A vibrant sonar competition unfolds this season between two top "flasher" sonar contenders, the vernerable and outstanding Vexilar FL-8 and the Vexilar FL-18, introduced last year; and the newly introduced MarCum Technologies LX-3, a re-engineered redesign of the previously popular Zercom Color Point. MarCum engineers designed the original Color Point technology. MarCum reacquired rights to this technology from Zercom in early 2002, retooling to create the LX-3. So the world will be a much more interesting place this season for anglers who like to argue the comparative performance characteristics of competing sonar units. This competition was mostly missing last winter as the Zercom Color Point was mostly absent from the marketplace.

The LX-3, like the Vexilar units, offers a three-color screen reading. The LX-3 reads in a spectrum of yellow-orange-red, with yellow the weakest reading and red the most intense. Vexilar units read in a spectrum of green-orange-red.

The competition between these units plays forth in a variety of basic performance differences and in differences in options available for each of the units. One difference is in screen readings, the LX-3 relying on a color update of the basic thin-line technology available in early Zercom units. This technology offers crisp, thin readings that some say do a better job of separating targets.

Vexilar FL-18		MarCum Technologies LX-3

Of course, Vexilars also deliver thin-line readings, but the best Vexilar performance is a factor of a slightly thicker reading in which the astute user learns to read "flicker" within the signal as well as highly variable color changes within the three-color spectrum. So, for example, a bright red bottom reading flickers slightly when a fish is belly to the bottom.

Last season's remarkable introduction, the Vexilar FL-18, offered bottom lock and Auto Zoom -- that is, a zoom up in size of the angler's view of what's happening in the bottom six feet of the water column. Breakthrough technology. The new Marcum LX-3 features "adjustable zoom," allowing the angler to zoom into a 5- or 10-foot window anywhere in the 20- and 40-foot scales, and a 10- or 20-foot window anywhere in the 160-foot scale.

And much more, including pricing, transducer options, transducer leveling options, carrying cases, and other accessories and techno options. It will be worth the price of admission at ice shows this season to hear the comparative sales pitches from those selling the competing units.