[fish2live]

I'm wondering if anyone else has has a BU-303 or BU-353 GPS unit go bad on them. I used a BU303 heavily last year and started getting all sorts of strange scrambled problems in MacENC. I borrowed a BU353 to get home from Dutch Harbor and the problems disappeared, strongly suggesting a bad GPS unit. This year I have a brand new BU353 and I've had odd problems on several occasions. The first time the electronics showed me ripping around in a large oval across the south Bering sea at 33 knots. Lately I have twice had to disconnect (preferences: disconnect on window close check box) and reconnect after losing any GPS feed. Both times reconnecting the GPS immediately restored normal operation.

I have several more GPS units that I could use, but that little unit is the fastest and lowest power-consuming unit on the boat. I'm starting to wonder it it is worth it to keep buying them if they really have such short life spans, or if there is some odd hidden problem in software or hardware. Has anyone else seen this problem?

[GPSNavX]

The only issue I have seen with the BU-353 or for that matter any of the SiRF Star GPS receivers is when absolutely stationary they will some times report an erroneous SOG and/or COG, but once I move even 10' the unit corrects itself. Certainly closing the GPS panel and reopening it resets the GPS.