Course up for me. Not sure why but if I see something outside visually it helps me relate to it on the screen easier.
We don't have a fixed thermal camera. Use the heck out of our night vision monocular though. Kind of fun tracking rain pours on the radar. There was once that our radar was able to pick out a boat hidden in the rain. The equipment paid for itself that day.
I hope you do not mind; We kinda got off track from your original post question. I hope your question was answered. I did pick up a lil something.
All those nice gadgets in the wheelhouse or even in the cockpit of an aircraft are usefull and add to traffic safety. But not without reason, the good old wiskey compass is still built in by any responsible builder. The GPS signal can be lost or the satellites are signal relocated by the authorities, the laser IN box and the gyro compass can fail due to electrical power interuption or the the complete AC and DC electric on Your boat can go "TU". I would never waive this last chance of navigation. It is inaccurate, has due to its principle many inherent limitations but it is still better than nothing ! Just my 2 (Euro) cents
I prefer course up. And I like radar overlay. If I’m in heavy fog or conditions where radar is really being used, I like to put plotter only on one screen, plotter with overlay on another and then radar only on the third screen.
Well, I think the discussion has been good. From what I understand the Sat Compass has 4 antenna's and it basically measures the phase difference between them to give you the accurate heading even when not moving. Also it gives you pitch and roll which probably clears up your sonar and radar (trails). I want to know if people find that so in practice or its just not an issue. From what I'm hearing on this forum, people haven't messed around with it enough to know if there are any advantages over a fluxgate (other than the magnetic interference that can happen) OR at the end of the day Sat Compasses are all marketing hype.