drawn on the screen with all the logged information displayed there, including all the warnings - exactly as it is displayed underwater. And the nice thing is that it's compatible with all their recent computers. I used an Aladin Prime until now and have switched to Gallileo Luna. No problems, just the displayed emulated dive computer face is different and more information is available. And at least with the SmartTRAK you can also set different parameters on the dive computer, e.g., max O2pp,. which alarms to sound,..

J-TRAK is a Java application, not quite as powerful as the SmartTRAK, but it runs on a PC, Mac and Linux. In any case, you can download the software and try it out. I just did (the PC version) and the basic functionality looks similar to SmartTRAK. And, as it's written in Java, it should work the same on all these platforms. It actually comes with sample dives, so you can see how it will look when he's transferred his dives. On the website it says that it's compatible with Aladin TEC2G.

Note that for this to work he will still need to get an IR adapter. From what I've heard Macs are slightly touchy about this, so the best bet would be to get a (probably expensive) original one from Apple. But I'm sure good info can be found on the internet and, if your friend's a geek, he will probably welcome the challange of getting the cheapest working IR interface for Mac

And as for the dive computer itself, I'd go with Aladin. I have used it for three years and would have gone on using it until it broke down (or my diving got much more advanced), if hadn't gotten an exceptional deal on the Luna. And now that I've gotten used to using SmartTRAK, I consider good logging software an essential part of a dive computer "package".

+1 on the Uwatec TEC 2G - The geek in him will love it, and it will cover him for a good, long time.

<a fellow geekophile>

 

[BB1]

I would look at the new UEMIS!

Home - uemis - THE UNDERWATER REVOLUTION

Wrist mount, air integrated, colour display and updateable so that it grows with him in the future.

Logging is platform independant as its all done through java directly to the web!

I am absolutely loving mine!!!!