Finally got my boat on here!

[cbrooks07]

You can still use the hand timer in lieu of magnets on either version of PP. But magnets or some method of timing trigger are still required for SG. If you get SG, you will need a minimum of two magnets (one for one side of each set of gates). The ball-to-ball times after that are handled virtually.

Thx. So aside from avoiding inputting crew weight etc. is there much benefit to SG?

Opinioins vary as to the quality of pull between PP DP and SG. With the latest update, a few of the bugs from last year's SG are no more. Also, if you don't have a paddle wheel, you no longer need it for SG. There are other settings other than crew weight. Skier weight is creeping back in in the form of about 4--6 weight ranges as of the most recent update. Our crew is all in the "Normal" range, so we never mess with that. Kx +/- is still there as well. I played with it a bit last year, but with my lesser skiing abilities, I can't say that I noticed much difference. For the most part, we don't adjust more than the crew weight. With long setups, skier weight is not critical, but if you have someone outside the "normal" range per the system, it's just a push of a button or two.

There are also some fine tuning settings for the gates, 1, and 3 balls. I'm using some settings given to me by JD. These are designed to give you better ball to ball times IIRC and to avoid the system speeding up at the 3 ball to get that perfect total course time.

For us, SG has been an improvement, if only because the system is a bit smarter by virtue of the GPS input. When we are on open water, there's no more wondering about the speedo settings (when we don't have a course to calibrate it).

Higher end skiers have more refined pallets than I do for sure and notice nuances in the system that I simply am not bothered by. That's not to say that these aren't things worth fixing (or which make the upgrade not advantageous to better skiers than I). I believe that Mark is probably skiing and driving at a much higher level than me and mine are. That said, from the driver's seat, I know what he's talking about with the hotter second segment in SG. Hopefully, my fine tuning will take care of that since I do have the opportunity to pull skiers who are working their way up the line from time to time.

In short, we've liked the upgrade to SG for what we do. YMMV. But even if you don't like it, it still comes with Digital Pro, so the only thing you have to lose is $400, which is nothing to sneeze at obviously.