Humminbird Side Imaging Forums

General => General Discussion => Topic started by: Blackwaterkatz on April 05, 2009, 12:42:25 AM

Title: Ping Rate?
Post by: Blackwaterkatz on April 05, 2009, 12:42:25 AM

Can someone explain just how ping rate affects recording?  I don't know what the default rate is, so if I wanted to change it, I don't know what to select.  Thanks.

Title: Re: Ping Rate?
Post by: RGecy on April 06, 2009, 09:07:25 AM

Sorry for the long delay in getting back with you.  I was at the Treasure Expo over in Myrtle Beach and had my hands full.

The ping rate is only changeable in snapshotview and recording view.  Now the explanation is a little complicated but the final answer is not.  The ping rate is the amount of time the system will listen for sonar returns.  Sound travels through salt water at around 1500m/s and through and in fresh water at around 1497m/s.  Now there are many veriables to those numbers, salinity, depth, and temperature.  If the range setting in short say 50' the ping rate will be faster than at a setting of 200'.

This can be usefull in cutting down recording size, but with larger cards available I think its a mute point.

If you set the ping rate manually, the system may be not be listening long enough for the ping and the data may be incomplete in the recording. It will cause the ping data length (number of bytes recorded in each ping) to vary and you will end up with jagged edges on the image during playback.

Now, what is the optimum ping rate for the range setting.  Hmmmm! The answer is, AUTO.

Good Luck,

Robert
 

Title: Re: Ping Rate?
Post by: Blackwaterkatz on April 06, 2009, 08:48:03 PM

Thanks for the reply, Robert.  I won't worry about that setting any more. 

Title: Re: Ping Rate?
Post by: RGecy on April 13, 2009, 01:25:38 AM

Just a little note on Ping Rate.  I was on the water today and decided to check the ping rate while recording at an SI range of 100' in about 20' of water.

I manually set the ping rate to 10, the highest manual setting.  Basically, this is 10 pings per second and has ping rate of 100ms per ping.

Next, I set the pings per second back to auto and was surprised to find that the Ping Rate jumped dramatically to over 20 pings per second at 48ms per ping.

So this is just another example of why you would leave it on Auto. 

Robert

Title: Re: Ping Rate?
Post by: Blackwaterkatz on April 13, 2009, 06:12:57 PM

Great info, sir.  Thanks a ton.  I haven't bothered with mine, and don't intend to.