Rebreather World - View Single Post

depth · 25th April 2008, 10:31

Hi Rebreather World

As a gadget freak, I had a hard time resisting the temptation of the Liquivision X1. Four weeks ago I sold my trusty VR3 and ordered an X1. The unit was delivered by post to my address the next day, thank you Rasmus Lauritsen at Nortechdiving for such fantastic service and fast delivery! See PICTURE #1 for details.

Reasons why I wanted to change my computer:

I do not like the fact that I am depended on sending my unit back to the manufacturer for upgrades.
The VR3 is bulky
I wanted divelog software and interface

I decided to post a small review of the computer. I am by far not an expert on decompression models and so far I have done eight dives with the computer with depths between 20-70m and with runtimes between 40-65 minutes…

Here is an overview of the review:

What’s in the box?
Setting up the X1
Diving the X1
The divelog software
Things that could be better
Summary

What’s in the box?
The small box contains the following: The X1 computer, wriststrap, dockingstation, USB cable, credit card size CD-ROM with USB driver and manual and a power supply with interchangeable socket connections. See PICTURE #2 for more details.

Setting up the X1
From unpacking the box until the computer was ready to use took about 30 minutes. I decided to go with the v-planner software because this was what I was most familiar with. I simply went to the v-planner live webpage, registered the X1, and entered my personal details and my credit card number. The software uploaded to the computer within a few minutes and I was good to go. Liquivision recommends that the computer is charged fully the first time to make sure full battery capacity is achieved.

For a few minutes I had problems uploading the txt key file to the X1 because my Gmail acted strange and would not show me the attached txt file. This was resolved by pressing a button on the firmware uploader program which then automatically downloaded the file from the v-planner live webpage.
I usually, like all men, never open the manual for a gadget. In this case I must admit that I had quickly looked through it to get an impression of what the X1 was capable of.

I learned to navigate around in the menus within one or two minutes. After five minutes I had set up my Diluent and bailout gasses and was simulating dives. The navigation is very intuitive and straight forward and the “button less” tap function was spot on.

Diving the X1
From the very first dive I was amazed with the screen, bright, easy to read and with all the information that I need. I have always had the screen in medium brightness. I was surprised that my dive time also showed seconds, a nice feature. To enter the “in water menus” I simply tap the X1 three times on the top. From here I can change setpoint, last stop depth, see current deco schedule and make a fast bailout to OC and more…
Currently I am using DUI neoprene dry gloves and I can easily work the tap functions on the X1

The X1 also has a build in buzzer, I think this is I nice to have feature, but unfortunally I cannot hear it underwater with my hood on.

My old VR3 always ran a conservative factor 10, the X1 I run at +3. It took some getting used to leaving my VR3 buddies on the deep stops ascending to shallower waters. It has never been a competition for me, but the X1 usually got me in the boat a little faster than my VR3 buddies. On one dive I stayed with my buddy on his two deep stops, this resulted in me getting out of the water last.

After the first dive I threw out the supplied strap and mounted the X1 to my high tech strap solution which works flawlessly. See PICTURE #3 for details.

The divelog software
The data in the X1 is easy to download to the computer and the pc software is Vista compatible. The detailed log shows all necessary information and different graphs can be calculated if needed. See PICTURE #4 for details.

Things that could be better
The buzzer is impossible to hear with a hood on, why on earth did liquivision not test this before choosing buzzer type.
The wrist strap is useless
There are still a few flaws in the X1 user interface
I cannot make a diveplan on the X1 like I did on my VR3 with run times and deco stops.

Summery
Apart from the buzzer and the strap problems, the rest can be solved through changing the software which I hope they will do eventually.

I love the X1, it fits my diving purposes perfectly and I am very comfortable using it in the water. The tap function is great, especially with cold hands and when using drygloves. The screen is amazingly bright and easy to see. My buddies also liked the fact that they could check my computer from 2-3m away and see what kind of trouble I was in

Worth every penny… See picture #5 for why I keep using so much money on dive equipment! The picture is from the wreck "Gudrun", in Flekkefjord Norway. The picture is taken by my frien Peter Særmark-Thomsen on our Norway trip April 17-20, 2008. Trip report in the making...

Safe diving

/Christian