Auto Chart, Auto Chart Pro & Auto Chart Live Information Resource

Look I have been fighting this thing for a week now. There have been several guys give some suggestions but no one has been beating down the door to help me. If my post offend you don't read them. I would love real help from anyone. I followed the directions you gave me in this post and there is no green box. What now? Calling hummingbird is out because they told me not to record to a SD card. If I did I had to change the settings for it to work. Yes, I am very frustrated with this thing.

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Originally Posted by CamoHunter

DUDE! Enough with your profanities! I read your customer service post as well. Seriously, it's okay to be frustrated, but let's grow up a little shall we? You have several guys here willing to take time out of their day to try to help you. But I'm done if that's the kind of attitude I'm going to get to experience with trying to help you out.

Now, can we move on??

Part of me suspects that the size of the box you're using is small, and you're only updating a very small portion of your lakemaster map, and thus not able to see it when you put your sd card into your unit.

Here's what I want you to try.

1. Open up the program.
2. First, go to Tools --> Settings --> General --> Now, under Map Generation, adjust the Internal Map size to 7000 x 7000 m, and click "OK".
3. You'll get a pop up that says "You must restart AutoChart for a change in map size to have effect." Click on "OK".
4. Close the program.

1. Open AutoChart again.
2. Click on File --> New.
3. On the map, is there a green box enclosing the area where you made your sonar recording? If there is, right-click on that box, and click "Map Here".
4. It should now display a red box, and a number of data points inside that red box where you made your sonar recording.
5. Your next step, is to click on the icon at the top of the program that says "Create Map".
6. Your map should now display depth contour lines with an area of colors displayed between the contours. (Mine are Yellow to Red in color)
7. Now, click on the "Lakemaster Update" icon. You'll see a popup that says "adding new content to your custom LakeMaster map".
8. Then you'll see another popup that says "Your LakeMaster SD card was successfully updated with new chart data. Would you like to change background map display to the custom LakeMaster Map?"
9. Click on "OK".
10. Now, before moving or panning around the map anywhere, adjust the transparency slider bar at the left side of the screen. As you adjust the transparency, you should be able to see the Red/Yellow depth map go away, and see the underlying lakemaster contours that were created. If you don't see those, something happened and your lakemaster sd card was not updated properly.

Depending on the size of your sonar recording, that may cover all of it, or it may have just updated a small portion of it. Lets just worry about these steps so far, and proceed further if we can get that part figured out.

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Here is a copy of the sonar track prior to conversion,
https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a.akamaihd.n...05623542_o.jpg

Here is the map created from the sonar recording.
https://fbcdn-sphotos-b-a.akamaihd.n...97666597_o.jpg

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Originally Posted by K-DAWG

...but no one has been beating down the door to help me. If my post offend you don't read them...

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Sorry, I wasn't aware I was supposed to check this forum every single day of my life, just looking for someone who wants me to beat down the door to help them.

Your posts don't offend me, I'd just be much more willing to help someone who shows appreciation for those going out of their way to try to help them.

If you don't want me to read them anymore, or offer any more help... well, you might just lose your best resource on here for Autochart. That's your loss, not mine. I'll go help someone else and ignore your posts.

There are not that many people who own Autochart, and there are even less who have enough of an understanding of the program to be able to troubleshoot problems and explain steps to you.

Hope you got my emails with all my screenshots. I spent the last couple hours trying to give you those guides and instructions.

Here's the latest on this.

I had K-DAWG send me his R00014.acd file. I was able to open it, create a map, and update the lakemaster sd card. I put it into my 788ci HD unit, and got the map to show up.

However, here's the thing that I think we were missing.
You have to open "Menu" on the depth finder, go to the "Chart" tab, and go down and change the "Base Layer" from "Default" to "AC" for the custom map data to appear. My initial guess, is that the base layer menu setting was possibly the one thing that K-DAWG was missing.

Hopefully that was it, but we'll see. I'll keep helping him until we get it figured out!

Camo hunter is the freakin man! I went outside put the card in the unit. Went to the chart menu changed the settings from default to AC. Now the map I created shows up. The problem I am assuming the whole time was the unit not auto chart. Dude you should apply for a job with hummingbird. You certainly know more about it than them. Thank you very much. Maybe they should sticky this to the top of the page just I case someone else has this problem. I am not sorry for my comments about auto chart. It should not have been this hard to figure out something that simple. I want to thank everyone who offered help.

Awesome. For some reason I kept thinking it wasn't letting you hit the update lakemaster button or wasn't working. Glad it's going for you now.

GREAT work K-DAWG! You persevered! Glad you got it to work! I do sympathize with you about the steep learning curve for the program though, and don't blame you one bit for your comments about the program. It is a great program once you learn it though, with lots of potential. It is just complicated to pick up though in the beginning. I have spent way more time than I should have had to, to try to learn this program inside and out! I've got a pretty good handle on it now though, so I've tried to help others with the issues they face with learning it.

One reason I had forgot about the adjustment in the depthfinder menu, was that I hadn't updated the software on my units yet, and was still using the workaround method from a year ago (the one Humminbird put out so that you could use autochart with older units without autochart software update). When I updated the software on my 788ci HD and didn't see his map show up, I too was baffled for a minute. But quickly remembered the baselayer and overlay map information that was mentioned in the zerolines sd card manual.
I'll attach that manual to this post.

Now, part of the reason the program is fairly complicated, is that Humminbird didn't really design the program. It was actually Dr. Depth before Humminbird acquired it. Dr. Depth did most all of the program design and computer programming years ago, and got it to a point that enough people were wanting it, Humminbird must have felt it was worth enough for them to purchase the rights to the software and programming. However, I feel they sort of dropped the ball with not providing better support, better manuals, training customer service, and cleaning up the program before releasing it to the public. They tried to rush the process and release this before they were ready, in my opinion.

Here's a link to the manual for the zerolines sd card. It provides information on changing menu setting on your depthfinder unit. It's 9MB, so it works best to just right-click it, and save it on your computer.
http://www.humminbird.com/WorkArea/D...t.aspx?id=5728

Thanks CamoHunter for following through and getting K-Dawg up and going. I purchased AutoChart Pro just before I started following this thread, and I was starting to get a little buyers regret, $250 is a fair amount of cash for something that isn't as easy as 1,2,3, as advertised. Now I can rest easier until spring when I can get out and do some recordings, and put the program to the test.

Well as I said before. I loved the idea of this because there are no topo maps of the rivers here. I'm excided about this once again. Good bunch of guys here thanks.

Thanks for letting us know. I assumed you had done that but I guess assumptions sometimes can be overlooked. ONIX system does not require that feature but I do remember reading on the CORE products you needed to do that sequence to enable Auto Chart Maps to appear. Best thing is you got it working and even better that you let us know. I guarantee your experience will pay it forward to help someone else. Thanks for sharing your concerns and the resolution to get it resolved.

Now share some of those awesome maps with us you will be creating.

:bows::thumb up2:

I'm mostly a walleye fisherman, and really haven't devoted any extra time to mapping these areas. All I've done, is just fish the areas over a number of days and saved those track files over time, and imported them into AutoChart. You can see how it maps the areas that we've fished repeatedly, and our boat paths to and from different spots. Eventually I'll fill in those areas as I alter my route to and from those spots each time. But those aren't really necessary. As long as I get the spots that we fish most often mapped, the rest is gravy.

http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/...psd123ca43.png

http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/...ps9d34e406.png

http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/...ps6e4d8824.png

http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/...ps9ce6b9cd.png

http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/...ps325b124f.png

http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/...psb0bc3dad.png

http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/...psaa4c3605.png

http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/...ps39f71192.png

http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/...psaf6a1b5b.png

http://i1258.photobucket.com/albums/...ps10865e2f.png

Also, let me debunk a myth right now. You do not have to record onto the zerolines sd card, or do anything else special. Many of the data imports you see above, are track files and sonar recordings from 2012 and 2013, that I had saved before AutoCharts was even released. I saved them onto my computer, and imported them into Autocharts when it came out in April 2014.
Just to clear up that misconception.

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Originally Posted by K-DAWG

I just got off of the phone with hummingbird. They told me that they didn't intend for people to save sonar recordings to a separate SD card. That when you do that you have to copy the dat files from the SD card and paste them into your AC folder on the zeroline card. If you don't do that the zero line card will never see the map you uploaded. Can anyone tell me how to do that? Sounds like BS to me. Is anyone else having to do this when recording to a separate SD card?

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I think what they meant to tell you, was that they didn't intend for people to save their custom lakemaster MAPS to their computer. (Like I mentioned that I do, so I don't have to have the zerolines sd card in my computer when making maps) (I work off a 'local copy' as it was detailed on page 6 of the "Getting Started" autochart manual.)
Since my maps are saved to my computer, indeed, I do have to copy the AC folder from my computer onto the zerolines sd card when I'm finished.
But that is totally different from the .dat & .son sonar recordings files, and the .ht track files. Those can be saved to whatever sd card you choose that will work in your humminbird unit, then saved on your computer when you take the sd card home. Then import those files into Autochart from your computer.

K-DAWG, you're right though. I do feel like I know the AutoChart program way better than the majority of the customer service reps at Humminbird.

:thumb up2: Interesting to see where you have been concentrating your fishing and what the structure looks like.

Now all we need are some GPS co-ordinates. :smile:

Those are some great examples of what AutoChart is about. You can build high detailed LakeMaster Style Mapping....those contour styles looks alot like what the LakeMaster Survey Teams do. Cool part you can see where you need to add data each time you go fishing if you want more coverage in those areas. Excellent examples what AutoChart can do you anglers and best part it gives you an advantage over other anglers because they will not have the same mapping as you if they don't invest the same time into mapping. Kind of lets you keeps some of those secret honey holes to yourself

Doug, you should make a Camohunter Auto Chart Thread and just let him go wild with the instructions/pictorials he has been sending me. I have got quit the education through just a few emails with him. Yes, Camohunter you were right again by the way from the last email you sent me.

I guess the silver lining to my crying about Auto Chart was a whole bunch of new info on how to use it got post here......................lol

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Originally Posted by K-DAWG

I guess the silver lining to my crying about Auto Chart was a whole bunch of new info on how to use it got post here......................lol

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That's the great thing about these forums.....solving 1 person's problems almost always help other also.:salute:

K-DAWG, I'm glad they helped you out! And I do have full intentions on creating and posting some step by step tutorials for everyone to be able to see and use. I just have to put them together and post them. Hopefully by the end of next week I can have a bunch ready to post. I'm going ice fishing out of town this weekend though, so won't be around to work on getting anything posted this weekend.

Bob B, here's the GPS coordinates :laugh: -21.805245, -49.090024