New AIS

[Flod]

I am getting tired of my Navico nais 300. I don’t have a cable or a software to configure it and it sometimes behaves weird. I have been looking to buy something new. My priorities would be:

1. Easy replacement. Preferably plug & play. Remove the navico and plug in the new unit. I have power, vhf and nmea2000.
2. Easy config preferably via app on the phone
3. Compatible with lowrance, raymarine plotters instruments vhf and autopilots

Been looking at the Vesper Marine XB-8000 AIS . Is it the way to go? I see all the fancy stuff but I doubt that I’ll sit on the phone looking at COG when out sailing. I do like the anchor watch thing. Now I use iPhone apps that drain my phone battery. Can the vesper notify me over internet remote to my phone? That would be awesome

Any other devices I should look for?

[dlentz]

I have 2 Vesper products, an Xb8000 and a SP160 splitter. The splitter died a year or two out of warranty and I had to open it up and fix myself. Now the XB has no wifi or connectivity on the USB, I can't control it at all. Out of warranty also, Vesper solution? Buy new or send to New Zealand for charged repair and shipping.

Just saying.....2 products-2 issues.
Dwain

[Paul L]

If you are buying new you should look at newer 5watt SOTDMA units, instead of older 2 watt ones.

[Flod]

Thanks for the replies. Sounds bad with 2 out 2 units broken

[udyy]

I have a xb8000 over 4 years with antenna splitter and all works flawlessly. The wifi AP and n2k are great. The after sales support was great.

[Flod]

Originally Posted by udyy

I have a xb8000 over 4 years with antenna splitter and all works flawlessly. The wifi AP and n2k are great. The after sales support was great.

Is the anchor alarm working remote via internet? How do you use the WiFi AP? Do you connect it to a 4G router or something to get it online?

[udyy]

The xb serves either as a host to its own LAN or connects to the ship local lan via wifi. If your ship Network is connected to the internet you can creat a vpn and see the alerts. I do not think that the xb have native capability of connecting via WAN but i have never tested it.

[skipmac]

I have a Vesper and love it. Connected it to my N2K network and it immediately sent data to the Garmin plotter, so completely plug and play.

[AedanC]

I’ve had an XB6000 with the Vesper splitter for five years without any issues, and l have also installed an XB8000 on a friends boat, also without issue. Sorry to hear you had those problems.

[sailjumanji]

Have installed Vesper XB 8000 and their SP 160 splitter on my last two cats. Am sitting on anchor now with their Watchmate app on for anchor watch. Absolutely happy with their products. Wouldn't use anybody else. And read reviews because there are a lot of crap other systems out there.

[Snore]

I have had the XB with WiFi and a Vesper splitter on my boat for 6-7 years. Works fine. I have also recommended them to several owners and they have not called me screaming.

I am nit a fan of their new all-in-one device, but the XB is good.


Not sold on the need for the 5 watt ones. Sailboats are not fast, so the 2-watt range seems to work

[d8v1dl]

I have the Vesper Watchmate mounted in my companionway. The internal GPS antenna works fine and the unit is out of the weather. Mounted a dedicated VHF antenna on the pushpit rail. It did a great job in New York Harbor and an even better job alerting me to the tugs and tows along the Jersey coast. My one complaint: Too many options and too much scrolling. But that just takes a few hours of figuring out what you want from it. Once you do that it will tell you as much or as little as you want to know. The app is pretty much full featured and works fine on an Android.

What I like best is that it is fully independent of everything else. All it needs is 12 volts and a reasonably clear view of the sky. If everything else fails, I still have the compass and charts to figure out where I am and the Vesper to tell me if I am about to get run down.

[sv_pelagia]

We have an older Vesper Watchmate 850 (since 2013). Love it.

However, we found we needed to add the external GPS antenna, after one night in Mexico when wind switched to unprotected side (welcome to cruising in Mexico) and our pitching in the seas caused AIS to keep losing GPS and thus our anchor alarm kept going off. Lost a lot of sleep that night! Addition of Vesper's external GPS solved that problem -- never lost signal again.

[seahaul]

I bought a new Vesper Cortex. Expenisve, but now that weve had it a month its worht every penny! The ancor watch is a gamer changer, its that good. Also the hand sets are pretty amazing as they show a tonne of information.