sounder/fish finder

hello lads just wondering what type of fish finder are ye using? was thinking of getting a garmin 551s but might be better off with a good fish finder and a cheaper gps? be getting used on sea and the corrib all advise welcome

You cant go wrong with a Garmin 551s, it has the larger screen than the 451(s) and comes with Ireland and UK mapping. I believe it also includes the Shannon waterways now and for the Corrib you can pick up this chart online for around €25.
For the sounder (fishfinder) to work with the 551s, you will also need a transducer of which there are three versions available, the most popular being the transom mount.
If you have a look a http://www.marinewebstoreireland.com they have all the Garmin range and when I checked this evening, they had an offer on the 551s model also.
If you wanted to purchase separate units, again Marine Web Store have a large range of the Garmin units and now also seem to have the Humminbird units some of which include the Down Imaging and Side Imaging which would be great on the Corrib. And for a GPS unit, theres the Garmin 152H, this is a basic GPS with no mapping, but does the job.

Good with your your choice.

cheers colm, im leaning towards the 551s its not bad value from marineweb at that money. a friend just got a garmin 550c echo, going to wait and have a look at that when we get a bit of calm sea here. is the sounder on the 551s fairly decent?

Hi Conor o , how did you get on with the comparison ?
I am also in need of combo plotter/fishfinder and the Garmin 551 appears to be the favourite but it is a bit over budget . I don't need a lot of bells and whistles , just the basic functions -- decent inshore map for the Sligo bay area , tracker to show where I've been , facility to save marks , decent definition and zoom in/out on finder . Nothing much more fancy than that .
As far as I can see Eagle / Lowrance equivalents are priced similarly to the 551 but don't have such a good backup service over here . I have no experience of other brands .
Any feedback would be appreciated as I need to get out on the water asap !
Cheers .

Hi again ,
I hope you don't mind me bumping this .
Does anyone have any practical experience of the 551s combi ? The supplier tells me it is a very popular model so it seems strange that no-one has anything to say about it .
Good or bad points ? Any comments would be appreciated . Cheers .

Hi I have a 551s as backup to my raymarine and now I find that i use the 551s more as it is easier to use and the preloade charts are great. I say go and get 1 u wont be disapointed

I would always be happier with 2 seperate units rather than 1.
The Echo 550 is nothing short of stunning!

Many thanks for the replies lads , much appreciated . I can imagine that an Echo with separate plotter would give stunning results but the 551s combo appears to be a bit cheaper while doing everything I need so I'll go with that . It is a comfort that there were no negative comments .
ATB