RayControl & RayRemote, the future is here?

Ben Ellison

Ben Ellison

Panbo editor, publisher & chief bottlewasher from 4/2005 until 8/2018, and now pleased to have Ben Stein as a very able publisher, webmaster, and editing colleague. Please don't regard him as an "expert"; he's getting quite old and thinks that "fadiddling fumble-putz" is a more accurate description.

7 Responses

  1. Bill Bishop says:

    It was a matter of time, and good job Ray. Now it’s time to enable the WEP security on your MFD (it’s there). The next step is to be able to log in from home to look at your onboard cameras, upload new charts and routes, and see where you are when the system e-mails you your anchor has dragged. Now if the Ipad was daylight viewable….think about it Apple and others.

  2. Patrick says:

    Aaron – interesting observation, and one I completely agree with. I was missing Navico’s “GoFree” and wondering why it’s taking so long, when I realized that Navico has released all the important stuff first – several iterations of broadband radar, two iterations of structure scan – all innovations on prosumer-level MFDs… and rock-solid auto pilot integration.
    It looks like Raymarine did a good job, jut seems like the wrong order…

  3. Patterson Cartwright says:

    Wow wee this is really neat stuff – Are you able to control all the functions that are available on the Raymarines MFD’s or is there only a limited set ?

  4. Ben Ellison Ben Ellison says:

    Patterson, I believe the Remote and Control apps can control everything except autopilot, which seems like a reasonable exclusion for a phone or pad.
    Aaron & Patrick, I think it’s nearly impossible to introduce a new MFD series without bugs, especially one with a largely new code base like the e- and c-Series. What I’m looking for these days is how quickly a company fixes bugs and makes improvements, and gets the updates out to the field. Garmin has set a very high bar in this area, but it seems to me that Raymarine was darn slow with fixes and updates for gear like the ST70 and C/E Wide Series. I’m hoping that’s changed and the 3.15 update is a good sign.
    In fact, the top screenshot in this entry purposely shows some 3D chart problems that hopefully are moving up Ray’s fix list. 3D charting may not be high priority — a lot of boaters don’t care about it — but it really ought to put the boat toward the bottom of the screen…so you see the most chart detail right around you, not where you’ve been. I also know from other MFDs like Simrad’s that Navionics chart detail can be filtered so that it doesn’t jumble up on the horizon like that.
    At any rate, I think Raymarine was quite “resource limited” for a while but FLIR has not only stabilized it financially but apparently taught it some of the process discipline learned over its long history of acquisition and development. I have high hopes and will happily publish a screenshot of Raymaine 3D when it gets better 😉
    I’m not going to fault Raymarine for developing these apps, though. This stuff is not just “gee whiz” anymore and the interest in it among the general boating population is absolutely HUGE.

  5. Karl says:

    Bill Bishop: Is the WiFi encryption really WEP?
    I thought WPA2 had entirely replaced that years ago.
    That said, I’m not really sure what the security implications are on a boat with an advanced MFD…will there be vessel hackers trying to steal your fishing waypoints, for example?

  6. Ben Ellison Ben Ellison says:

    WiFi security choices on the Raymarine MFDs are “None, WPA only, WPA 2 only (default), or WPA/WPA 2” with Ray strongly recommending WPA2. The c- and e-Series manual dated 4/23 is here: http://goo.gl/voBmO
    What I don’t see, and hope can be added, is a way to make one of these MFDs part of a boat’s WiFi network rather than just standalone. Furuno included that choice on the NavNet TZ (and it’s also on Vesper’s coming Vision AIS and data hub product). I think that Furuno apps can also display info independent of what’s on the TZ screen.

  7. CC says:

    So unless I’m missing something, if your mobile device is on the MFD’s wifi, it will have no cellular Internet access, correct?
    Great info, as always. Thanks!

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