About six months ago, I started reading some posts and reviews about the Liquivision X1 computer. It seemed like a VERY cool gadget -- What immediately struck me about it was that it has an OLED display, which, for the electronics untutored like me, means it glows without being lit by anything. This means no more fumbling around in the dark to try to figure out how to angle your light to read your display; no more trying to remember which button activates the backlight, and no tying up two hands EVER to read your gauges in the dark.
There are some other cool things about it, like you can load it with two different kinds of decompression software, but that didn't really intrigue me, because I use my computer in gauge mode (no deco information). And I couldn't justify the cost of an X1 to use like that.
Well, wish on a star; sometimes it works. Through a convoluted set of circumstances, I now am the proud possessor of an X1 on extended loan (through November). I had lunch today with the person who provided it to me, and we sat and played with it over the lunch table. I'm going to go through the manual with it tonight, but I have to say that, after the first few moments, the menus are pretty intuitive, and the tap function to move through the menus is pretty easy to master. The display ROCKS! Even on "small" (and you have an option to make the display "Large", although you lose some labeling if you do that) the numbers are BIG, and I suspect I might actually be able to read them without my bifocals (yeah!). The display prioritizes the information I actually WANT, which is depth and dive time, and although it gives NDL time, it's off to the side a bit and slightly smaller, which is fine.
I'll get to dive the unit tomorrow, and I'm really excited to see how it works and what it looks like underwater. This weekend, I'll have a chance to dive it on some more aggressive profiles, and see how the VPM software it's loaded with compares with my depth averaging/minimum deco approach to my dives.
Anyway, I'll keep everybody posted on what I think of the gadget, but right now, I'm psyched!
There are some other cool things about it, like you can load it with two different kinds of decompression software, but that didn't really intrigue me, because I use my computer in gauge mode (no deco information). And I couldn't justify the cost of an X1 to use like that.
Well, wish on a star; sometimes it works. Through a convoluted set of circumstances, I now am the proud possessor of an X1 on extended loan (through November). I had lunch today with the person who provided it to me, and we sat and played with it over the lunch table. I'm going to go through the manual with it tonight, but I have to say that, after the first few moments, the menus are pretty intuitive, and the tap function to move through the menus is pretty easy to master. The display ROCKS! Even on "small" (and you have an option to make the display "Large", although you lose some labeling if you do that) the numbers are BIG, and I suspect I might actually be able to read them without my bifocals (yeah!). The display prioritizes the information I actually WANT, which is depth and dive time, and although it gives NDL time, it's off to the side a bit and slightly smaller, which is fine.
I'll get to dive the unit tomorrow, and I'm really excited to see how it works and what it looks like underwater. This weekend, I'll have a chance to dive it on some more aggressive profiles, and see how the VPM software it's loaded with compares with my depth averaging/minimum deco approach to my dives.
Anyway, I'll keep everybody posted on what I think of the gadget, but right now, I'm psyched!
