diff --git a/echopype/utils/coding.py b/echopype/utils/coding.py
index 1c8a88ef5..04167ee31 100644
--- a/echopype/utils/coding.py
+++ b/echopype/utils/coding.py
@@ -15,7 +15,7 @@
 }
 
 COMPRESSION_SETTINGS = {
-    "netcdf4": {"zlib": True, "complevel": 4},
+    "netcdf4": {"zlib": False, "complevel": 4},
     # zarr compressors were chosen based on xarray results
     "zarr": {
         "float": {"compressor": zarr.Blosc(cname="zstd", clevel=3, shuffle=2)},
diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
index 6d0150fb2..714e544ec 100644
--- a/requirements.txt
+++ b/requirements.txt
@@ -1,14 +1,12 @@
 dask[array,distributed]
 jinja2
-# https://github.com/Unidata/netcdf4-python/issues/1175#issuecomment-1173142506
-netCDF4<1.6
+netCDF4>=1.6
 numpy
 pynmea2
 pytz
 scipy
 xarray
-# https://github.com/pydata/xarray/pull/7650
-pandas<2
+pandas
 zarr
 fsspec
 s3fs