I've only used fish finders in lake michigan before, they make pretty pictures, and we could watch the down riggers as we dropped them down, but not sure they ever helped us catch fish.
Then again this was 20 years ago and we had some of the first non-paper fish finders (boy the fumes from those paper ones could make me sick in a confined cabin).
What I'm really looking for in this case is just bottom mapping sonar.
I want to know where the holes and channels are, I'm not expecting to use the thing to find the fish as much as bottom contours and structure.
So it sounds like my expectations are reasonable.
I will look into the side scan, but I'm not sure about pricing and we have to remember it is going on a $500 boat, so I shouldn't get too carried away.
Thanks for the info.
Matt
