December 3, 2009 13:36
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/200...r-rankings)
BTW MaxSea was originally published on the Mac and called "MacSea", but that was long before OS X.
Just my 2 Cents :-)
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/200...r-rankings)
BTW MaxSea was originally published on the Mac and called "MacSea", but that was long before OS X.
Just my 2 Cents :-)