MaxSEA v2 Upgrade - Anyone using it yet?

[Evenstar]

"The frontiers are littered with pioneers with arrows up their *****" - The Ugly Yachtsman

I've never been a fan of adopting a major piece of critical software before the first set of patches/maintenance release comes out.

Maxsea is mentioning, very subtly it seams, that they have come out with "V2" of the Timezero Navigator and Explorer products. It seems the only way to get it is to purchase it directly from MaxSea. The upgrade from 1.9.8 isn't expensive - 99 Euros (versus the $1,000+ purchase cost of 1.9.x) - and seems to have some nice features.

But I can't find anything about it. No product reviews, comments or complaints. Nothing much at all. You'd figure a major number release would be accompanied by some sort of fanfare and hoopla. I stumbled across this upgrade while looking for charts and had to e-mail the sales department in France.

There is a v2 product features video on Youtube. It is a year old, and doesn't really highlight new features much unless you are an experienced MaxSea user and can see "hey, that looks new."

So I am hoping to hear from someone that also stumbled across this well kept secret and installed the software.

[ranger58sb]

I'm running MaxSea v2.0.2 as of 6/24/2013. Given the time lapse, I don't really remember what features were new or upgraded. It works.


I also don't remember how I knew about it, but I'm on their mailing list so I probably got a notice about it from them at the time...

-Chris

[Evenstar]

Originally Posted by ranger42c

I'm running MaxSea v2.0.2 as of 6/24/2013. Given the time lapse, I don't really remember what features were new or upgraded. It works.


I also don't remember how I knew about it, but I'm on their mailing list so I probably got a notice about it from them at the time...

-Chris

Its been around that long? Geez, talk about a stealth marketing campaign.

Since it is 2.0.2 that is encouraging as they've squashed a few bugs!

How is it stability wise? Any problems?

[ranger58sb]

No stability issues that I'm aware of. That said, I'm not a power user for this particular package. I use it for home planning on a desktop, and also for planning and as a laptop back-up on the boat... but we have three other plotting systems ahead of it on the boat, so seldom have to stress it. OTOH, some of the planning features carry over to our primary (Furuno NN3D MFD) via sneaker net, and no problems with that, either.


-Chris

[Evenstar]

Originally Posted by ranger42c

No stability issues that I'm aware of. That said, I'm not a power user for this particular package. I use it for home planning on a desktop, and also for planning and as a laptop back-up on the boat... but we have three other plotting systems ahead of it on the, so seldom have to stress it. OTOH, some of the planning features carry over to our primary (Furuno NN3D MFD) via sneaker net, and no problems with that, either.


-Chris

Thanks. We've sailed from New England to New Zealand with MaxSea 1.98 as our primary nav software, talking to our Furuno chartplotters etc. so we've had it up running 16 days straight 24x7 a couple of times.

We've seen it choke and die occasionally, which is a nuisance unless it pukes so hard you have to remove it in and reinstall it and call Nobeltec for a new activation code...which is inconvenient if it were to happen off shore.

But so far that has not happened during passages.

I'm comforted that there have been two maintenance releases.

[CdS2 Roland]

Hello,
I bought the and installed Maxsea TimeZero 1.9... on my "old computer" working under Vista. I recieved the 2.0.., but this new version was no more working with Vista. Needed to change for Windows 7...

[Littlechay]

2.04 is the current release version I think, at least that is what I have and I think that it is the latest (it was last time I checked earlier this month).

Running it on windows 7, none of the choke issues reported by the OP. I run it on an N2k network via an Actisense NGT N2k to usb gateway. I have also set it up to output to autopilot via and Actisense NGW but don't use it like that.

I have the weather routing module also but am not sure that was worth the dosh but it seems that when you buy now you get a complimentary module.

I like it, it works very well as a navigation tool for both planning and whilst underway, is very stable.

I have found their support to be quite good when I did have an issue (I screwed around with something in MS framework by applying an update out of sequence or something ) and another time a hardware change on the nav computer changed the hardware fingerprint and I had to request another which was supplied without quibble.

I don't like the way that Maxsea and all the other top end companies make it difficult to get at data that 'you' have recorded. For example a track export from Maxsea drops off depth information so that you can use an exported track to generate your own bathymetry - this is obviously to protect their own PBG (personal bathymetry generation) module. However I just log all NMEA data using GPSGate and can do my own thing with the data.

Depending on where you live, and sail, OpenCPN can now give you almost the same functionality (more in some areas) for free and if your's in the US of NZ, for example, you have free charts too. For the rest of the world the S63 plugin allows the use of the latest vector charts from Chartworld. I think that when my large investment in Jeppersen charts for MaxSea get too old to use of I sail outside of their coverage area I'll just buy S63 charts for OpenCPN. OpenCPN is not as stable as MaxSea, and in my experience and others that I know who have used it for cruising, it gets slow and unstable with large tracks and large numbers of waypoints but the developers are aware and are working on this aspect which seems to have improved in the latest version of O v4.0.

Chris