Which dive computer?

[Agro]

I am diving a Liberty Sidemount Rebreather, it has two Divesoft Freedom computers, so far so good. As backup I am using a Shearwater Petrel, so far so good.

I can not take the Divesoft Freedom away from the Rebreather, it is fixed. When diving OC I only have the Petrel, so I need a backup. Instead of buying a second Petrel I am thinking of selling the Petrel and buying 2 new Divesoft Freedom computers. So I always have the same computer, no matter if CC or OC or backup. I have the same menu, I have the same calculation.

When diving CC I have no choise, I must use the rebreather's Divesoft Freedom. When diving OC a have the full choice to dive any computer. So I wonder if Divesoft Freedom is best I can get. It is a few years old and it seems it did not change since then. Is there anything missing which other dive computers have? I am not sure but I did not find a compass in the Divesoft Freedom. Can this be? No compass in a 2023 dive computer?

Anything else missing?

Thank for your help.

 

[tbone1004]

I have 2 Freedoms and have been using them for about 4 years now and sold my Shearwaters at that time, so this is all coming from a guy who is only diving Freedoms. I primarily chose the Freedom for my rebreather because it is a sidemount mccr and the Freedom has the ability to manually eliminate a cell instead of relying on voting logic and also has haptic feedback which is clutch for sidemount IMO. Shearwater has now come to the table with haptics so that narrows that gap considerably.

Shearwater has the following advantages IMO.
Bluetooth-no custom USB cables to deal with for either charging or data transfer. This is by far my biggest complaint, if they had Qi charging and bluetooth I would not even be considering changing.
Compass-nice to have, but I've not found them useful for precision navigating, great for getting your general sense of direction if I need to know cardinal directions but if I need to navigate to 098 and stay within a degree then I'm using a slate.
Air Integration-nice to have, especially on CCR.

The disadvantage is you are having two distinct user interfaces for gas switches and what not but you're already used to that. Freedom is also from Europe which means any support you may need is potentially a bit easier, but Shearwater has a pretty strong presence over there.

 

[Agro]

That's a pitty, no compass on the Freedom. No good at all.
No bluetooth: I don't care.
The Freedom's haptic alarm is great, I like it very, very much on my Liberty.

I am not sure if I understand you right: Shearwater now has a haptic alarm?
What is a wireless AI? Wireless alarm?

 

[tridacna]

What is a wireless AI? Wireless alarm?

Air Integration. Ability to see your tank pressure wirelessly.

 

[Agro]

Ah AI= air integration. I don't need this.
Does Shearwater now have a haptic alarm?

 

[Gandalf-the-Diver]

The new Perdix 2, has a haptic alarm. Shearwater used one 1st, in the Peregrine. Works great through my drysuit. My peregrine that is. If you are not doing OC TriMix, maybe just look at a Peregrine for a backup.

 

[tridacna]

Does Shearwater now have a haptic alarm?

It does. It's not new either. Been around for a while.

 

[Agro]

Oh t-bone, first I did not get your full message, only part of it.

Air intergration: My Liberty Divesoft just gets an upgrade. After this I will have a wireless AI but a special one. It will send the pressure to a receiver which is inside the CCR. The CCR's electronic is working with this information, for e.x. it will warn you if you start diving with zero bar or if you have a fast loss of pressure (cylinder closed or loss of gas?). So the gas pressure is not sent to the wrist unit directly but to the rebreather's elctronics and from there goes to the wrist unit - by cable. I do not understand at all why Divesoft uses a wireless AI for that. They could use a HP hose going from first stage to the CCR's electronics. But anyway I like the idea of having an electronic which is looking at my dil and ox pressure. And I like to have the pressure gauge on my wrist unit when diving CC, not when diving OC. Apart from that I do not need any AI. Especially when diving OC I don't want a bulky sender on my first stage. So having no AI on my OC dive computer is not a disadvantage.

So Freedom has a custom charging cable? How does it work? Going from Freedom's Fischer connector to USB?

What is Qi charging?

 

[tbone1004]

@Agro

Divesoft would have chosen to use standard AI transmitters that are used by Shearwater and others because they can easily add a receiver module to the head. If they used HP hoses going directly to the head it would have made the unit less modular, particularly for the backmount units but would have also required a complete redesign of the head to allow the HP ports to communicate directly. Using AI is actually a much more robust system despite needing the transmitters. Putting the receiver in the head allowed them to maintain the insanely small size of the Freedom by not having to add the chips and antennas to the board of the handset as well as a complete redesign of the computer.
Having the bulky senders on the first stage instead of a HP hose with gauge is very advantageous in sidemount, marginally so for backmount, but definitely very nice for sidemount.

Divesoft does not use a Fischer connector, nor should anyone but they are still used. They use a custom 4-pin cable that screws into the data port of the computer. This is some electronic witchcraft as it allows 1,2,3,ground for CCR monitoring, data transfer using USB, and charging through the same 4-pins which is crazy and nifty, but the cable is proprietary and is required to download dive logs and charge the computer itself which is somewhat irritating.

Qi charging is the standard in wireless charging that your smart phone uses as well as the Shearwater Teric/Peregrine and pretty much everything else that uses wireless charging. I have no problem with the Freedom having a rechargeable battery, but I do take issue with them not including bluetooth for downloading dive logs and requiring a proprietary cable for charging. Basically if you travel and that USB cable fails you are 100% completely f*cked unless you have really good soldering skills.

 

[Agro]

Sorry, I guess I confused the connectors. My old Shearwater has a Fischer connector which I do not like at all, they often fail.

What about the actual Shearwter computers? They do not use a Fischer anymore? How do they get the information from cells?

The Freedom has an other connector, right?