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Contemplating switching over to Maxsea TZ and Windows 7 from MacENC - Printable Version

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- trevc - December 3, 2009

Hi everyone,

Has anyone here tried Maxsea TZ in person? It looks like they're really pushing things ahead (the weather features are the most appealing to me, not as interested in the 3D, since I'm not sure if the Mapmedia charts have this feature in Australia).

I'm currently using MacENC and some of the older style Navionics charts (I bought the wrong ones, not the "gold" ones... damn!)

I'm installing a waterpoof, sun-readable touchscreen at the helm, and trying to decide if I should stick with MacENC, or switch over to the "other side" where there appears to be a bit more innovation happening.

I'd love to hear input from others. Perhaps I should just stick with what i've already paid for, and keep it simple?

The new Maxsea interface also looks more suited to touch-screen usage.

- cyberhusky - December 3, 2009

Hi

It depends on what you really need.

MaxSea TZ with all the modules (AIS, weather etc.) is more expensive than MacENC with a Macbook.

And you still need to buy the charts.

It true Maxsea TZ has great zoom in/out feature and the GUI is more suitable for touch-screens but that is due to FURUNO, who has bought MaxSea, to integrate TZ in their chart plotters.

At our sailing club I did demo MacENC and a friend showed MaxSea TZ. He was impressed by the features of MacENC which costs only as much as an expansion module for MaxSea.

In fact the only thing missing in MacENC is a true logbook, and automatic route planning using tides, currents and weather infos which do cost separately.

The biggest issue with MaxSea is the electronic hardware dongle, if you loose it you can't use MaxSea anymore!

After our presentations several people did order MaxSea TZ (PC guys) respectively MacENC (Mac guys), even one guy switched from PC to Mac (thx to MacENC)!

But what I do hear most times is that MaxSea TZ isn't as stable as MaxSea NavNet (the original MaxSea) and still does crash a lot.

And Apple Mac mini or Macbooks Air do use less power than equivalent PCs.

(http://www.greenercomputing.com/news/2009/12/01/apple-scores-high-energy-efficient-computer-rankings)


BTW MaxSea was originally published on the Mac and called "MacSea", but that was long before OS X.

Just my 2 Cents :-)

- trevc - December 3, 2009

Thanks for your response cyberhusky. I'm still trying to decide if this is worth shelling out the big bucks.

A few questions and comments:

- Doesn't Maxsea already come with Mapmedia charts (Navionics plus satellite/3d) for your region? It seems to include a set for Eastern Australia in my case. For the price, hopefully the charts are adequate.

- The normal 3d weather features/downloads seem to be included without a module.

- In their online shop, you pay for the software and download it directly. There was no mention of a dongle. It seems one may not be required. If there is, that could be a deal breaker (I hate those things! Why punish your paying customers?)

Interesting note about stability. I hadn't heard anyone comment on that.

cyberhusky Wrote:And Apple Mac mini or Macbooks Air do use less power than equivalent PCs.
Which is exactly why I would use my new Mac Mini for this purpose. Windows 7 runs great on it, but unfortunately it's still "Windows" and comes with the usual clunky user interface and in-your-face approach to security, etc etc.

Cheers

- Jade - December 4, 2009

Trev,

:o
For that kind of money, it occurs to me that you might as well spring for a Furuno chart plotter with NavNet TZ. It may better meet your stated requirements.

- trevc - December 4, 2009

Hi Jade,

It's looking like I could get a 15", 1024x768, sunlight readable, LED-backlit, waterproof, touch-screen display for less than the Furuno units (even factoring in the Maxsea license). That's with waterproof connectors, etc. I can feed the display directly from the Mac Mini. I'd much rather rely on the Mini since I can replace parts in it quite easily (and carry them with me). The screen has surprisingly low power requirements, and along with the Mini consumes similar amps as a typical laptop. I can't carry extra parts for a name-brand plotter, because there's really nothing user serviceable. I would carry a spare HD, 12V dc-dc regulator, memory, and possibly a main-board (logic board) for the Mini.

Also, big bonus points for being able to run iTunes with a touch screen from the cockpit.

I really do like MacENC. However, it does seem sluggish stacked up against even old versions of Maxsea. I'm running it on a brand new Mini, with the HD upgraded to a 7200RPM model. I also don't like that it doesn't have a "full-screen" mode, to make better use of limited space on a lower-resolution helm monitor.

I'm torn between running a minimal (cheap) boat, and having lots of information and slick nav software at my fingertips. I'm looking forward to seeking out the best compromise. If I do add "gadgets", I like to be able to fix them without relying on some manufacturer 100%.

Ended up rambling a bit there, sorrySmile

- bobetter - December 4, 2009

Sounds like you're looking at one of the Argonaut displays, yes? I had a touch sensitive industrial "mouse" in the cockpit for a while, replaced it with a HULA device 'cuz it couldn't tell the difference between a raindrop and my finger. How do touch sensitive screens react to rain?

I also wonder how much more a second Mini would cost as opposed to carrying parts, motherboards are pricey.

Have you thought about an SSD instead of a HD? No moving parts, potentially faster and less power consumed.

- trevc - December 5, 2009

That's funny about the rain... oops.

I think you're right about just keeping an extra Mini, ready-to-go. Leave it sealed right up. They're great little computers. Although, we wouldn't need any backup until we actually go beyond local cruising.

Unfortunately we'll need to wait until SSD's get more capacity and cheaper. We have about 120gb of music, and a decent movie selection on the same HD. We do keep backups on external drives.

The Argonaut is the one, yes. There's also one local vendor that presented a pretty good quote on something with the same specs. It has a very industrial looking brushed stainless case. All the usual water resistant specs too.

- ActiveCaptain - December 5, 2009

Hold on a second - are you sure you're really talking about MaxSea's new TimeZero program? It's very, very new - like a couple of weeks old since release. I just got my copy last week. It includes all vector and raster charts for the US from NOAA along with satellite imagery, 3D data, tide, current, and a pretty slick interface to weather. There aren't any modules for the software and it has a street price of $350 (check out Defender).

I installed it on a low end Toshiba laptop - a $399 computer. All I can say is that I'm blown away by it. I've been using nautical navigation applications since 1995 and have even written a few applications (Maptech, ActiveCaptain, Raymarine prototype). I've tried every application that exists and there is just nothing else like this one anywhere. You've got to see how it pans and zooms and puts things into 3D. I'm not a big fan of the 3D display in real use although it makes a cool demo. Even just for 2D use, this software is incredible.

I'm trying to figure out how to make it run on my MacBook Pro. TZ has a variety of hardware requirements and only supports certain video adapters. I'm trying to find someone who has actually tried it on a Mac.

TZ is unlike anything you have ever seen. It's like the first time I saw Nobeltec's quilting of charts. Once you see that, you can't go back to chart-by-chart display. TZ does that same thing for the very basic display, zooming, and panning of nautical charts. You honestly won't believe the performance. It changes the way you'll do navigation. It's that big.

- AugustH - December 5, 2009

But it's Windows-only. It would be nice if it was mac as well, but it's not. It would also be nice if MaxSea would recognize a large and growing population of Mac users who would be interested in their software if it was native to us, but I doubt they care. And if they don't care about us, why should we care about them?

- ActiveCaptain - December 5, 2009

Just to clear up some of the previous incorrect statements.


cyberhusky Wrote:MaxSea TZ with all the modules (AIS, weather etc.) is more expensive than MacENC with a Macbook.
The full software with all charts for the US, weather, tides, currents, 3D, satellite imagery, etc is about $350 street price. You must be referring to the previous MaxSea software.



cyberhusky Wrote:And you still need to buy the charts.
Totally false for the US. There is a full range of international charts available and they cost extra.



cyberhusky Wrote:It true Maxsea TZ has great zoom in/out feature and the GUI is more suitable for touch-screens but that is due to FURUNO, who has bought MaxSea, to integrate TZ in their chart plotters.
TZ works exceptionally well (best, I think) with a wheeled mouse. Furuno, I believe, owns a minority stake in the company who owns MaxSea. It's interesting that the parent company has also just purchased Nobeltec from Jeppesen.



cyberhusky Wrote:At our sailing club I did demo MacENC and a friend showed MaxSea TZ. He was impressed by the features of MacENC which costs only as much as an expansion module for MaxSea.
Again, different product. This is confusing the comparison.



cyberhusky Wrote:In fact the only thing missing in MacENC is a true logbook, and automatic route planning using tides, currents and weather infos which do cost separately.
Once you see the zooming and panning, there's just no comparison. And these are only a few of the capabilities that TZ has above MacENC. I'd expect this though since MacENC is a much less expensive product.



cyberhusky Wrote:The biggest issue with MaxSea is the electronic hardware dongle, if you loose it you can't use MaxSea anymore!
Incorrect again. Points again to a comparison against a completely different software product. There is no hardware dongle at all. You activate the software using an internet connection. I think there's a manual way to do it too. That's it. I have no dongle or any type of special hardware.



cyberhusky Wrote:But what I do hear most times is that MaxSea TZ isn't as stable as MaxSea NavNet (the original MaxSea) and still does crash a lot.
I've been hitting it pretty hard and showing it to a bunch of people around the docks here in Charleston (we're currently at the Maritime Center continuing south in a couple of weeks). It hasn't crashed or had a problem yet...and I've really tried to make it crash.

It's hard to know what you've been "hearing" or if it even involves the same software product. From all of your other comments, you're referring to something completely different and not MaxSea TimeZero.



cyberhusky Wrote:And Apple Mac mini or Macbooks Air do use less power than equivalent PCs.
That's one of the reasons I'm looking forward to seeing this run on my MacBook. It will be very sweet there.


If anyone is by any chance in the Charleston area, come on by and see it for yourself. I'm running it on a $399 Toshiba laptop (bought from BestBuy of all places). It screams on that computer. I could easily buy two (maybe three) Toshiba's with MaxSea TZ included for the price of my one MacBook Pro. That said, I want it on my Mac.

- GPSNavX - December 5, 2009

Does TZ work with the native (updated and readily available and free to download) NOAA raster RNC's and vector ENC's? Or is one dependent on Maxsea providing the chart data? If the latter, then how often to they update their charts?

- ActiveCaptain - December 5, 2009

AugustH Wrote:And if they don't care about us, why should we care about them?
Actually, they have a history of creating Mac-native software. Perhaps they'll do the same with this if they want that extra 8% of the market.

If MaxSea/Furuno were ever to ask me, I'd tell them that 15% of the users on ActiveCaptain are accessing the site on a Mac. That tells me that a larger percentage of boaters use Macs than the general population. I don't know if 15% is enough for them to go to the porting effort - or perhaps its written with tools that would make it trivial to create a native version. Who knows. For now, it would be fine with me if it just ran under Windows on my Mac. You really need to see the zooming and panning August. And the tide and current integration. It works really well and doesn't cost anything extra!

- ActiveCaptain - December 5, 2009

GPSNavX Wrote:Does TZ work with the native (updated and readily available and free to download) NOAA raster RNC's and vector ENC's? Or is one dependent on Maxsea providing the chart data? If the latter, then how often to they update their charts?
Excellent question! And that gets at the meat of how they're able to get such incredible performance. The region data comes from them and you have to rely on them to release updated data. For me, having Furuno in there helps ease the discomfort of that. Furuno wants to obviously have updated charts as often as possible.

Having the chart data as a single downloadable file is really nice too. There's no messing around with loading individual charts. That's a real mess. Take iNavX as an example. It took me 4 blasted days to download each of those individual charts. Something really needs to be done about that - I consider it user-hostile and wrote about it in our article about the iPhone and navigation. I can't imagine going through that process again to download the charts - yikes! I'd much rather point to a single large file and grab it all and not have to mess around with anything else. There might be a lesson there Rich.

- trevc - December 5, 2009

I can't believe Maxsea TZ is going for $346 on Defender. You Americans always get such good prices on everything!

The TZ version which includes full charts for east coast of Australia is $930USD. This is Navionics charts + satellite imagery + 3D.

I'm not as concerned about the "3D" aspect, it's more just the appeal of a really fast vector/raster charting engine. The weather downloads seem really slick too.

- GPSNavX - December 5, 2009

FWIW: The Navionics Gold charts from X-Traverse load/display/zoom in less then one second in MacENC 7. They are far more efficient then the S-57/S-63 ENC format charts available from NOAA or ChartWorld or any raster chart. For US$329 you get the entire Australian continent...

http://x-traverse.com/product/TD-NAV-32XG-PC

- trevc - December 5, 2009

Thanks, that's excellent info.

It sounds like I completely wasted my money on the ones from Chartworld. I was too eager to get started, and didn't know that the Navionics Gold charts from X-Traverse were any different to the Chartworld selection.

Not that it's really your responsibility, but some sort of post-purchase note would be nice for customers buying MacENC. There's really no reason Australians (and likely other regions) should even bother using Chartworld when the Navionics Gold charts are so much nicer to read (and apparently faster, as you noted).

- bobetter - December 5, 2009

ActiveCaptain Wrote:Having the chart data as a single downloadable file is really nice too. There's no messing around with loading individual charts. That's a real mess. Take iNavX as an example. It took me 4 blasted days to download each of those individual charts. Something really needs to be done about that - I consider it user-hostile and wrote about it in our article about the iPhone and navigation. I can't imagine going through that process again to download the charts - yikes! I'd much rather point to a single large file and grab it all and not have to mess around with anything else. There might be a lesson there Rich.

Well, this was a thread for MacENC/MaxSeaTZ, but you've brought up iNavX. If you post some specifics regarding what charts you downloaded, what type of connection you had, etc. over on the proper forum (iPhone), I'm sure someone will be able to help you with your download difficulty. I can't imagine spending 4 days to download, I'd think you could get the entire X-Traverse library in 4 days....of course it wouldn't fit on the iPhone....

- GPSNavX - December 5, 2009

Navionics Gold chart support via X-Traverse was only recently added to MacENC. Before then the ChartWorld ENCs (Official or Navionics) were recommended. Some also want the official S-52 presentation of the chart that MacENC uses for ENCs.

- trevc - December 5, 2009

Hopefully the X-Traverse deal wasn't around when I purchased MacENC. At least I'd like to think so Smile

FYI: MacENC can run in "full screen mode" using the app Mega-Zoomer (which allows you to do this within any Cocoa app).
[color:green][/color]

Here's a screenshot:
[Image: vfXwLs.png]

- bobetter - December 6, 2009

Trev Wrote:Thanks, that's excellent info.

It sounds like I completely wasted my money on the ones from Chartworld. I was too eager to get started, and didn't know that the Navionics Gold charts from X-Traverse were any different to the Chartworld selection.

You didn't necessarily waste your money at all. The S-57 charts are much more data-rich than the Navionics Gold versions. You also have the possibility of more than 1 install with the ChartWorld charts, not the case with Gold. I believe that the update frequency with ChartWorld (as long as you keep your license current) is higher as compared with the Gold series and the cost of keeping the licenses current is very reasonable. Lastly, in regards to your later post, any window or panel in MacENC can be full screen natively, just toggle the green + button in the upper left hand corner of the respective window and viola, full screen!

- trevc - December 6, 2009

By "full screen" I meant without a titlebar, dock hidden, main window extended from edge to edge. The entire screen taken up only by the application. The green button is only to "zoom", which at most will fill the free space on the screen, excluding the dock and top menubar areas.

For display on a device like a smaller touchscreen with lower resolution (say 1024x768), items like the dock and titlebars are simply wasting precious pixels that could be used for charting.

- bobetter - December 6, 2009

For the Chart Window, it doesn't "Zoom", it increases or decreases the screen size and amount of the Chart shown, no scale change occurs.

I have my Dock "Hidden", so the only screen real estate not used by the app is the Mac Menu bar.

One of the unique features of MacENC is the ability to "redesign" it's layout to suit the navigator's needs by moving and/or resizing any and all displays presented. One can also hit the - button and have a panel/window collapse into the dock....it remains active but doesn't sit on the screen when not needed.

edit

I see now what you mean regarding the Chart Window Title Bar, hitting + will not disappear it...

- ebgb - December 6, 2009

my 2 penn'th...

I know a lot of commercial fisherman, all use maxsea, sometimes with olex as well

as far as TZ versus the older maxsea (V12) goes, none off em will touch TZ with a barge pole. A few have installed it and within weeks gone looking for a second hand version of maxsea or re-installed their old maxsea

reliability is one big issue I'm aware of. I've heard It gets flaky and dog slow once you start racking up lots of routes/waypoints/tracks or start overlaying extra data from GRIB/AIS/Radar etc & the bathymetric sampling of vector data for 3D and grabbing of your own sounder data for 3d is prone to error as well

opening multiple chart windows of the same chart at differening pulls it down as well, especially if you are mixing rasters and vectors

some of these trawlermen have every track from 7 or 8 years of trawling going in the old maxsea, and any number of charts - even their old kingfisher/decca stuff and it never misses a beat

The pre TZ versions of maxsea will open virtually any chart format you can throw it as well

as for dongles. as far as I'm aware the version of TZ furuno are flogging in the UK requires a hardware dongle (although you can get around it with a sentinel dongle emulator)

I've installed it on a mac under parallels and it runs fine.

I think its all too easy these days to get 'feature fever' with new boaty toys. If you are definitely going to use all the extra features of TZ versus MacENC then fair enough.

Panning zooming speed is hardly an issue IMHO. When your cruising along at say 8 or 10knots, how often are you actually going to be fiddling with a plotter, zooming in and out panning around charts and the like

- ActiveCaptain - December 6, 2009

markH Wrote:...I've heard It gets flaky and dog slow once you start racking up lots of routes/waypoints/tracks or start overlaying extra data from GRIB/AIS/Radar etc & the bathymetric sampling of vector data for 3D and grabbing of your own sounder data for 3d is prone to error as well
A lot of your posting was like this - "I've heard...". There's some value in that type of info but everyone needs to remember that it's not necessarily valid. At least in the US courts, hearsay isn't considered evidence. It's a shame to trash an entire new product line because of what you might have heard from others.

The product I'm using was released 2 weeks ago. Maybe it's different from what you're hearing about. I suspect it is. I can say directly that I haven't gotten it to crash with every overlay I've been able to throw at it. I've used the free weather integration along with 3D, multiple displays (vector and raster at the same time), tide and current markers all over the screen, and 3D overlays with satellite imagery merged into the land portion - a very cool feature. In this merging mode, the water in the chart display gives soundings, etc and the land is merged with satellite imagery to see marinas, land features, etc. It is stunning.

The bottom line is that I haven't been able to make it crash while trying hard to make it do something out of the ordinary.



markH Wrote:opening multiple chart windows of the same chart at differening pulls it down as well, especially if you are mixing rasters and vectors
Not really. And I'm using a $399 computer. Have you actually done this with the latest version of TZ? I have.



markH Wrote:as far as I'm aware the version of TZ furuno are flogging in the UK requires a hardware dongle
Might be true. I don't know. Charts for the UK require payment of a royalty to UKHO so maybe they require it. I know first hand that no hardware dongle at all is needed for any of the US data. I also know that the latest data can be downloaded from MaxSea directly providing the latest charts from them.



markH Wrote:I've installed it on a mac under parallels and it runs fine.
Now THAT is good info. But I don't understand why there is all of that other "I've heard" references. Have you been able to crash it? Are you using the same software that I am? What is the name and version of the product you installed under Parallels?



markH Wrote:Panning zooming speed is hardly an issue IMHO. When your cruising along at say 8 or 10knots, how often are you actually going to be fiddling with a plotter, zooming in and out panning around charts and the like
The exact same thing was said when quilting came out - it's not that big of a deal to switch charts - who needs it? It's now the standard on any real chartplotting software. Even our web site does it by quilting and seamlessly displaying charts (although it's an early expression it certainly shows how it can be done).

Having instant panning and zooming changes the way you create routes. It makes it much nicer when you are exploring a different area because there is no "penalty" for zooming out, moving around, and zooming in. With a wheeled mouse, it's a very natural way of using the display - way different than anything else I've ever used for any type of mapping, not just boating. It reminds me of GoogleEarth sped up 100 times. Sure, who needs faster panning when you're moving at 6-8 knots. But try creating a route quickly when moving and you'll instantly see the huge advantage.

Funny, but in all of my years of being involved with marine navigation, I've never heard someone say, "that display manipulation is too fast". Instead, the frustrations have usually been that the updating is too slow. No one would ever say that of TZ. Of course, you have to be using the same current version that I'm using and that Defender is selling. I have a feeling the actual software being compared here is different.

I've shown the software to a bunch of people at the marina we're at. All of them agreed that it represents a new level of user-interface and capability. People can try to make excuses about how the new capabilities aren't really needed - until they try them for real. Then they'll realize that it's a whole new ballgame. And after all, isn't that what we expect from software developers? Shouldn't we want them experimenting and coming up with ways to make our use better? It's human nature to defend what you've previously purchased. I understand that. There's nothing wrong with continuing to use an older product. I do that myself in many ways. But I'd rather look at new ideas and be able to evaluate them honestly instead of just shooting them down because I don't have them. That's just silly.

- AugustH - December 6, 2009

I would like to see it up and running, maybe at the Seattle Boat Show coming up next month. It sounds from your description to be very nice. Trouble is, $350 for the software + $140 for Windows 7 is steep for just doing charting, when I already have MacENC and GPSNavX. And then there's the inevitable support question "what PC are you running? Oh we don't support Macs" issue that will come up eventually. Do you have MaxSea running on Bootcamp or Parallels?