Cheap Marine Electronics Thanks To Classical Technology Trends

Cheap marine electronics are easier than ever to come by today. And that’s because not only is the economy topsy-turvy, but also because marine electronics are sliding down the same price curve as the PC. And that means, whether you’re looking for a GPS unit, a fishfinder, a VHF radio or even the latest satellite phone, odds are you’ll find a less expensive one with more features and higher performance tomorrow.

It’s not like it used to be in marine electronics. In the past, a company with an innovative design could keep the price high. Not so today, almost every marine electronics manufacturer uses the same off-the-shelf components to design their marine electronic products with.

And those components are becoming less expensive, not more. Those components, also known as integrated circuits, follow a law known as Moore’s law. This law coined in the 1960s, states that every two years, the size of integrated circuits decreases by half. Put another way, as time moves on component costs drop, size decreases and performance increases.

For those who want the best marine electronics at the lowest price, Moore’s law is important. Knowing, for example, that the expensive thermal imager you’ve been eyeing will in two years have twice the performance, be half the size and cost 10 to 30 percent less could be a decisive purchasing consideration. In fact, it may be just enough to make you think about buying used. Not just on a once-in-a-while basis, but on an ongoing basis.

One of the best reasons for buying used is that, if you’re willing to live behind the technology curve by just a few years, your overall marine electronics costs will be less, and, if you do it right, your boat will, over the long term, run at a higher technology level.

However, determining whether or not the used marine electronics path is right for you, requires some cost analysis. For this undertaking, determine what your long-term annual marine electronics budget is. Once you have that decided, make a list of what you’ll need to buy. Then compare the used costs versus the cost of buying new.

What you will find out, once you factor Moore’s law in, is that buying used equipment frequently will result in more modern marine electronics on your boat than buying new items once in a great while.

The decision to buy second hand, or even refurbished, should however not be taken lightly. Always find out about the used product and how it compares with the newer marine electronic devices. A good starting place is the installation and operations manuals that are often posted online at the manufacturer’s web site.

Knowing how to operate marine electronics devices can also really help in making a used buying decision. And that’s because you can test the functionality first hand before you make a purchase. That is, of course, if the product is not bought sight unseen.

When you buy a product sight unseen, especially an electronics device, it’s a good idea to get at least a 30-day warranty. That’s not because the product might stop working in less than 30 days, but because that’s about the amount of time you need to find out if all the features work.

Overall though, marine electronics product reliability is generally good, if not better than your typical PC. And one of the reasons is that most marine electronic devices have solid state memory as opposed to the rotating memory that most PCs rely on. The advantage of not having rotating memory is that there is also no rotating motor, which means there are no moving parts to wear out.