Why the dislike of air integrated computers?

[guyharrisonphoto]

I have 50 dives on mine and no indication of low transmitter battery.

The transmitter will work until the battery is too low to supply power. Read your manual.

I don't know how much time it gives you between warning and loss of power. Read your manual.

My comments have not addressed AI for tech diving only for rec. Tech divers can address tech concerns, but I assume that all tech divers would carry a redundant spg--heck, even I do that.

 

[dmaziuk]

I searched the thread for "batter" and found some interesting replies but none that answered the following two questions: The battery power in your transmitter gets low. (1) Will it continue to transmit pressure? If so, (2) how much time do you have before it stops transmitting? The implications for diving in OH environments are clear.

The answer depends on the battery, drain, and exactly when the low battery alarm triggers. That's something the computer vendor should know. The problem of course is they don't know exactly how the battery you got in there is going to discharge: if it's a piece of people's republic junk that's been sitting in a warehouse for 20 years, all bets are off. So I wouldn't be surprised if the vendor's legal dept. won't let them put the figures they know into the fine manual.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

SAC is an outdated term. Nobody calls it air anymore, the new term is gas.
Just ask them.

 

[tursiops]

SAC is an outdated term. Nobody calls it air anymore, the new term is gas.
Just ask them.

Isn't this like the old Yogi Berra line about the restaurant that is so crowded nobody goes there anymore?

 

[Kharon]

Re. transmitter battery life. The transmitter will keep searching for a computer to pair with as long as it senses pressure. One way to kill a transmitter battery fast is to continually turn on the air long before you splash and forget to purge the reg down to zero after the dive.

 

[scubadada]

I searched the thread for "batter" and found some interesting replies but none that answered the following two questions:

The battery power in your transmitter gets low.
(1) Will it continue to transmit pressure? If so,
(2) how much time do you have before it stops transmitting?

The implications for diving in OH environments are clear.

I did 28 dives over the course of a week-long liveaboard trip with the low-battery indicator telling me to change the battery in the transmitter.

Changing the battery on a transmitter(oceanic) is cheap and easy. I have a spare battery in the bag and usually change it anyway before a trip.

I've been diving an Oceanic VT3 for 5 years/nearly 600 dives/nearly 700 hours. I change the computer and transmitter battery soon after the computer low battery signal comes on. I've never seen the transmitter low battery signal. I just put in my 3rd set of batteries in March. The manual suggests the computer and transmitter batteries last about the same time. My computer and transmitter have been extremely reliable. I believe my transmitter temporarily quits sending if there has been no change in pressure for some amount of time, to save energy.

 

[RJP]

Re. transmitter battery life. The transmitter will keep searching for a computer to pair with as long as it senses pressure. One way to kill a transmitter battery fast is to continually turn on the air long before you splash and forget to purge the reg down to zero after the dive.

Not so sure that's true... at least not with Suunto, which also stops transmitting after a short time of no change in pressure.

 

[eelnoraa]

in oceanic implementation, transmitter will be active as long as pressure is on. It is a broadcast transmission with signal coded to the serial number. The computer is set to receive signal for specific transmitter(s) according to serial number. No chance of picking up non intended transmitters. I found this implementation is superior than suunto's

as for battery life, they last a long time. For the 4 years I own it, i was on the same battery. About 200 dives. I changed wrist unit battery 3 times in the same period. I also think the battery compartment implementation in oceanic is batter than suunto's.

for wrist unit tho, I found oceanic's choice of what info to display is not as good suunto's.

 

[randytay]

It seems a recurring theme that air integrated is readily dismissed by advanced and tech divers and I was wondering why. I could see it being another failure point or "crutch," but with a backup SPG the benefits outweigh the risk of failure in my mind.

Just wondering what some of the concerns with AI are.


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If you use the backup SPG as your main SPG, you don't need the AI and save like what, 700 bucks? That can get you something else and the benefits will far outweigh the benefits of AI.

 

[scubadada]

If you use the backup SPG as your main SPG, you don't need the AI and save like what, 700 bucks? That can get you something else and the benefits will far outweigh the benefits of AI.

Not necessarily, Shearwater Petrel 2: $749, Oceanic VT 4.1 complete with transmitter and download cable: $700