Aeris A300 CS (now the Oceanic VTX)

[Greg Evancio]

Hello!

Great website & group! I particularly liked Linus' comments on dive computers, about the Eon Steel from Suunto. That little beauty is on my Xmas list for next year.

I see that he hasn't yet tried the Oceanic VTX. I owed an Aeris A300CS (same computer), and had terrible luck with it. I took it down to Belize for a liveaboard trip, and right from the start things started going wrong with it. I turned it on  while in flight, to run through the manual with it, and sure enough it thought I was starting a dive. Upon landing it showed me at 8ft depth, just like Linus' experience with the Uemis Zurich. Luckily the VTX has a user replaceable battery, so I just pulled the battery & it reset itself. Next, the air integrated transmitter on the tank failed. It also has user replaceable batteries, but replacing them didn't work. I wound up using my spare SPG. Then I found that the screen contrast in daylight safety stops was awful, & I could barely read the sceen near the surface. The surface stop countdown timer is in royal blue numbers, not great at all for contrast. At night it was great, but not in sunlight. Increasing the screen contrast drained the battery faster. I went through 2 batteries on that 10 day trip, which I think is totally unacceptable for a dive computer. Finally, the alternate data screen, which showed the date, time, elapsed dive time, maximum depth, and some other data, was in text so small that for a guy like me with older eyes, it was really hard to focus on it.

Sounds like a lot of complaints, but for the price I paid I expected a lot more. Luckily I was able to dump it at the store where I bought it, and got an Oceanic VT 4.0 as a replacement.

On the plus side, underwater the colour screen is good, although you can't customize it like you can the Eon Steel. At night it was great, very clear.

I have a review on this computer on Amazon.ca. I also posted on on Aeris' site, but I don't think they liked it, so it has disappeared.

Anyone have experience with the Shearwater computers?

Take care!

[Dirk Hohndel]

On Fri, Nov 21, 2014 at 03:09:02PM -0800, Greg Evancio wrote:
> I see that he hasn't yet tried the Oceanic VTX. I owed an Aeris A300CS
> (same computer), and had terrible luck with it.

Well, he owns an Aeris A300CS (I'm not sure if he reads the list, so I'm
answering for him) - but on the last trip I was diving it...

> I took it down to Belize
> for a liveaboard trip, and right from the start things started going wrong
> with it. I turned it on while in flight, to run through the manual with
> it, and sure enough it thought I was starting a dive. Upon landing it
> showed me at 8ft depth, just like Linus' experience with the Uemis Zurich.
> Luckily the VTX has a user replaceable battery, so I just pulled the
> battery & it reset itself. Next, the air integrated transmitter on the tank
> failed. It also has user replaceable batteries, but replacing them didn't
> work. I wound up using my spare SPG. Then I found that the screen contrast
> in daylight safety stops was awful, & I could barely read the sceen near
> the surface.

Yeah, I found that challenging as well when it was sunny. Other active
displays do better there.

> The surface stop countdown timer is in royal blue numbers, not
> great at all for contrast. At night it was great, but not in sunlight.
> Increasing the screen contrast drained the battery faster. I went through 2
> batteries on that 10 day trip, which I think is totally unacceptable for a
> dive computer.

Again, that matches my experience. 2 batteries for 21 dives. Yikes.

> Finally, the alternate data screen, which showed the date,
> time, elapsed dive time, maximum depth, and some other data, was in text so
> small that for a guy like me with older eyes, it was really hard to focus
> on it.

That's pretty much my biggest complaint about it - worse then the contrast
or battery issues. There are several data fields that are only shown on
the alternative data screen and that one is a real strain for me to read
during a dive.

> Sounds like a lot of complaints, but for the price I paid I expected a lot
> more. Luckily I was able to dump it at the store where I bought it, and got
> an Oceanic VT 4.0 as a replacement.

Interesting. I haven't played with the VT 4.0. What did you like better
about it? And how good is Subsurface support for it? :-)

> Anyone have experience with the Shearwater computers?

I have a Petrel (full disclosure: provided to me by Shearwater) and really
like it. Great screen, great divecomputer. No air integration which means
it fails a required test to be my main dive computer, but other than that
I'm quite happy with it. And of course as a company they actively support
libdivecomputer and Subsurface - they even did a firmware change based on
a request from us at one point. Very nice to work with.

/D

[Greg Evancio]

Hi Dirk!

Glad to hear I wasn't the only one who had trouble reading this screen on the Aeris. . I loved the idea  of this computer, but the reality wasn't so hot. The battery issue was a real downer too.

I have yet to use my Oceanic in the water. I have a buddy from my liveaboard trip, who used it. I'll ask about software support for it. He's the reason why I went for the 4.0. And thanks for the info on the Shearwater. It looks like a great computer, even without the air integration.

I'm betting that they don't offer support for Macs. And of course that's what is sitting on my desktop. Will have to check that out.

Take care!
Greg