HOOK2 5 - 5-inch Fish Finder with SplitShot Transducer and US Inland Lake Maps Installed

I purchased this unit mainly for ice fishing this winter but got it early for fall fishing too. I have had it out in the boat once so far and my favorite feature was the autotuning sonar. I did not have to change any settings to get good sonar readings right out of the box. The main screen is really easy to navigate with the arrow keys, the easier the better is what I always say. I am really excited to try this unit ice fishing this year. I have been using the flasher style units for quite some time and decided to make the switch this year. There is a flasher mode but I think with the autotuning sonar the regular sonar screen should work great. Also, having the GPS functionality will be great for navigating out to my favorite hard water spots with the 4-wheeler. Just a disclaimer, the transducer that comes with the unit is not for ice fishing, I have found part number 000-14089-001 for the correct transducer from Lowrance's website.

Easy install and worked well two times. Now nothing but problems, powers up then dies, if it doesn’t die won’t Recognize transducer checked wiring and batteries no problem. Friend has same unit on his kayak so we switch heads and he had same problem. So I’m going to return and hope it’s a lemon. Bought it February 26th and started having problems on April 20th used only four times. On the plus side Lowrance customer service was fast but couldn’t figure it out on the phone. Can’t recommend it.

The screen will go dark if you push the wrong button, and then you can't figure out how to brighten the screen without the manual. I think that a bright screen should come back up by disconnecting the power. The screen refresh was also slower than I anticipated.

This is the best (and cheapest) fish finder with actual gps maps not a chart plotter map that has chirp and downscan imaging this is what you are looking for if you don’t want to break the bank I have been a humminbird fan for a very long time since they came out with the wide 3D eye and I will not look back now lowrance has set the bar so high I can only imagine what the premium models do the ease of use of this unit is simply amazing if you are debating on it this will not let you down

Love Lowrance’s entire product line and this is a great unit for a kayak fisherman or someone who doesn’t need all the bells and whistles that the $1000+ units offer. Very easy to use and setup. My only complaint is the mount base that comes with it seems a little flimsy and doesn’t rotate, but I got the unit with the intention of using a RAM mount anyway on my kayak. The ability to add additional mapping cards to this unit is also a plus.

Short version: Huge disappointment across the board.Long version:New to the category, read a bunch of reviews and tried this out in my Hobie Outback. Thought I'd give Lowrance a try because a) Hobie has endorsed them and b) they're all about water. Well, I learned the hard way that the product quality, software and support is very weak vs. Garmin.Since the embedded map didn't have my lake on it (a 14 mile lake in the NW!), I decided I'd paddle around the first few days, learrn how to use it and map a couple miles of the shoreline (using Genesis CMAP). Well, wasn't very successful.1. Pre-purchase - could not get anyone from Lowrance to tell me what was actually in the box and what was needed for successful installation and use, what mounting hardware was compatible, etc...so, I ended up sitting it on the floor of my kayak after ordering the wrong mount. If you are considering, do some work to figure out how you are going to wire your battery in (no connectors supplied), how you are going to mount the unit, how you are going to mount your battery and if you want a cover for the unit.2. Problems out of the box with the Sonar - depth readings were routinely out of conflict with the image and would often "---". Read the entire manual (not included, digital only), looked all over their website and scanned (and posted to) forums. No help from anyone, not a common pattern. Tried every switch and option. Tried moving slower and faster. Paddling and peddling. Sometimes it worked as I thought it should, sometimes it just freaked out. Sometimes it worked after rebooting it. Images attached were from my first session. I've got dozens more showing the same problem.3. Emailed customer support (which doesn't allow attachments). No response. Called customer support. Despite explaining what unit I had and what problem I was seeing, proceeded to tell me that I needed to enable features that don't exist on the unit! They proceeded to grasp at a few straws, told me the only way they could help me was if I was on the water in the boat. I explained that I tried everything and clearly I was more familiar with the product than the agent on the phone. I asked for him to explain what he wanted me to do in water, because I had mapped over 100 acres, read the book and pressed every button I could find in the UI. After not being able to answer that he said, "you should return the unit, lets start the RMA process"...4. The unit itself is pretty cheap and I wouldn't recommend it for a kayak or boat that you use frequently, especially if you plan on removing it every time you use it. The plugs (I was told are waterproof?) have no caps for them to store and just dangle freely, are not very "quick release" and require firm seating. I've since looked at units with terrific quick release and integrated connectors on backplates which would be better for my use. The "wings" on the back for mounting really add unecessary size and limit the flexibility for mounting and storage. Why they didn't have these bolted into a standard bracket pattern, I don't know. The memory card slot requires needle nose pliars to remove the card every time and felt really cheap. No usb connectivity to access memory from computer, no way to power the unit away from the boat (absent a 12V power supply wired to a proprietary plug). Simply not up to snuff with the basic designs of modern consumer electronic devices.5. The software (and documentation) is lackluster. Being familiar with GPS units for cycling, it's surprising that this thing can't keep up with capabilities and ease of use of 2" devices that weigh a few ounces. Waypoints and screenshots cannot be set to store on the memory card, so you need to copy them over each time though a crappy file manager. The UI is pretty scattered with different types of menus and behaviors throughout. No software tools to convert their proprietary formats to standard formats (thanks gpsbabel!). One good example is that the geniuses decided to overload the power button to cycle through brightness settings. Not knowing this, I managed to set it to night mode while trying to take a screenshot (also uses the power button). I couldn't see the display any longer and didn't realize that I wasn't capturing for my 2 hour paddle (why isn't capture the default and if you don't choose to save it they flush it, I don't know. Requiring you to turn this on with 64gb of storage on the card, I also don't understand.Overall, a really disappointing product experience for something that is supposed to be "magic" and let you see the lake floor, fish and objects. It feels like the engineers designed the parts they were interested in and dropped them off for someone to staple them together rather than making it a cohesive product.I'm a resourceful guy. I was ready to disassemble the thing and build a mounting bracket for it and write some code to automate some of the regular tasks I planned to use it for on the Mac. But, the unit just didn't work reliably and the company offered very thin resources to troubleshoot and customer support was a major disappointment. I really did try to give it a try.About 30 hours of use, 10 hours of research, troubleshooting and hold music.See ya, Lowrance. Back to Garmin.

The HOOK2 5 is awesome. I'm an avid fisherman that was looking for something that would offer my down scan and 2d sonar with a split screen option. I also wanted it to be compact for my application. This offers what I need. It has super clear pictures of all the screens. Also it has auto tune. Just plug in and go! Great job Lowrance. You did good with this small yet powerful package.

Fishfinder works ok but to many drawbacks for me. If you want a unit that you just turn on then this might be for you. Very clear screen. I was disapointed that there was no sensitivity adjustment to reduce the screen clutter. Depth and temp reading are too small to easily see and can only be made smaller. Unit is also slow to boot up. on a plus side the transducer is very easy to mount on your trolling motor with built in slots for the hose clamps.Craig S.