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If you had to start again with a completely blank boat how would you kit it out?

I am planning on buying a boat soon and it would be good to see what the state of the art laptop based equipment entails.

Budget considerations should be moderate but should include all systems, AIS transmitter, weather system, SSB communication, instrumentation, etc. Go for it!

It depends on where you will be cruising. Crossing the Atlantic is one thing, cruising the ICW is something else.

For cruising the ICW, I certainly would not waste money on a chartplotter. Instead I would go with an I-pad G3. and a Macbook pro with a sunlight viewable monitor and a USB GPS. An autopilot is essential, as is a good depthsounder. A second forward looking sonar would be useful too. Two vhf are on the list, but radar and AIS is not. A cell phone amplifier, and a wifi amplifier would be on my list too.

For software, MacENC, Mr. Tides, ActiveCaptain, and the latest nav software for the I-Pad.

The I-pad is not available yet, but I think it will revolutionize marine navigation when it gets here.

It's nice to dream!

Richard
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