I have only been on one other live aboard so take this with a grain of salt.
Necton's biggest advantage from my perspective is its stability. On the previous liveaboard (cat boat type hull) I spent the entire first day ensuring I didn't get seasick. i.e. standing on deck, watching the horizon when not diving. Works, but always at the edge of queazy. On the Nekton, the first hour or so just to be sure then didn't worry about it the rest of the trip. We did have one day where the wind picked up and I would normally be very very careful re seasick but again not even a twinge. While I am new at liveaboards I have owned several boats so know exactly what will cause me to lose my lunch
Accomodation is good the cabins are smallish, but adequate. You get a bed, a few shelves to put things a sink and an enclosed head and shower. Four plugs in my room for recharging stuff. It is an all metal boat so condensation is a problem - some complained about dripping water, and sound travels. Someone slams a door you will hear it. The food is good, not excellent, not complaining, chef does a great job with what she has to work with. The diving is the focus on this boat.
The dive deck is excellent. I like the layout. This is a boat that was designed to dive from. You are at most four steps from entry if you want to do a giant stride off the side from about 4' up. If you want to go down the stairs at most you are about 10 feet from the top of the stairs, and can walk down in fins if you want. Camera tank on both sides of the stairs. Nitrox was at 32 all week, you can dive air - most did, but if you want to do 5 dives a day and max your bottom times on the large tanks Nitrox is the way to go. my buddy on air was in the yellow on his computer pretty regularly, I could have stayed down another 10 - 15 minutes on most dives - lots of air left, but no point pushing your buddy's NDL.
The top deck is a great place to get some sun - lots and lots of room. The lounge is large enough for everyone to spread out a bit. Widescreen TV with DVD, VCR and computer hookup. A couple of computers if you want to look at your photo's and don't have a laptop. It might be a bit crowded with a full boat however.
Two camera tables - one with compressed air to blow off the water and a separate dunk tank.
The crew was excellent, better than that even. Always willing to lend a hand, go diving, whatever to make your trip better. if they weren't having fun they faked it well
I suspect that you get a more "first class" kind of experience on Peter Hughes or Aggressor the two other boats that were always tied up next door. When I poked my nose into one of them (can remember which now) the crew was in a "uniform" that was sort of "fake navy". I prefer the more relaxed atmosphere of the Nekton. The diving is virtually identical - all three boats were within sight of each other for most if not all of the week. A good healthy swim would take you to the next boat in line.
I think(not sure) that both other boats do the Blue Hole - my preference was not to bother as it is a very deep dive and would limit diving for the rest of the day, but that is a personal preference. As I said, the stability was the most important criteria for me.
Recommend flying out Sunday or even Monday, many were disappointed that they couldn't do all the dives on the last day.
