Scuba Diving Computer -  Basic information to get you started in buying your dive computer

If you are thinking of buying a scuba diving computer and want to find one that suits your needs, it is important for you to understand some basic dive computer fundamentals. This article is designed to help you make an educated decision when buying your scuba dive computer.

Whenever you scuba dive, nitrogen will dissolve into your body’s tissue due to increased pressure. The deeper you dive the faster the nitrogen will dissolve in your body. If you do not keep this amount of nitrogen to acceptable levels you will increase the risk of getting decompression sickness.

The scuba computer is one of the most important pieces of scuba gear which will help you monitor your dive time and depth. With the help of Dive computers you will get far more out of your diving experience.

You can constantly monitor your depth, ascent rate and bottom times and a dive computer will automatically recalculate your decompression status, which permits longer dive times while avoiding the risks of no-decompression time. It is an especially important tool for when you will be doing multiple dives on a single day.

Dive computers come in all shapes and sizes. Some are wrist-mounted just like you wear a scuba watch whilst others fit into your instrument console. Certain higher end dive computers also have additional features which enable you to check how much air you have left in your cylinder whilst some models will also have an incorporated digital compass.

If you however use a scuba computer for your dives, it is still important for you to still use tables such as the recreational dive planner. Always have backups in case something goes wrong. It is important to note that a scuba diving computer can fail. They can suffer from battery failure or even damage due to improper handling. Should your computer fail, and you have maintained a record of your dive profiles, you can still continue to dive by using your tables. 

When using your dive computer keep these following tips in mind

• Different brands of dive computers will have different time limits and identical models will also have slight variations. You and your buddy should follow your computer with more conservative times.

• Each diver in a buddy team should have his own scuba diving computer. You and your buddy should not attempt to share a single computer.
  
  Besides your dive profile will be considerately different to that of your buddy, you cannot share it during the day because a dive computer tracks changing theoretical gas levels for each individual diver during a dive, between dives and during a second dive. For this same reason you must not turn it off as it will lose the dive log of the previous dive. Should this happen you should not dive for at least 24 hours.

If you want to take scuba diving to a whole new level then owning your scuba diving computer can provide you with real-time information that you can access to give a safer diving experience.